It can be tricky, but it definitely is something to answer, if you want to feel like you’re following a path towards success.

A Few of My Business Models

For example, here are a few business models that I’m currently executing against to make business for myself:

• New Marketing Labs is a marketing consulting company. It follows the service model. Charge clients for services and deliver against the promises made in the contract. The basics of the model are to charge companies for service, to pay employees to execute the service, and make small profits off the margin.
• [chrisbrogan.com] is a media platform. It makes some money via affiliate ads like my support of Thesis (affiliate link), but more so, it’s a media hub that lets me point towards projects and ideas I think are interesting. It’s lead generation for my professional speaking. It’s lead generation for NML. So, the site isn’t the business model, exactly, but it’s part of other models.
• Professional speaker – I make money off speaking professionally to companies about marketing, online media, community, sales, lead generation, and topics like that. It’s a simple model, where you make money for intellectual property, but it’s a tricky model in that you have to be there to earn the money. It’s an “active income” model.
• Third Tribe Marketing is a media model as well. Build an active community, give it useful information, provide it lots of resources, and make money off the membership dues. This is a bit more passive (I’m on there daily for 1-2 hours a day), but it’s a little easier than flying all over the world speaking, so it’s a great business line to add to what else I’m doing.
• Books and other media. You don’t get rich selling books. But they’re great lead generators for other business.

So, those are just some of my own business models. In there, I didn’t mention events, which can be a good model for earning money. I didn’t talk about informational products, which can be lucrative. I didn’t talk about a lot of ways one can make money.

Find Models and Mentors

One of the best things you can do for yourself, should you want to improve your own business, is figure out models and/or find passive mentors. For instance, when I read Business Stripped Bare, by Sir Richard Branson, I felt like I’d found a kindred spirit in how he likes to organize his companies. I thought, “Wow, I’m not crazy.” It’s not like I spent any time across a table with Sir Richard. I simply read his book, took scores of notes, and then tried applying bits of his ideas to my own work, and found out what worked.

I do this with as many business books as I can get my hands on. I look for the bits I can apply. I also do that with blogs, and I do it with videos (you do watch TED, don’t you?).

Figuring out models is tons of fun, too. For instance, I had a great talk with John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing for some content I was building for Third Tribe, and John was talking about how he built out his training package, how he built a network of people to refer business into, and some of the other facets of his business. It’s all very replicable, all without ripping off John, and all something you could build towards growing out another niche.

I had a great talk the other night with Joe Sorge (I’ve talked about Joe’s business before), where I riffed some of my new business ideas off him, and he gave me his experiences back. It was immediately apparent that Joe was far more than a guy who sold hamburgers. The more we talked, the more I realized that he had a lot of experience in picking apart business models and finding inspiration to make them succeed.

Modeling Your Own Business

Ray Kroc used to quiz MBA students as to what business he was in. Everyone thought he was in the hamburger business. When I heard this, I thought, “A-ha. No. He’s in the franchising business.” But no, I was wrong, too. Ray was in the real estate business. McDonalds owns more real estate (more PRIME real estate, by the way) than even the Catholic Church. When you look at a business, the model isn’t always immediately apparent.

What’s your business’s model? How are you looking to make money? What is the longer-term vision behind your company? Have you modeled it?

Here’s a hint, by the way: in doing this, in taking out a piece of paper and writing down what you think your business is, if you can’t describe it in just a few words, it might not be a very successful model. Further, if you don’t work on ways to emulate some of the more successful models that are out there, you might be missing the opportunity to learn and piggy-back off the success of other pioneers.

Ted Turner turned billboard profits into a media company by having the vision to see that he wasn’t in the billboard business. What business are you in? How wide can you cast your vision, while still keeping the model simple?

The Internet has given us simple means to create businesses out of nothing. But to sustain them, we need solid models. What’s yours?

I thought I’d write about how I use it.

