Attracting New Customers via Mobile Coupons: It’s a winner!

So, all of us are now realizing that we’re becoming, at least in this one way, more like the rest of the world;  our use of cell phones is going way up, and it’s become our lifeline to functioning competently in the day-to-day.  Here’s what I’ve been adopting myself,  either for my personal use or as someone on the lookout for ways to help small businesses establish some presence — sans the obnoxious, ‘in your face’ behavior, of course.  I will cover mobile in the next series of posts.

Mobile Tools that help me save money: Coupons via mobile  are taking off like never before.  From a small business angle, this means that getting involved in coupon opportunities has the capacity to do more than just give my customers a break during these recessionary times.  It also has the potential to build customer loyalty, give you visibility as a featured, local, neighborhood destination, get both interested individuals AND their friends into the act (many coupon tools have social forwarding built in), and even give you a bit more of that “here’s a business that’s hip” persona (translated: you get to to tie into young (20’s-30’s), single, educated women in the way they find is uncomplicated and cool).What I like:  Groupon or Living Social, both of which feature a SINGLE coupon for purchase every day.

It works on the principle that there is power in a collective — that a certain mininum number of people expressing interest will make it financially viable to offer a good deal and ensure that a deal will come to pass.

You might think that collective purchasing would work best for businesses people already know a bit about, but actually, the most active audiences are people seeking new engagements, and a quality business could very well fit the bill.  I know I find many offers showcase the creative or unique, which certainly gets my attention and interest.

One statistic from Groupon shows merchant feedback with the average check size 60% greater than the Groupon’s value, and that most participants are first-time customers.  If this fact continues to be true, it behooves small business owners to be at least as far along as they can be in terms of being able to field excellent service once interest on a couponing site is sparked.

Here’s what I like.  Check them out!

Groupon Contact: 877-788-7858 Ext. 2
Living Social Contact: 202.408.1745 x1117, deals@livingsocial.com

Oh, and for some information on the general state of couponing, here is an excellent article by Mashable.

Clearing the Way to Do Artist’s Work: some time-tested solutions

Creative Workout: Do a prep task, lasting no more than 4 hours using David Seah’s productivity sheets. Note whether stopping regularly helped with deferring procrastination or interfered.

Artists can feel mad, as in crazy-mad because they often feel like they are tossed about a million times over in an effort to get their left and right brains in gear. And because  they have to do what often feels like endless setup just to begin.  The plight of us all!

The trick is to use what you can to get settled quicker.  It’s an area I think I could help you with, since I’ve been on the lookout these days for some how to’s.  Sustained focus isn’t exactly easy when constant distractions fall into your lap, and when the chatter of our mind insists on taking care of every little thing.  But hey, there’s a limit to this, and you might as well heed it.

In this workout, identify your task and break it down into its key components.  It can be a task that is four hours or less. Then, locate the productivity sheet of David Seah online.  If you find you like less structure to your task tracking, check out this, more open-ended Task Tracker for Creative Types. Then, get yourself some beautifully colored markers and color in your progress with each fifteen minute increment as you go.  It’s a simple device to bring your attention back to where you are in pursuit of completion of the whole.  It also serves as a great reminder about how you actually end up spending  your time.

By the way, if your task is longer than four hours, it is probably not a single task and not one that will make this productivity sheet suitable.  Instead, make sure your overall goal is pretty much what you want to accomplish in a four hour slot, and then, reward yourself for moving forward on your path.  The strategy may not work for everyone but there’s nothing like seeing the results of your sustained attention, especially when it is towards doing what you really want to complete.

So, what about you?  What visual devices do  you find useful?

Dominos of Self-Confidence: this way to growth

In this post, I’ll explore the tremendous value in building and protecting growing self-confidence.  It will influence every aspect of how you offer your craft to the world.

I’ll start with the obvious. I know that in really taking a shot at something, to really come out of hiding, it’s essential to be aware of where you are inside yourself.  It’s not trivial. Self-confidence is the fuel that holds hands with motivation which, in turn, allows us to take the plunge and do some very interesting things.

I also know that for many years, all I wanted to do was stay beneath the radar, invisible.  If you asked me why I was doing this or even if I was doing this, I’m fairly certain you wouldn’t have gotten much of a reply.  But I think I have two good stories which are helping me piece it together better now and transition.

The first is at an event I recently attended.  It was from a micro-finance professional who had been immersed in facilitating micro loans on the ground level in Bangladesh. Micro-finance is a relatively new field, with new models emerging every day, but one could say it’s birth came from the mother of lending, a more established process here in the United States where donors typically advise where and how money should be spent. We are familiar with this kind of giving, and its name is “donor-advised” funds.  Terrific.  Money going out in support of important causes. Giving in substantial amounts.  All good.

Then, the speaker started to relate more dimensions of his story.  He mentioned that the loans were always successful (paid back) if they focused on the activities recipients sensed they could do well. If there was the willingness to honor an individual in this small way, there would be a domino effect that would spur all kinds of other personal efforts made by this same individual in the future.  In other words, it was never really what someone else believed would be beneficial for either the individual or the community that created outcomes of abundance for everyone, but what one individual was willing to believe and make better about him/herself, followed by a real opportunity to build oneself up from there.

