The marathon at the Olympics in Athens this month is fearsome, so grueling that even an elite athlete is liable to feel at least a moment of trepidation. The 26-mile, 385-yard course includes, among other body-bashing stretches, a 13-mile hill so steep it has been described as the equivalent of running up a five-story building every mile.
Your everyday, normal sort of runner, like me, will be breathless just watching. But many of the Olympic runners will make it look easy.
Let me get right to the point. The single most powerful small business marketing tool on the planet is a marketing plan. Now before you roll your eyes and run for the hills let me clear a few things up.
When I talk about a marketing plan I am not referring to those academic exercises found in college marketing books, or the templated mumbo jumbo found in business planning software. I will not be asking you to determine your share of the market today. Give me a break, share of the market, most small business owners just need to figure out to get ten more customers.
A marketing plan is a simple (in many cases one page) document that specifically answers who you are, what you do, who needs it, how you plan to grab them by the throat, when you plan to do it and how you plan to pay for it…in a way that everyone in your organization, network, and client base can clearly understand.
Now that was a mouthful so let me back up a moment. Small business owners are doers, not planners. While doing is better than, say, mildewing, without direction, it leads to “marketing idea of the week” syndrome and stunts any chance a small business has for real growth.
Take one day, follow these 7 simple steps to creating the most powerful small business marketing tool on the planet, and your life will become a much simpler affair. Flowers will grow where weeds had previously resided, your children will say thank you at the top of their lungs, and your favorite baseball team will finally make that run for the pennant.
Well, maybe none of that will happen but you won’t be as irritated when it doesn’t.
The fine art of business networking is now being mirrored on the Internet.
Web sites are springing up to help managers meet the right contacts. And in many cases colleagues can help make the connection.
“Chatting people up at networking events is of limited value, but obtaining introductions is the key to getting the ear of the people they want to reach,” Konstantin Guericke, co-founder of LinkedIn.com, told CNN.
“People join because they believe the most valuable new business contacts come through referrals from people they already know and trust.”
LinkedIn and others like Ryze.com and Itsnotwhatyouknow.com are the business equivalents of the popular Web site Friendster.com.
Most are free to join, profiles have no photos and your list of contacts is called your “tribe.”
LinkedIn, active in 80 countries with 48,000 regular users, does not allow people to cold-call each other. Instead mutual contacts can vet whether they want to refer you.
If there’s one thing that Chris McMurry wants you to know about his custom-publishing and marketing firm, McMurry Publishing, it’s this: His company has values.
Eight values, to be precise. A full list is available in McMurry’s promotional literature. Do the right thing. Help one another. On the firm’s homepage, the values flash across photos of smiling staffers. Deliver raving service. Produce quality always. They also can be found on the “about us” pages. Exceed expectations. Embrace change. In fact, once the company finishes renovating its Phoenix headquarters later this year, the eight values will be beamed in yellow light by miniature projectors onto the floor of the foyer, where clients are received.
As you’ve probably noticed, values are in vogue these days, with so-called moral values credited by many pollsters as having played a key role in the reelection of President Bush. Of course, moral values didn’t first appear on the scene on Election Day, nor are they just about politics. Consumers have long said that they buy products and services with values in mind — whether those values are religious, spiritual, environmental, or political.
More than a quarter of U.S. consumers, for example, say they’d like to see the companies that they do business with get more involved in everything from protecting the environment to fighting homelessness to improving education, according to Roper Reports, a quarterly survey of 2,000 adults. (Only 15% volunteer or donate money for such causes themselves, Roper also found.) Depending on how you look at it, the success of everything from Toyota’s environmentally friendly hybrid car, the Prius, to movies like The Passion of the Christ, or books like The Purpose-Driven Life, can be attributed to the values trend.
None of this has escaped the notice of corporate America, seeking to repair its image after several seasons of scandal. That’s particularly true in the financial sector, where companies like UBS and SmithBarney, among others, are hawking a hearty stew of moral values, with their trustworthiness, character, and integrity the principle ingredients. “Consumers are fed up with businesses that seem to lack values like honesty, and are frustrated by trying to figure out who to believe,” says Cary Silvers, vice president of consumer trends at NOP World, the New York City market research firm that administers Roper Reports.