For Consulting

Not everyone can pay my day rate. Not everyone is the ideal client for New Marketing Labs (my company). But some folks might want to ask me a simple question or two about their business, and by signing up at Third Tribe Marketing, you pay a whopping $47 for not only my advice and insight, but whatever else you get from the other participants in the forums (who often have astounding feedback and ideas).

So, if you’ve got some questions for me that aren’t a full blown marketing project for New Marketing Labs, then Third Tribe might be the place.

For Resources

I just copy/pasted a whole bunch of informational resources from a few threads in the forums at Third Tribe Marketing for a project I plan to launch in about a month. It’s awesome for that. Oh, and the other day, I asked a question about graphics types to help with another idea I had. Tons of connections.

For Education

There are many types of internet marketers in there. We have franchise professionals, big corporate types, b2b, small shops, lots of solo businesses, and many people who are creating their own businesses based on what they’re reading. It’s a real blast listening to what they’re doing, following links to their projects, getting a chance to talk up what we can improve or not. That’s one thing I really like about Third Tribe is that the folks are really participating.

Is It For You?

I don’t really know. Nonprofits are in there. Big companies are in there. Little guys. It’s a big blend. People seem happy. We get the occasional person who leaves, saying it wasn’t what they wanted, but those were often people who weren’t really interested in marketing techniques, tips, and resources. Or maybe the ideas were good, but they couldn’t use them right away. Because you can cancel whenever, it’s not a big deal to leave after a month, if you’re not ready to execute. I mean, we’d love to have you around, but you can leave after you get a few bits of actionable advice.

I’m pretty happy with what we’ve created there. If you want to talk in depth with people about online marketing, check out Third Tribe Marketing. It’s where I’m spending a good 30-60 minutes each day, and where I’m finding ideas that turn into money (or at least value for my clients).

In August 2003, I decided to get healthy. So did Kat. We started with nutrition. We lost a little weight. Then we lost some more. We worked on our fitness. Then we did even more. Then I got into running. And by November 2004, I ran and completed a trail marathon. I sure didn’t wake up one morning in November 65 pounds thinner and start running. It was built on several hundred (thousand?) little victories along the way.

Start With Little Flags and Bigger Flags

One way to start achieving your own victories is to know what you’re aiming to accomplish. For instance, if you hate your job, plant a positive flag in the ground that says, “I’m going to change roles/careers.” That’ll be your bigger flag. If you want to get really specific, you should consider adding things like dates to your flags. (Otherwise, they’re more like dreams.)

Then, plant some smaller flags. For instance, having some extra money stashed away so you can cover your transition for a few months might be a good way to accomplish your bigger flag goal. So, how will you get that money? Maybe it will be to start an eBay business. (My friend Marsha Collier is THE author of all the best books about eBay and eBay businesses.) With extra revenue, you’ll reach another little flag that builds up to your next victory.

See how it works? Put out a bigger flag that signifies your victory: “I’ll work independently 8 months from now.” Then, figure out how many little flags you’ll need to put in the sand for all the little victories that will get you there. “I’ll look to start taking in an extra $2000/month within 60 days.” From there, figuring out HOW is a bit more concrete.

Praise Each Little Victory. Then Move on.

On your way to success, make sure you praise your accomplishments. I’m working on my fitness and nutrition again after a long hiatus. At the time I wrote this, I’d lost 10 pounds in my first two weeks. I’m happy with that progress. But, I’m also not going to linger. I’m going to work harder at getting more fit, at reducing my calorie intake a bit more (I’m not eating a fad diet and I’m certainly eating more than enough food), and working those little victories. But I just accept each win, nod, and move on.

Never Justify

One secret to your little victories: never use one to justify a fallback. “Well, I did lose 10 pounds. I’ll just have this vat-sized popcorn at the movie theater.” No. Never. That’s how you got there in the first place. Apply this thinking liberally over all the other things you do. If you get a win with one client, never let that be a reason to mess up with another. Treat every victory as crucial to your success, or you’ll risk eroding your success.