The micro-finance approach of starting with the individual, in organizations like Kiva and Wokai, are now helping millions of people pull themselves up (from the individual in poverty to the average guy loaner who is now gaining confidence as one who gives).  In effect, it’s an industry whose 360 degree purpose may well be to grow the self-confidence of people.  It reminded me that, in life, progress always comes down to cultivating enough inner self-confidence to translate ideas into action. It’s the courage not to accept hanging back or hiding as a solution but rooting oneself in uncompromised practice of a single strength that helps us all make a difference.

The second comes from direct experience.  We know we can learn a lot through feedback from others but what if the feedback comes from a person with jealousy or insecurity or arrogance or without any sense of what can be built upon in you.  I’ve been in those circumstances, and while I couldn’t influence the outcome for myself, I certainly noticed the effect — a situation which had me working against my own capacities. Only when I made a decision to protect that area of my becoming, stand up for the circumstance that would make it stronger, could I make progress. Otherwise, I was left holding the bag, the lingering echoes of others amplifying all my imperfect efforts.

Hey, don’t misconstrue what I’m saying. Feedback can be extraordinarily necessary and gratifying at times.  But self-confidence is like the blood that runs through our veins; it’s vital to our circulation in ourselves and in the world.  And learning how to protect what is emerging is so interwined with the growth of confidence and in turn, being productive, that if you don’t recognize it or ignore what is pulling against it, you will lose a great deal. Better to devote yourself to your craft and make a commitment to building yourself up day by day than listen to feedback that could derail you.

To get moving with this, imagine a single, confidence-building domino to get you in the game.  Next, imagine the energizing belief it can represent, cup it in a hand, and use it to remind yourself you will be leading with and then protecting this inner piece/place in the months to come. Imagine laying this domino back down, and see it connecting to a first opportunity and then another and another, until quietly, intentionally, you are building your strength out to wherever and whenever you need it. Align yourself with every activity you find that will support your movement. And make it real.  Okay then, dominos on the table, please.  And oh, your turn.

For a Fundraiser, Set Your Criteria for Success, Then Go!

Fund-raising is sometimes a hit or miss effort, but an effort it is.  And yet, more and more, creative professionals need to fold fundraising into their sustainability plans.  To address the challenge, it occurred to me that surfacing resistance at the very start of our project, even if indirectly, might not be a bad idea.

At the start of projects, what you want most is to get people on board.  The more you can do this, the more likely people will see their own values reflected in the chosen projects, and therefore, experience their own desires to remain connected to those projects.

An unwitting mistake is often to plunge into some activity straight off.  For example, you could involve your team quickly in a fund-raising challenge by asking them to locate and engage with some online communities (it is actually one of the preliminary tasks) or do some online research highlighting admirable stories about how like-minded organizations pulled off their fundraisers, but lately, I’m thinking no.  Better to harvest the most potential by generating passionate commitment within the fundraising team.  It’s a little like deciding to play closer to home.

To do this, identify a set of professional criteria for evaluating what your successful fund-raising campaign MUST deliver before you even begin reaching out to folks.  Setting criteria helps you narrow down the best groups to appeal to.  Choosing personal criteria as well as professional criteria will also add cohesion.  For example, you could ask those in your fund-raising circle what matters to them in terms of spurring their own engagement/ commitments and then, expand the professional list to make room for those personal items.

For criteria building around my own community, I knew that it would be best to to include criteria that reflected both the personal and professional. To see what I ended up with, check out my Social Media Guidelines here. Such a criteria list is bound to help people more precisely target their efforts, help eliminate good but still not compelling enough ideas, and get individuals on a team thinking more about the MOST FRUITFUL ways to make connections and build support into their fundraiser events.

When you think about how challenging fundraising really can be, why not take the time to aim a little better?

Have You Exercised At All Today? No, I mean, exercised your brain!

There’s a book that’s been around since ‘99, but one which is the forerunner to many since. It’s called Keep Your Brain Alive by Lawrence Katz and Manning Rubin, and they’ve named their fitness practice, Neurobics.

The premise is that to keep our productivity up, we need to be exercising our brain — daily. For example, learning something new every day, like waking up and smelling something unexpected (vanilla instead of coffee), putting a chess game in a collaborative space so with each person throughout the day is responsible for making just one move, doing common tasks but with the hand you don’t typically use, and placing different gelatin filters over your lamps, (which create new associations).  These simple activities all lead the way toward increasing your mental fitness.

I particularly like the one that makes the shopping list into a treasure hunt. Instead of listing the ingredients, describe them so the shopper has to work a bit to figure out the ingredients for dinner.  Oh, and have a backup plan, just in case.

Both playful and very serious, Keep Your Brain Alive sells at Amazon.

Help in the Modern Age

This is not my strong suit, this business of asking for help.

