HELLO ALL I KNOW THAT IT HAS BEEN AWHILE SINCE YOU LAST HEARD FROM ME BUT I HAVE BEEN LOST IN THIS CRISIS, I HAVE BEEN PLAYING THE RECOVERY GAME AND WINNING AT ONE POINT NOW I AM PLAYING FOR MY LIFE, I HAVE BEEN WORKING MY BUTT OFF TO GET SOME INVESTORS FOR MY PROJECT AND KEEP THE CATERING ASPECT OF THIS COMPANY ALIVE, IT HAS BEEN VERY HARD. HAS ANYONE ELSE BEEN AFFECTED BY THIS SITUATION? PLEASE LET ME KNOW
THANK YOU
PLEASE KEEP ME IN YOUR PRAYERS AS I WILL DO THE SAME FOR YOU
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Friday, May 8, 2009
Who do you associate with?
As entrepreneurs, one of our most valuable assets is our time. Because time is that one commodity you can never get back, I am very selective on who and with what I spend my time with. So, when someone invites me to a network or referral group, I do my due diligence to make sure it is worth my time.
However when you find a good one, industry associations can be a wonderful resource. They can help you stay on top of trends in your business or industry. They can also keep you sharp and motivated, help you stay on top of your game. More importantly, industry associations can give you the tools necessary to differentiate your business from others in a competitive marketplace. Sometimes, it's not about WHO you network with during these association meetings...but about WHAT you can learn.
Here's a list of several groups I have found to be helpful along my entrepreneurial journey. If you have one that has been helpful to you, feel free post it.
1. Pass It Forward: http://passitforwardmd.googlepages.com/
2. NRG: http://www.networkreferralgroup.com/
3. WEB (Women Entrepreneurs of Baltimore: www.webinc.org
Good Luck!
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Twitter-Pros and Cons
The Negatives People Will Throw At You
Twitter takes up time.
Twitter takes you away from other productive work.
Without a strategy, it’s just typing.
There are other ways to do this.
As Frank hears often, Twitter doesn’t replace customer service (Frank is @comcastcares and is a superhero for what he’s started.)
Twitter is buggy and not enterprise-ready.
Twitter is just for technonerds.
Twitter’s only a few million people. (only)
Twitter doesn’t replace direct email marketing.
Twitter opens the company up to more criticism and griping.
Some Positives to Throw Back
Twitter helps one organize great, instant meetups (tweetups).
Twitter works swell as an opinion poll.
Twitter can help direct people’s attention to good things.
Twitter at events helps people build an instant “backchannel.”
Twitter breaks news faster than other sources, often (especially if the news impacts online denizens).
Twitter gives businesses a glimpse at what status messaging can do for an organization. Remember presence in the 1990s?
Twitter brings great minds together, and gives you daily opportunities to learn (if you look for it, and/or if you follow the right folks).
Twitter gives your critics a forum, but that means you can study them.
Twitter helps with business development, if your prospects are online (mine are).
Twitter can augment customer service. (but see above)
Twitter takes up time.
Twitter takes you away from other productive work.
Without a strategy, it’s just typing.
There are other ways to do this.
As Frank hears often, Twitter doesn’t replace customer service (Frank is @comcastcares and is a superhero for what he’s started.)
Twitter is buggy and not enterprise-ready.
Twitter is just for technonerds.
Twitter’s only a few million people. (only)
Twitter doesn’t replace direct email marketing.
Twitter opens the company up to more criticism and griping.
Some Positives to Throw Back
Twitter helps one organize great, instant meetups (tweetups).
Twitter works swell as an opinion poll.
Twitter can help direct people’s attention to good things.
Twitter at events helps people build an instant “backchannel.”
Twitter breaks news faster than other sources, often (especially if the news impacts online denizens).
Twitter gives businesses a glimpse at what status messaging can do for an organization. Remember presence in the 1990s?