Your Flags, Not Everyone’s Flags

The flags you set for yourself, the little victories, are yours. They pertain to goals you’ve made. Sometimes, on the way to success, our passion to be helpful sometimes overrides our sense that our efforts are our own, and not prescriptive across everyone else. That’s when we risk coming off as preachy. For instance, just because you realize that Twitter and Facebook are the wave of the future doesn’t mean that everyone else who doesn’t is a jerk, behind the times, and doesn’t get it. Maybe those aren’t the flags those people are working towards. Maybe their victories are different than yours.

Work your own flags.

Praise Others Often

The best thing you can do with success is share it. Praise others along the way. Be grateful. Thank others. Share as much of the stage and spotlight as you can. Hoard nothing. Instead, give as much praise away as possible and keep only what you can’t possibly deny to yourself. Your success was made up of many other helping hands. Do what you can to thank them.

Success Accepts Temporary Setbacks and Failures

I called my business New Marketing Labs because I wanted us to always be experimenting. We win business by telling our partners that sometimes we’re not sure the outcome of our efforts until we give it a try. We have, on many occasions, told someone in a meeting, “We’re not really sure if this will yield, but we’re going to try it, and if it does, we’ll do it some more. If it doesn’t, we’ll figure out how to make things work.”

Experimentation, failure, and setbacks are all part of the map. Just don’t dwell on them. Airplanes are off-course 90% of the time, I once read. As long as they land safely and on time (oh, how I wish), that’s good enough for everyone involved. Accept your setbacks (but learn from them).

What Happens With Success

Depending on your views, what happens next is usually the most important. When I’m successful, I do what I can to educate others in how they can accomplish what I’ve done, or at least they can have access to the tools I used to get there. Teaching, raising others up, doing what one can to bring success to others is perhaps the biggest measure of the real value of success. It’s not money that determines success. It’s not fame. It’s the chance to help others with their own success that I value most of all.

Our efforts to achieve success hinge on little victories. When it’s all said and done, after 10,000 hours of hard work, the external sense that it all seems effortless is just another external sign that you’ve worked hard to achieve your position. But it’s really only the start of another kind of effort, complete with more little victories to be had along the way.

What about you? Does that describe your own successes? How are you planting your small flags? What do you find discouraging?

But the other day, Mashable posted a video that Ben Folds had done, where he would sing spontaneous songs to whatever he saw on the screen during Chatroulette. He calls these “ode to Merton,” and the backstory there is that this other person, Merton, would sing songs to people that connected with him on the service. Ben Folds, being something of a celebrity, has since overshadowed Merton in some senses, while still paying homage. But that’s not really the main point.

The following video is what Ben was doing. NOTE: Some NOT SAFE FOR WORK/KIDS language in the video.

The main point is this: after watching Ben Folds in this video a few times, I was reminded that I like his music. More so, I liked that he embraced a new technology like Chatroulette. More so, I appreciate that he could be extemporaneous. And that, friends, sold Ben one more album. Here’s an amazon affiliate link to the album I bought.

Marketing is sometimes about exposure, awareness, and getting us to connect with the product. By watching Ben interact with people on Chatroulette, I connected with the spirit of what he was doing, and he made another sale. That’s the takeaway.

What say you?

As With All Things, Goals First

I decided to tell myself the story of me, the story of me for the next few years. This comes from my experience with Don Miller’s book. In my efforts to determine how to conduct my business and my life, I started with goals. I won’t share the details, but I have goals for (in no order):

• New Marketing Labs.
• Books and other publications.
• Professional speaking.
• My new business (not yet announced, but maybe by end of week) and related projects like Third Tribe Marketing.
• [chrisbrogan.com] – some changes coming here.
• Work/Life balance
• Fitness/Nutrition

Those are the major buckets, at least. And I cut those down from 17 projects. I killed about 10 over the last two days. That was first: deciding what goals would yield the best rewards for me (I measured “best” by happiness, satisfaction, money, time).

