He first showed me his new business card, which he did himself. He was no graphic designer, so I whipped up a quick design in ten minutes for him. He has made and saved me a small fortune over the past decade and a bit, so it was ok I didn’t charge him. Besides, the “wow, you’re really good at this!” was payment enough.

The second conversation was about building websites. He had contracted with a firm that specializes in building sites for people like him in the investment industry and he wanted to know if he was paying too much. He had heard that most of this should be free, but the firm was offering space and content that was already vetted. With that one sentence, he had made an argument for using the firm. Even though we build and host websites, there was no way I was going to take on any of his liability.

And lastly, we had a phone conversation this morning about his corporation application (well, actually he had called for my charter and the conversation turned to him.) My advice was immediately, “have your attorney do it,” a conclusion he had already come to even though he had been told by some family members that he could easily do it himself.

I was being a bit selfish here, I must admit. I want him to focus on managing my portfolio, not trying to figure out the ins and outs of the Ohio Department of State and why they sent back his application for the third time because he didn’t complete this field or check that box.

Only a fool for a businessman does his own accounting, marketing and legal work. Hire good people to do what they know how to do. In the end, you’ll sleep better, have more free time to grow your business and stay out of tax court.

This blog post is part of a blog-off series with a group of bloggers from different professions and world views, each exploring a theme from his/her world view. This was about exploring the theme, If you can’t afford the tip, you can’t afford the meal. To explore how others handled the theme, check them out below. I will add links as they publish.

Apparently large, bright spot lights and air horns are illegal in most states. That is really what I want to shine and blast when I know someone is back there but I can’t see him. Instead, we dipped into our bag of skills and thought we might have a bit of fun with technology.

Who knows, maybe one day QR Codes will replace the “How’s My Driving” on the back of trucks. Shoot the left QR Code for “really crappy driving;” shoot the right one for “outstanding, good job!”

PS Shoot the QR Code in the photo.. I know you are dying to see where it leads….

Originally published at GerardMclean.com

“Ford?” she said. “You mean Toyota.”

“What? Whatever,” I said. “Ford, Toyota, it is a commercial for Facebook.”

Oh, snap.

This does not matter one little bit. Unless you are the brand manager at Toyota.

Makes you think about who really has the power over your brand, doesn’t it?

Originally published at GerardMclean.com

“Wow,” I thought, “this is so cool that lots of other people would like to read this.” So, I looked for the retweet button on the article, found it and clicked. The message included BNet, but not the company’s twitter handle. No problem, I clicked over to their website to include it.

Nothing.

If you are moderately successful, someone will eventually write about you. Even if you don’t buy into all the social media hype and don’t tweet regularly, twitter is a quick way “connect” you out to a larger audience that reads other media.

Originally published at GerardMclean.com

This past week, I was visiting with a friend in New York. There is a shop around the corner from his office. We stopped in on our way back from lunch to grab some coffee.

“I’ll have a small,” he told the guy behind the counter.

“Tall? Look, man, We ain’t Starbucks,” the server shot back.

Even if you overlook the server’s obvious hearing problem and surly attitude, you can’t ignore one of the biggest problems coffee shops have — how to order the size you want.

There used to be three sizes, small, medium and large. Then along came Starbucks who sought to change the coffee culture. Everyone in the “club” would be ordering coffee their way, short, tall, grande, venti.* It was fun; for a while. Now, it’s really a giant pain in the butt as other shops look to reproduce that magic cultship.

The next morning, I went to a Dean & Deluca’s for a coffee. They had three cups on the counter labeled small, medium and large.

“I’ll have a medium,” I ordered confidently knowing exactly what I was going to get. No sass-back, no attitude, no inferiority complex. Just coffee.

Here are the two basic problems all coffee shops have. Fix them tomorrow.

Coffee sizes labeled
It used to be cool for Starbucks to “own” their unique ordering language when they were hip. Now, they are the McDonald’s of coffee. Most people go to a Starbucks because they know what they are going to get. Almost no greater than than.

I can’t memorize your sizes. I don’t want to. Can you just put a display with the cups clearly labeled with how you want me to order? I’ll say “tall” if you prompt me to say the right thing. All I know when I belly up to the barista is that I don’t want the small one and I don’t need the 55 gal drum of coffee. What do you have in the middle? I’ll take that. Call it what you want.

Coffee-only line
I know you are supposed to suggest sell me when I order just coffee, but when I really, really, really only want coffee, selling me your daily baked good for only 1.99 just ticks me off. If you had a coffee-only line, it would move quickly and you would be setting some explicitly clear expectations for us both right from the start.

Set up a “coffee-only” line. You could even make it self-serve and we would not mind one little bit pushing our own button that says “tall” and swiping our own card.

The coffee shop did more damage to their brand in five little words than any twitterstorm or social media intern going wild could have done. They did it in real life, to real people who visited their shop every afternoon. And they exported their brand damage four states over and to several thousand readers, all sipping on their Sunday morning coffee, nodding in unison.

At least we know this ain’t Starbucks.

—-
*I had to Google for the sizes. Really.

Originally published at GerardMclean.com

I’ve always wanted to have a publishing house that believed type is art. In the modern day world of publishing where Kindle looks like it taking over the publishing world, I think there is room for a teeny, tiny publisher that sets type and prints with ink on paper.