Twitter brings great minds together, and gives you daily opportunities to learn (if you look for it, and/or if you follow the right folks).
Twitter gives your critics a forum, but that means you can study them.
Twitter helps with business development, if your prospects are online (mine are).
Twitter can augment customer service. (but see above)
Monday, April 13, 2009
The Facts About Twitter-Part Three
Some Sanity For You
1.You don’t have to read every tweet.
2.You don’t have to reply to every @ tweet directed to you (try to reply to some, but don’t feel guilty).
3. Use direct messages for 1-to-1 conversations if you feel there’s no value to Twitter at large to hear the conversation ( got this from @pistachio).
4. Use services like Twitter Search to make sure you see if someone’s talking about you. Try to participate where it makes sense.
5.3rd party clients like Tweetdeck and Twhirl make it a lot easier to manage Twitter.
6.If you tweet all day while your coworkers are busy, you’re going to hear about it.
7.If you’re representing clients and billing hours, and tweeting all the time, you might hear about it.
8.Learn quickly to use the URL shortening tools like TinyURL and all the variants. It helps tidy up your tweets.
9.If someone says you’re using twitter wrong, forget it. It’s an opt out society. They can unfollow if they don’t like how you use it.
10.Commenting on others’ tweets, and retweeting what others have posted is a great way to build community.
1.You don’t have to read every tweet.
2.You don’t have to reply to every @ tweet directed to you (try to reply to some, but don’t feel guilty).
3. Use direct messages for 1-to-1 conversations if you feel there’s no value to Twitter at large to hear the conversation ( got this from @pistachio).
4. Use services like Twitter Search to make sure you see if someone’s talking about you. Try to participate where it makes sense.
5.3rd party clients like Tweetdeck and Twhirl make it a lot easier to manage Twitter.
6.If you tweet all day while your coworkers are busy, you’re going to hear about it.
7.If you’re representing clients and billing hours, and tweeting all the time, you might hear about it.
8.Learn quickly to use the URL shortening tools like TinyURL and all the variants. It helps tidy up your tweets.
9.If someone says you’re using twitter wrong, forget it. It’s an opt out society. They can unfollow if they don’t like how you use it.
10.Commenting on others’ tweets, and retweeting what others have posted is a great way to build community.
Monday, April 6, 2009
To Tweet or Not To Tweet (Part 2)
Ideas about WHAT to Tweet
1. Instead of answering the question, “What are you doing?”, answer the question, “What has your attention?”
2. Have more than one twitterer at the company. People can quit. People take vacations. It’s nice to have a variety.
3. When promoting a blog post, ask a question or explain what’s coming next, instead of just dumping a link.
4. Ask questions. Twitter is GREAT for getting opinions.
5. Follow interesting people. If you find someone who tweets interesting things, see who she follows, and follow her.
6. Tweet about other people’s stuff. Again, doesn’t directly impact your business, but makes us feel like you’re not “that guy.”
7. When you DO talk about your stuff, make it useful. Give advice, blog posts, pictures, etc.
8. Share the human side of your company. If you’re bothering to tweet, it means you believe social media has value for human connections. Point us to pictures and other human things.
9. Don’t toot your own horn too much. (Man, I can’t believe I’m saying this. I do it all the time. - Side note: I’ve gotta stop tooting my own horn).
10. Or, if you do, try to balance it out by promoting the heck out of others, too.
Here's the link to the full article by Chris Brogan:
http://www.chrisbrogan.com/50-ideas-on-using-twitter-for-business/
1. Instead of answering the question, “What are you doing?”, answer the question, “What has your attention?”
2. Have more than one twitterer at the company. People can quit. People take vacations. It’s nice to have a variety.
3. When promoting a blog post, ask a question or explain what’s coming next, instead of just dumping a link.
4. Ask questions. Twitter is GREAT for getting opinions.
5. Follow interesting people. If you find someone who tweets interesting things, see who she follows, and follow her.
6. Tweet about other people’s stuff. Again, doesn’t directly impact your business, but makes us feel like you’re not “that guy.”