By starting with my goals for those various buckets/roles, I can then ask myself every time something new comes in: “Does this contribute to the success of my goals?” Having the answer this this is golden.

Actual Paper

I use paper when I redraw. I quite literally draw little pictures with circles or boxes, and I do lots of simple math (I really only know how to do simple math, but if I wrote just “math,” you’d think that I was doing something huge).

On paper, it’s a lot easier to see what’s working for me. For instance, I’m a believer in the mindset of having multiple revenue streams. I have a job (president of New Marketing Labs), but I also make some of my money speaking professional, through my affiliate programs, my books, and through a few other sources.

When I put down what I could make from where, it helps me understand where to focus some of my attention to achieve my revenue goals. But then, I have to overlay the “time” goals, the happiness goals, etc. With PAPER, it’s a lot easier to overlay information for my consideration. For instance, I can draw a little “$, T, H” symbol for money, time, happiness and determine which meets more of the criteria. Make sense?

Silence

This part is the hardest for me. I don’t really handle silence well (thinking about you, Alanis). But I can’t do what I’m doing to redraw, answer emails, tweet, and all that. I paused a lot of the external noise so that I could find some silence. I’m still doing it as I type this. And yet, I sneak back into my noise because that’s part of my job, and thus, at present, I have to maintain some of it.

But, if you asked, silence would be a vital element to the process, and I’ve done what I can to silence the noise when I can.

Lots of Questions

I described the process to a friend the other day like this: “You might see a chip of paint peeling on the wall and think, ‘huh, this wall needs painting.’ I look at the chip of paint and think, ‘should this wall even be here? Should *I* even be here?’”

I look at the frames through which I see things. For instance, do you see yourself as an employee or a leader? I know some people who make amazing employees, but who are horrible leaders. I’m not even the best leader (Justin can tell you that), but I’m a great operator/thinker/tinkerer. I’m the kind of person who can see something unique, noodle it into a working prototype, and then get others to weaponize it (most of the time). Knowing this about myself lets me know which types of businesses I’ll be better suited to create/operate.

What types of questions are helpful to redrawing?

• Does this make me happy?
• Who am I doing this for?
• Does this add to my primary goals?
• Where am I? Is this where I want to be?
• If I stop doing this, what really happens?
• What would be totally fun? Can I feed my family doing that?
• What would my ideal day look like?
• How many airplanes do I really want to be on in a given year?

These are somewhat from my perspective, and somewhat generic. You can make your own questions. They’re free. The answers sometimes cost money, but the questions are free.

Action Plans

Goals without plans are meaningless. Plans without deadlines and measurements are wishes. Thus, I have plans in place. They are very flexible plans, and they rotate on a few of my goal/measurement hinges from above, but they are clear and I will know if I achieve what I set out to do.

The thing is, I know that I won’t be successful if all I do is write out some new plans about my business. It won’t work. I learned that from reading and exercising what I learned in Switch, by Chip and Dan Heath. So, I have to build the entire frame of what I do. Here’s some of what’s included in that framing work (in no real order, and in no real system – YET):

• Put time blocks in place for correspondence. Stop checking mail 45,974 times a day.
• Set time limits on RSS reading.
• Start my day with fitness, not email.
• 2000 words a day (some days, I did 4000; others I did 0. I want to steady-state this).
• Mind everything I eat.
• Move daily.

You know, things like that. But then, I also have real live plans with numbers and dates attached to most of those. Like weight goals, fitness goals, etc. So that’s the most important part.

Finally, Check-Ins

In this case, I mean check-ins to reconsider how I’m doing with my framing. I have mine set for every four months. That way, I can analyze a bit at a time, without tweaking it so often that I feel I’m not getting any traction. But without checking in, I don’t get the chance to see if this is all making sense and heading towards an end goal.

That’s the stuff I’ve put into it.

Your Mileage Will Vary- Try Anyway

Lots of us get stuck and stay stuck. Lots of us worry about things outside our control. Lots of times, we’re looking at that peeling chip of paint and not the wall, the house, the town, the land. But we can choose to redraw. We can choose to really look at every decision we’re actively living with, and see whether there aren’t better ways to reach our goals.

