March 8, 2010 53 Comments

What I Told Simon Last Night

Simon from Bar B-Ria in Bogota Colombia

Simon is marketing director for Bar B-Ria, an upscale barber shop experience for gentlemen in Bogota, Colombia. They offer everything from massages to haircuts to manicures and pedicures, and a bar full of top shelf liquor, including a new favorite rum, Zacapa from Guatemala. I’ll tell you what advice I had for the place upon appreciating their services and their commitment to guest experience. This is mostly tactical. There’s still something to learn from it.

They Had Zacapa Rum at Bar B-Ria in Bogota Colombia

Turn The Revenue Measure From “Dollars Per Day” into ” Dollars Per Guest”

Because the entire plan of Bar B-Ria is hinged around delivering excellent guest experiences, it dawned on me that measuring revenue by day instead of dollars-per-guest means that opportunities get lost.…

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February 11, 2010 104 Comments

Build Ecosystems for Your Content

mindmap of content ideas If you’re ready to think of your blog as a business (one of the hot topics over on Third Tribe Marketing), one way to do that is to start thinking of your blog content as the core of a distribution flow. In the little drawing to the left, I’ve put your subject matter at the heart of your system, and then have recommended you look at your blog, other products, education, and partnerships as the four areas you might consider. Note how I’ve moved your blog off to a branch and not to the heart of the drawing. Let’s talk through it.

Your Blog as PART of a System

In the drawing above, I list your blog as part of your content ecosystem.…

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February 8, 2010 140 Comments

Pursue the Goal Not the Method

finish line In the back of a town car hired to take me to the Kansas City International airport, talking to Jeff, a driver with two kids, self-proclaimed ADD, and a history of quitting rote sales jobs every few months, I realized something of importance to the story of what’s brought me to this place: I am a seeker of the goal, not the method. Now, to unpack.

The Method Is What We’re Taught to Pursue

We learn our times tables. We learn the 50 states (in the US, at least). We are taught all these rules, these patterns, these systems, these methods. Musicians learn their scales. Painters copy the Masters. Copy.…

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February 1, 2010 109 Comments

Framing Your Social Media Efforts

house being built There are three main areas of practice for social media that your company (or you) should be thinking about: listening, connecting, publishing. From these three areas, you can build out your usage of the tools, thread your information networks to feed and be fed, and align your resources for execution. There are many varied strategies you can execute using these toolsets. There are many different tools you can consider employing for your efforts. But that’s the basic structure: listening, connecting, publishing.

Listening

Listening tools have more than one application: they’re useful for customer service.…

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January 29, 2010 68 Comments

How Do You Stack Up

titles Swing by any page at Alltop and browse the titles other bloggers are using. Now, compare their titles to yours. Which would you click? Go back and look at the last 30 days of your blog. How many posts does that encompass? If someone only had the last 30 days of your blog to go on, what would they say about it?

If you look at this graphic I copied, you’ll see a few titles that get your eyebrow raised. I found the experiment to be interesting, and even more interesting when I picked a topic material that wasn’t really my thing. It’s amazing how just the titles got me thinking about my own blog and what I could do better.…

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January 27, 2010 100 Comments

How I Use Mindmapping to Write

mindmap of a post I use lots of tools for writing. The other day, I talked about the importance of writing practice. Today, as I’m working on a new speech, I wanted to share another tool I use: mind mapping.

Before you ask, because the technology minded of you often do, this particular mindmapping software is called Mind Node and it’s for Mac. There are plenty of tools for Windows and some that operate online. I think Steve Rubel covered some a while back, but I’m too lazy to Bing the exact title. That’s not exactly the point.

The way I use mindmaps is that I start with my main idea, and then figure out the “branches” I’ll want to talk about.…

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January 25, 2010 173 Comments

The Writing Practice

Chris Brogan signing books Where do you get your ideas for your blog? I get this question a lot. Do you? The question is a bit more telling than the answer, I’m afraid. You see, I have more topics and ideas than I have time to write about. I write two or three posts every time I sit down, and lately, I write a bit for a book at the same time, so that I can give you original book content as well as original daily post content. How is it done?

It’s practice. Practice the verb, in this case.

The Spark of an Idea

Last night, Kat and I were at Ruby Foos in Manhattan for dinner after a movie. The server, Jenna, was pretty good at her job, but when it came time to try and sell us dessert, I noticed a flaw in her service.…

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January 7, 2010 178 Comments

How to Reach Out to Bloggers

fishing Are you hoping to connect with bloggers and get the word out about your product or service? Are you hoping that you can find someone who’s interested in what your company is offering, and then share the pertinent details so that hopefully the blogger will write a decent story about you, maybe even include a few links? Have you felt frustrated by the varied and less-than-successful experiences you’ve had with your efforts?

Let’s talk about it.

Do Your Homework

All bloggers aren’t the same. Big numbers don’t mean big response. Just because someone writes about X doesn’t mean that your product is actually X to them.…

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December 27, 2009 59 Comments

Tips for Google Wave

Collaborating With Wave As I’m getting more and more into using Google Wave, I’m coming to appreciate its collaborative value. The only way that I’m using it right now is as follows: I come up with an idea. I want another opinion about the idea. I write it up in Wave. I share it with others and get them to collaborate with me.

There might be other ways to be using it. You might be hosting weekly chats and/or writing blogs in there, or whatever. That’s all swell. So far, the way that I’m using it differently than email (because NO, I don’t feel it’s a replacement for email – at least not in its current state), is in collaborating on something fluid that will eventually be static.…

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December 26, 2009 130 Comments

Wiring Yourself for Success

paths

I’m getting ready to write up my 3 words for 2010. If you’re not familiar with the exercise, the object is to come up with three words that you use as compass points for your efforts over the year to come. They’re not resolutions. They’re ways of framing what you plan to do in the coming year. Here were mine for 2009 and 2008. (In my mind, I did okay with 2 of the 3 goals. I’ll make 2010 a redoubled effort on “armies.”)

In using this method, here’s how I set about wiring my goals to the way I accomplish what I do.

  • Determine 3 guiding words for my efforts in 2010.

    • …

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