7. When you DO talk about your stuff, make it useful. Give advice, blog posts, pictures, etc.
8. Share the human side of your company. If you’re bothering to tweet, it means you believe social media has value for human connections. Point us to pictures and other human things.
9. Don’t toot your own horn too much. (Man, I can’t believe I’m saying this. I do it all the time. - Side note: I’ve gotta stop tooting my own horn).
10. Or, if you do, try to balance it out by promoting the heck out of others, too.
Here's the link to the full article by Chris Brogan:
http://www.chrisbrogan.com/50-ideas-on-using-twitter-for-business/
Thursday, April 2, 2009
In the mood for something "tweet"?
I apologize for being MIA lately...but I've been tackling a lot of new projects lately. One of them is learning about the hottest Twitter Trend that is sweeping the Internet. According to Wikipedia, Twitter is a social networking service that enables users to send and read others' users updates known as 'tweets'. Tweets are text based posts of up to 140 characters. Twitter can be a great marketing tool for entrepreneurs who are testing the social media waters and a fun way to keep in touch with your family and friends.
1.Build an account and immediate start using Twitter Search to listen for your name, your competitor’s names, words that relate to your space. (Listening always comes first.)
2, Add a picture. ( Shel reminds us of this.) We want to see you.
3. Talk to people about THEIR interests, too. I know this doesn’t sell more widgets, but it shows us you’re human.
4. Point out interesting things in your space, not just about you.
5. Share links to neat things in your community. ( @wholefoods does this well).
6. Don’t get stuck in the apology loop. Be helpful instead. ( @jetblue gives travel tips.)
7. Be wary of always pimping your stuff. Your fans will love it. Others will tune out.
8. Promote your employees’ outside-of-work stories. ( @TheHomeDepot does it well.)
9. Throw in a few humans, like RichardAtDELL, LionelAtDELL, etc.
10. Talk about non-business, too, like @astrout and @jstorerj from Mzinga.
So, for the next several posts I will be re-blogging a series titled:
50 Ideas on Using Twitter for Business
by Chris Brogan
Here's the link to his page:
First Steps
1.Build an account and immediate start using Twitter Search to listen for your name, your competitor’s names, words that relate to your space. (Listening always comes first.)
2, Add a picture. ( Shel reminds us of this.) We want to see you.
3. Talk to people about THEIR interests, too. I know this doesn’t sell more widgets, but it shows us you’re human.
4. Point out interesting things in your space, not just about you.
5. Share links to neat things in your community. ( @wholefoods does this well).
6. Don’t get stuck in the apology loop. Be helpful instead. ( @jetblue gives travel tips.)
7. Be wary of always pimping your stuff. Your fans will love it. Others will tune out.
8. Promote your employees’ outside-of-work stories. ( @TheHomeDepot does it well.)
9. Throw in a few humans, like RichardAtDELL, LionelAtDELL, etc.
10. Talk about non-business, too, like @astrout and @jstorerj from Mzinga.
Stay tuned for more helpful tips.
Friday, March 13, 2009
Taking a step back
One of the great things about owning my own company is that I can move at my own pace. I know that if things have to get done, I am the one responsible for making sure it happens. However, sometimes being 'the only' one can work against me. You know, it's like looking through a magnifying glass. You can hyper-focus on something so much that it looks one way to you...but when you back the glass up to take another look..things appear a lot differently. Applying that same logic to my business, I've found that it's best to bounce my ideas off SEVERAL people, to make sure I get clear picture on a pending project or proposal. I prefer to get that diverse feedback from people I know won't always agree with me. I believe that things you may WANT to hear from others may not always be the things you NEED to hear.
So if you are like me or other entrepreneurs I know, take a step back if you find yourself struggling to make progress in a particular area. Who knows where it may lead you. Taking a step back is not always a bad thing. Especially if it takes you closer to your goals.
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