If you’re in business and you’ve got morals, then it would seem there’s been no better time to flaunt them. But you’ve got to wonder: In our current polarized times, is there a downside to all of this talk about morals and values, whatever they happen to be? Will playing the morality card drive your business? Or does it run the risk of driving it away?
For Mcmurry, the answer is easy. The way he sees it, broadcasting his company’s values far and wide increases the comfort level of clients — and the firm’s $22 million in revenue in 2004 is enough to convince him that he’s on the right track. “Clients are more inclined to do business with people they’re comfortable with,” he says.
In fact, social psychologists have found that persuasion — which, of course, is what marketing is all about — depends to a large extent on creating the impression that you’re substantially similar to your potential customer, because people are more likely to pay attention to those they can relate to. And creating a sense of shared values is a particularly powerful way of communicating those similarities. Jocelyn D. Campbell, president of T3 Design Associates, a 12-employee architecture, engineering, and construction firm in Atlanta, knows that well. Campbell’s company typically focuses on projects in the aviation, infrastructure, and education arenas. But she recently found herself meeting with an auto dealer looking to build a new 50,000-square-foot dealership. During her presentation, Campbell mentioned that her company had recently participated in a church construction project. She got lucky: The dealer, it turned out, was a member of that church. As she does in many circumstances, Campbell also related her own strong Christian beliefs. (The T3 in her company name stands for Trinity.) She got the deal. “He was a Christian business owner,” she says, “and my beliefs provided a level of comfort that our value systems were the same.”
Apple Computer Inc. on Tuesday introduced a stripped-down Macintosh computer and cheaper versions of its popular digital music player, iPod.
Apple chief executive Steve Jobs, unveiling the new products at the MacWorld exposition, said the Mini Mac computers, without monitor, mouse and keyboard, will go on sale Jan. 22. The 40-gigabyte Mac will cost $499, and the 80-gigabyte model would cost $599.
The company also plans to sell two versions of the iPod Shuffle, according to Jobs. The smallest version will have 512 megabytes of storage and cost $99. A one-gigabyte version, which holds 240 songs, will sell for $149.
Apple said on its Web site that the new “iPod shuffle” would be smaller and lighter than a pack of gum.
Jobs said that his company had sold 4.5 million units of its blockbuster iPod in the 2004 holiday quarter. Currently, the cheapest version of iPod is the iPod Mini, which costs $249 for 4 gigabytes and stores about 1,000 songs.
But the announcement failed to push Apple stock higher, as some said the news had already been priced into the stock, thanks to widespread rumors ahead of the show. Shares fell more than 6 percent on Tuesday.
“There was so much expectation built in for the stock … I think that the expectations were about as high as they could get for it,” Marc Pado, U.S. market strategist at Cantor Fitzgerald & Co., told Reuters. “I think it was a case of buy on the rumor and sell on the news.”
The iPod sales figure was also slightly below some Wall Street forecasts. Banc of America Securities had predicted iPod sales of 4.6 million units in a note Tuesday. Prudential had predicted 4.25 million units.
The new iPod falls into a category of music players that use “flash memory,” like that found in digital cameras and some portable disk drives, rather than hard drives like the other iPod models, according to Reuters.
“We’d like to go after the remaining mainstream flash market,” Jobs said at the MacWorld expo, noting that the flash memory-based digital player market is currently highly fragmented. “The products are all pretty much the same.”
He also claimed the iPod holds a 65 percent share of the entire market for portable digital music players, up from only 31 percent a year earlier.
Apple said a number of car companies like Mercedes-Benz USA, Volvo, Nissan and Ferrari were working to integrate the iPod line into their car stereo systems, according to Reuters.
Jobs’ announcements were awaited eagerly by the Mac faithful worldwide, though they offered no real surprises, unlike in previous years. The new iPod and the smaller Mac were telegraphed by the many online Mac rumor sites in recent weeks, some of which are being sued by Apple for those leaks.