Does this make sense to you? Have you ever tried a process like this? How did it help?

How have you come to the decisions you’ve made right now, and what do they mean to you?

First, understand that the best clients for this kind of business are local-ish, have some discretionary money, and are hopefully shooting for being a repeat customer (that would work best for her business).

It’s not a simple transaction business. It requires loyalty. To that end, here are my ideas for marketing a business like hers.

Search and Listen

My first effort would be to find local prospects. I’d start with Google Blogsearch, putting in local town names, to see who’s blogging in the area. I’d use Twitter Search to find some more folks. I’d look around for other sources, like local online newspapers. You can even do some clever google work. Once I had a decent list, I’d start determining who, if any of them, are actually prospects. Just because they’re local doesn’t mean they fit the other criteria. Break the list down a bit more from there.

Promotion

You need a home base. I’d recommend a blog, but even a static website is better than nothing. Then, I’d see whether or not you can get listings with any other local businesses, any local groups related to the field, possibly even the Chamber of Commerce.

Make your site a combination of explanations of your business and the value you provide, as well as a chance to get to know a bit more about you. Personalized businesses like this, especially a body works business like massage means that people want to know more about you, want to get a sense of who you are, and want to understand what matters to you.

If you’ve got a blog, consider doing video so that people can see even more about you. It’s a great way to add some promotional oomph.

From here, you might start reaching out into outposts. Facebook might be a tricky place to pick up business when starting. It’s not like a bunch of people will rush in and join the massage company fan page. That said, you can always try. Twitter might work better, insofar as people speak more openly there, there’s serendipity, there are more chances to find new people without “friending” first.

What do you do once you’re there?

I’d recommend talking about them. Them= whoever you’ve found at these outposts, the people you’ve found via these lists. As for WHAT to talk about, talk about what they’re into. Get to know them. It’s an important part of building relationships, to be there long ahead of the sale.

Newsletter

What might also work is an email newsletter, talking about other health and wellness tips, but also with a few subtle offerings from your organization. I mean subtle, too. Make it more about equipping them for success and much less about finding clients immediately. It will be a slower build, but you’ll have a better chance to build a community you can tap into when needed over time.

Sales

From here, you can work on conversions and sales. My friend who runs the massage business did a promotional event at a local arena. I think there’s an opportunity to do a few more gigs like that, even maybe calling around for corporations to offer two hour blocks of time for 10 minute chair massages (so 12 massages) at a rate of $300 (so close to the $150 an hour that a quality massage therapist gets). This is also a great lead generator for future business, so bring business cards.

Obviously, this step would be different for different types of businesses, but realizing that some kind of demo, promo, introductory offer is always a great way to seed future opportunities is the first step.

What Else?

I’ve given out a few steps, a few ideas, especially aiming towards social media and the like. What else would you tell someone looking to promote their massage therapy or similar business? How have you handled the challenge? What matters to you if you were the prospective client?

By the way, this kind of stuff is exactly what I cover in my new book, Social Media 101, should you be interested.

Here are some ways you could get the ball rolling:

First, here’s what I’d do if I started today.

It might be helpful to consider setting up a simple presence framework.

If you need the larger picture, here’s some thoughts on how outposts improve your ecosystem.

Want some blogging advice? Here are 50 blog topics marketers could write for their companies.

Those are probably some good places to start. If you want something like this that’s a bit more portable, that’s why I wrote Social Media 101, a book that gives you these kinds of posts written down on paper (81 or so of those kinds of posts) such that you can hand it over to the folks who need to know. Click the photo if you want to learn more.

Or, just hang out with me here. I’m happy either way. : )

photo shared via flickr

Methods of Engaging in Social Media

First, let’s level-set what we’re talking about here. When I talk about scaling your efforts, here are the efforts I’m talking about:

• Listening/monitoring for PR, for customer service, for marketing opportunities, for R&D opportunties.
• Customer service.
• Client relations.
• Social marketing (such as two-way sales conversations).
• Sales prospecting (including two-way conversations, but also listening).
• Publishing (blogging, video, etc).