I could be wrong. We’ll see.

Stay tuned as we crank up a press somewhere.

I was talking with an associate about an animated instructional video I had found that illustrated how to use a complicated product. The video boiled the product down into its basic functions and presented it clearly and concisely. He wanted an animated video for his product that was equally as complex.

His real question was:

“How do I find someone who knows what I need and want, won’t take me to the cleaners, won’t frustrate me by making me responsible for the tiny details of the project and will just handle it? How do I find someone I can trust?”

Be that person and you have a loyal client for life.

Originally published at GerardMclean.com

I think Marjorie is more right, but I’m going to offer an abbreviated case study of how my company, Rivershark, helped “promote” a client on a recent speech he gave at St. Joseph’s University to a group in the retail and food industry. Short story long, he walked his own talk and stood out.

A week before David Rich of ICC/Decision Services was to speak at the annual Food Industry Summit, his company put out a press release saying he was going to be there and what he was going to talk about. It was short, direct and to the point. There were no platitudes, no grand statements.. just a standard 5W, AP-styled release. We posted it to his company’s web site, sent it over to PR Newswire and published it to trade associations like NARMS of which he is a member. (BTW, few people do this last step. Few trade associations do member news. All of them should.)

We then helped distribute through the various social media outposts like Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook.

We wrote a series of blog posts on social media and retail, one of them written by David. He had been writing on the use of social media in mystery shopping, customer intercepts and experience for a couple years so this wasn’t a “shell game” we were running. In fact, ICC/Decision Services is very much walking their talk and has been for a while. You can check out their blog posts, Google David for other connections about the use of social media in retail, find out he is the past president of the MSPA and all that. He has the credentials.

And I’m sure a lot of people attending the conference did just that. Some of them did it in real time.

The day before David went on, we wrote a blog post that gave a preview of his talk, outlining his main points.

The day after his talk, he wrote a summary blog post. All of this was supported by tweeting out, posting to LinkedIn discussion groups, etc.

Does this seem like a lot of work for a 15-minute speech to a small group of folks in the food industry? Sure does, but in the 365/24/7 business world, this is probably the new minimum. Being the leader in something means you are willing and able to do just a little bit more than the pack. The reward is you stand out.

Is this what Marjorie Clayman meant when she said “make sure you send out a press release?” Probably not entirely. Hopefully we are able to take that advice and move out into the social media space with a little more deft than thumping our chest and say, “Look at me, look at me.”

Hopefully all this helps our potential clients find us and make quick decisions about how legit we are. That we walk our own talk.

*I didn’t tell you EVERYTHING my company did for David and ICC/Decision Services nor everything David did for himself. That’s the part that cost money. :-)

Originally published at GerardMclean.com

Social media has grown up. It’s what everyone who provides social media to business wanted. Yet the overwhelming opinion within the twitter elite leans toward things like “it’s just a tweet” and “you should turn this into a customer engagement moment” and “firing the employee was cruel.”

They are wrong. Two years ago, it would not have mattered. Today, the employee screwed up very, very badly.

Twitter can either be a serious business tool for companies to engage in social media or it is just a fun thing that nobody cares about. As a social media professional, you can’t say it is both in every situation. For a company like Chrysler, dropping an f-bomb or disparaging the City of Detroit on their twitter account is a terminable offense. Your brother-in-law who is driving in from Dayton, Ohio to visit you in Detroit saying the same thing on his twitter account is an opportunity for Chrysler to engage (unless he works for or supplies goods or services to Chrysler.)

AdAge is reporting that Chrysler is not renewing its contract with New Media Strategies. And rightly so. According to its twitter profile, New Media Strategies “established the world’s first social media marketing firm in 1999.” That has given them twelve years to establish account controls to ensure this never, ever, ever happens.

In 2011, mixing up client and personal twitter accounts is akin to a bank depositing funds in the wrong account. It just should never, ever, ever happen.

If you are pining for the good ol’ days of twitter where your audience was just fellow geeks and nerds, it is time for you to move on or grow up.

From the same episode of Mad Men* I borrowed the title, you can’t go out there, but I can. Because I am wearing a suit and tie. And you are still donning sandals, bell-bottoms, wrinkled shirts and peasant skirts. And you curse.

*Mad Men, Season One, Episode 8 The Hobo Code

Originally published at GerardMclean.com

I was working on a social media piece with a client this week. As I was going through all the pieces and parts that we had been accumulating, curating and massaging over the past three years, that voice went off in my head; “stay on target… stay on target.” What prompted this was a tendency of the group to veer off into the newest, shiniest new social media thing where everyone in the room would either get quickly overwhelmed with the out-of-control entropy that resulted in thinking about how to manage all of this or shut down and want to do none of it.

My job was to keep everybody focused on the target, to keep things simple, manageable, understandable and effective.

Stay on target.

Even as I was guiding the fighter into the narrow channel, trying to hit that sweet spot, a distraction popped into my email inbox promising even greater rewards if I just took my eyes of MY target and looked at theirs. But I’ve been flying these skies enough to know that their promise of success was not going to be MY success; it will be theirs.

Stay on target.

Remember why you are doing all this social media in the first place and learn to ignore all the other distractions flying around in your head. Without focus — and faith in yourself and your mission — you’ll never hit your target.

Originally published at GerardMclean.com