First of all, let’s look at the root word which is used for “fasting.” The Greek word for fasting is nesteia — a compound of ne (a negative prefix) and esthio which means “to eat.” So the basic root meaning of the word simply means “not to eat.”
But what does this “not eating” food mean? Why did people in the Bible “not eat?” We find a clue in Leviticus 16:29. This verse says that fasting is synonymous with “afflicting one’s soul.” We gain some insight here about how the Hebrews viewed fasting. Fasting is more than just “afflicting one’s body”. It is “afflicting one’s soul.” In other words, fasting in the Hebrew mind is something my soul participates in. Fasting is denying my self. It is denying not only my own body, but also my own wants. It is a way of saying that food and my desires are secondary to something else. Fasting is “afflicting one’s soul” — an act of self-denial. But it is not only an act of self-denial and here is where the monks and hermits went wrong.
Biblical fasting is “not eating” with spiritual communication in mind. How do we know this? Because Biblical fasting always occurs together with prayer in the Bible – ALWAYS. You can pray without fasting, but you cannot fast (Biblically speaking) without praying. Biblical fasting is deliberately abstaining from food for a spiritual reason: communication and relationship with the Father.
If winning more than $2.5 million wasn’t enough, “Jeopardy!” whiz Ken Jennings will have a shot at winning an additional $2 million — but the competition will be tougher this time around.
Producers of the game show announced Tuesday a “Super Tournament,” which will pit Jennings in a final match against two survivors of a competition between nearly 150 past five-time winners.
Host Alex Trebek called the tournament the “quest for Ken.”
“Ever since Ken started his amazing run, people have been speculating on how some of the past ‘Jeopardy!’ players would do against him,” Trebek said in a statement.
Based on ability, durability, longevity, statistics and, most important, team success, Brett Favre, to me, is the best quarterback ever. That’s just one (young) man’s opinion.
The impossible happened Sunday. My opinion of Favre grew.
At 35 years old and in his 14th season, Favre has nothing left to prove. But he keeps doing things the right way. His Packers didn’t show up for Sunday’s supposed showdown with Philadelphia, while the Eagles proved in the 47-17 rout that they are, lest there were any remaining doubts, not only the class of the NFC but also in a different class than the rest of the conference.
Favre, though, showed something in the loss. As a matter of fact he exhibited a few things — class, professionalism and perspective.
Favre failed to throw a touchdown pass for the first time in 37 games, a streak dating to Oct. 20, 2002. He fell 11 games short of tying Johnny Unitas’ league record of 47 consecutive games with a touchdown pass. The Eagles’ defense did a fabulous job against Favre, limiting him to 14-of-29 passing and 131 yards and picking him off twice. For that, Philly should be commended. But it shouldn’t be credited for snapping the streak. Favre should. He deserves credit for that.
Harvest Bible Chapel (HBC) is pleased to announce that Dr. Joseph M. Stowell, III, will join the HBC staff as a Teaching Pastor beginning in March 2005.
Dr. Stowell presently serves as the seventh president of the Moody Bible Institute of Chicago (MBI). Early this year, he announced his resignation to Moody’s Board of Trustees, effective February 28, 2005. Prior to coming to MBI, Dr. Stowell served as a pastor for 17 years in Ohio, Indiana, and led the multi-phased ministry of Highland Park Baptist Church in Southfield, Michigan. He holds a B.A. from Cedarville University (Ohio), a Th. M. from Dallas Theological Seminary, and he was honored with a Doctor of Divinity degree from The Master’s College (California) in 1987.
Protecting myself from myself for Christ and for others.
Dr. James MacDonald writes: I was a pastor in seminary when the moral failures of the late ‘80’s hit the news and they scared me. In addition to the newsworthy blowouts, I was hearing a shocking number of similar tragedies from my own circle of pastor/friends. I remember one Sunday night in 1987 when I cried all the way to church. I was terrified as I asked over and over, “How does this happen? Could this happen to me? How can I protect myself and my growing little family from the devastation a moral failure would cause? How can I be sure my actions will remain pure when men better and stronger than me were falling like flies?”