Of these six, everything but “listening/monitoring” assumes a little bit of two-way participation, meaning that you choose to comment on the other people’s posts and statuses, etc. This takes time, as well. It’s part of the relationship-building, however, and can’t be skimped on.

Approaches to Assigning These Tasks

Listening/Monitoring – In my estimation, every social media effort has to have Listening/Monitoring at the core of it. I tried thinking of exceptions, and couldn’t (without accepting that some people choose to be scammy). That said, you can opt to split the listening/monitoring chores out such that each member of your team that will be touching the social web owns some level of the process. For instance, your PR person can use the tools to listen for crisis issues, for storytelling opportunities, etc. Your customer service team can use the tools to enhance their customer service channel. Your marketers can listen for opportunities. Thus, you’ve already looked at how to split the vast bucket of information that comes in during listening. Someone should still own it. Maybe that’s the product lead, the manager of that line of business, whoever is responsible for the bottom line. They should have their eyes on listening the whole time.

Customer Service – Some companies already have this nailed down. Dell and Comcast have built great customer service integrations using social channels. Zappos has, as well. This area seems the most important to scale. Customer service is a tireless experience, and requires prompt attention. Thus, you need a deep bench. I think Frank at Comcast has 14 people on his team at this point, to give you a sense of it. Of all the social media tasks, this is tie for the most time consuming and most important (client relations would be the other). Learning how to scale this might be nuanced and customized, but just by knowing that it’s the hardest part might be enough to get you a little further in this part.

Client Relations- I split out client relations from customer service, because I think this part includes managing things like Facebook groups, managing blog comments, etc. It’s the “there’s no problem, but I’d like to keep you warm” part of business. You sometimes see “community manager” in this role (though I see the best community managers as a blend of a few of the above topics). This is tied for first place in time-consuming with Customer Service. People want the warm touch. It’s also the hardest of the brand promises, because if you’re nice to me on Twitter, but your counter help stinks, did you really move the needle? I vote no. With time, this one requires perhaps even more special care and attention. If you start offering this to your customer base, you’ve got to maintain it. Toy with the hours spent here at your own risk.

Social Marketing – By social marketing, I mean things like finding new customers via Twitter, or coming up with YouTube challenges, things like that. This clearly falls into the marketing department of larger companies, and it falls on the shoulders of whichever of your small business partners markets the best. Like all roles in a small business environment, you should cross-train. Don’t get lulled into thinking that just because Surya has a Twitter account that he’s the only one who should do social marketing. This is probably the easiest to scale, but it’s also the one where you can see the most obvious results of marketing effort. For instance, if you build a loyalty program and you need sign-ups, you can count pretty easily how many people took advantage of your offer, so you now whether or not to add attention to it. This is probably a lot less personable than client relations and customer service, so can likely be scaled the easiest.

Sales Prospecting – Your sales team (or you, if you’re a company of one or two) should already be realizing the sales benefits of the social web. Every day, someone’s out there talking about their needs, and giving you a sense of how you could sell to them. It’s lots of opportunity and requires a bit of time, but not much more than old fashioned prospecting. Switch out some of your time from sifting through phone books or wherever you find your customers, and put it into using search tools on the web to find new clients. Also, for ongoing relationships, if you’re not keeping tabs on their social presence, you’re missing the opportunity to know how they’re doing before you make your important sales calls. This doesn’t take a ton of time, but requires you to build it into your process.

Publishing – Blogging, shooting videos, all that stuff – that’s where some of your time gets eaten up, and yet, that’s where a lot of the value comes from. In seeing some of the comments from my post about redrawing, a lot of people offered that maybe I should blog and tweet less. That’s where I get my revenue. This post? It will generate a query for business where someone wants me to further customize and formalize these processes for their organization. I give it away to you for free, and you can run with it, but someone will ask for that next step, and I’ll make money from that. Thus, publishing should never be considered the thing to slip. Hell, it’s the product sometimes, and other times, it’s the best advertising you could ever create. Never skimp on publishing.

Where Does That Leave You?

I’ve told you that everything’s important and that nothing can be cut back. So where do you scale?

• Spread listening/monitoring as deep as you can.
• Enhance customer service and deepen that bench internally.
• Add to client relations when you can, from internal resources. It pays off.
• Social marketing can be augmented by external help.
• Sales prospecting is a sales job, but can be augmented.
• Publishing is important, but can be augmented by external help.

That’s how I see it. Again, if you’re talking about smaller scale operations, you’ll have to find the mix. I’ve put it almost in order of importance, from top to bottom. You can shuffle it a bit. Is that how you see it?

For those complaining that social media doesn’t scale, the trick is this: we equate these tools to personal relationships. Because of that, we can’t just open a “call center” for many of the touchpoints. However, as we move forward, and these tools become the new phone, the new radio, the new TV, it’s no longer going to be a world of solo trust agents, but trust agencies.

Will you be ready?

Photo credit Bill Lapp

But I want to talk about more. I want to do more.

The guy in that photo is Mark Horvath from Invisible People. He caters to the homeless. Directly. He and Liz Strauss walked around giving pizza to homeless guys while they were here. They talked to the homeless, made them feel seen.

As well as meeting me, I want you to find Mark and say hi. I want you to make HIM feel the way you make me feel. He’s doing good work.

This is Melissa Leon and AJ Leon from TheLACProject, a human business company. They are doing AMAZING things. Find them in the hallway and talk about Africa and social good.

On another note, Thom Singer. He just wrote about a giving moment that happened at a party at SXSW. Man, I wish I went to that party.

What We Could Do: Networking

We need better networking tools. We need to build a “I’m ____, and I’m into _____ , and I’d love to talk about _____ , and I’d love to meet people into ______ , or just ______ . I like _____ food. If I were to support a cause, it’d be _____ , but I’m open to ____ , too” kind of tool.

We need to give new people the warmest welcome with some kind of “I’m new here” badge.

Can you see it?

What We Could Do: Panels and Speeches

We need to give the new people more to talk about. We need to give them more fundamentals. We need to strip out some of the entertainment value and get back to sharing our big ideas, our golden thoughts. (Me included. I think the panel that Julien and I gave was fun, but not as informative as we could’ve made it. Next time.)

We need to bring our A game, our A ideas. Maybe some of you did. I spoke to a few hundred people, and no one gave anyone rave reviews except for the panel with Jeff Jarvis, and the talk by Clay Shirky. (Note: I didn’t see hardly any panels, so I’m not talking from experience, as much as I’m talking from what the buzz reported).

What We Could Do: Sponsors and Exhibitors

We could do lots more in these regards. I think sometimes, as attendees, we forget that the sponsors are helping pay for the experience. How can we do more things to pay them back for that? Yes, we pay for the ticket. I think we would do well to grab a quick interview with a few sponsors while we’re out and about at all these parties.

What We Could Do: Interpersonal

People still anxiously talk all about themselves. We could ALL just ask about the other person, get to know what they’re doing, and share our best intentions of understanding each other. Sounds hippie, but that’s how things really get done. It doesn’t get done when you start into your pitch before really even getting to know us.

Might Just Be Me

Know what I saw more than anything else when I really took a moment to look around? Lonely people. I saw people not connecting. I saw lots of people who could’ve used a little attention. And I saw many people with lots of energy looking for a place to put it. And that means we have opportunities.

This wasn’t a rant about SXSW. It’s a post begging for a new way, a more engaged way, a human way to bring out the best in our efforts and time and expense.

What say you?

Can’t see the video? click here.

Direct link to the video

People always ask which camera I used to shoot my video. I use the Panasonic Lumix DMC-LX3 (that’s a review of the camera).