I’ll admit it. My will to figure things out on my own inevitably interferes, and I’d willingly go ’round and ’round with something myself, sometimes for many painful hours on end, than stop the swish in my brain to find another way. The sad fact is that I’m stubborn, and can refuse to let in what would make my efforts easier.  Doesn’t have to be your fate though.  Interested in some valuable tips?  Read on.
 

 
 NAME WHAT YOU NEED

First, it’s a good thing to name what it is you actually need. For me, the passage of time and the chance to be still usually hint at where I’m lagging. Then, I follow that up with a written plan of my top 3 strategic goals and my most passionate implementation ideas, both which become incredibly useful devices for helping me see my own needs. And finally, there’s nothing like the evidence of what never seems to get done at the end of the day to amplify the ways I am simply standing in my own way (just in case I might prefer to forget!).

No, you aren’t perfect and no, you can’t do everything yourself.  But, there’s good news awaiting. Name the thing, maybe even two things, to turn things around for that day, that week, that month, and you’ll do a whole lot better.  To get closer to what this might be for you, consider naming:

• what it is you are going for so you remind yourself where your energies are best placed,
• what those things are that are not getting done, and preventing you from reaching any kind of task closure, those times when even your body feels like a slug, and you’re going ’round and ’round, and
• those small steps you can take that will pull you up and out. If you don’t know them, read ahead.

It’s an ongoing cycle, this process of checking in, naming, and moving forward by the way. And we’re not done yet!

ASK FOR HELP

You’ll need to ask for help next. There can be loads of things to say about this and nothing really to say.  Or to put it another way, you’ll either ask or you won’t (sure, since it’s always easier not to.  Avoiding keeps our super person fantasies alive). Nevertheless, it really feels like crossing a threshold when you finally can make asking primary because suddenly you’ll find many people can be helpful. Letting yourself be available to influence brings a whole lot more serendipity too.  A story someone casually shared when you asked suddenly becomes the subject for you–a useful article, angle on a creation or job lead.  It’s all good.

One caveat.  Always stay true to your overriding intention or goal. If you subsumed your own interests, now is the time to put an end to that. Instead, use your metaphorical sword and shield, remember its use.  Because to continually return to what it is YOU are going for, that’s what matters. It’s the bigger picture, the grander idea you are hatching, that even our closest friends may sometimes not truly get.  So, deflect idle comments as much as possible.  And if you’re the type that’s easily thrown off course, make sure there’s a place you pass by every day that showcases a reminder photo or  mind map to help you stay on course.

ZERO IN AND GET SPECIFIC! (what really needs a boost: managing quality, cost, service or time?) 

I’ll add that knowing where to get help is certainly going to up your chances of following through. It’s distinct for each one of us.  If you are underhanded, think virtual support or sources of volunteers. If you are time-starved, timely reviews so you get to the point of what’s primary to take care of.  If you feel distanced from your own goals and/or out of the flow of the networks you want to reach, identify a few ready advisors whose guidance can get you closer. Here are some strategies for all these areas.

• Do a google search on virtual assistants (there are hundreds but check here and there) to give yourself a little relief. Some of them are good and affordable–even in our recession, 
• Check out mentoring blogs to see who you can line up to give you feedback (the words “mentor” or “coach”,  your geographic location and area of need are worthy searches to do online), 
• Get active on social networks that pull together people around the same issues as yours, 
• Put the word out to friends, online and off, who can give you leads on where they turned.

Of course, you can also check out my previous posts on good sources for volunteers and how to find good advisors.  And if anyone out there has found their own great options, please feel free to leave your helpful comments below. 

DEVELOP NETWORKS BY BECOMING USEFUL! 

One parting thought: Getting help is a new pattern for loads of us out there and quite frankly, it’s not always clear how to get within some people’s sightline. But using our networks and continually putting our real needs out are perhaps some of the smartest ideas one can have on staying afloat.  Don’t think you always need the sturdiest of vessels to close the gap between what you don’t yet know and what you think you should; an inflatable raft is really just as good.  Need to borrow one?  Ask!

Location-Based Advertising: How’s it going?

This is the second in my series on mobile, and what’s getting me interested is this.

Whatever can save me time in seeing whether something is worth purchasing (and I’m one of those who think fewer and fewer products actually are) and save me money, I can become interested in, even if I start out lukewarm.  As a woman, what matters most to me is to have appeals that I can confidently say are within reasonable range of my own needs and interests, and avoid the feeling of fatigue associated with extraneous, poorly targeted stuff. Location-based deals AND reviews/ratings, therefore, have the potential to make my decision-making easier.

So, up comes location-based advertising tied into reviews on my radar, things like FourSquare, YELP, Loopt, Google (local directory bar codes), Gowalla, and Merchant Circle. But so far, much of it feels extraneous — how much can I actually rely on these reviews, given the critical mass is not quite there?  And for whom is location-based advertising useful when businesses can barrage you with what you don’t need or when your network produces more diversity than these groups?  Of course, location-based anything has its own terrors; take a look at Please Rob Me for what I’m talking about here.

Trust can also be undermined in other ways.  The report by the East Bay Express on YELP, a bit of time back, left many consumers feeling tricked. The allegation that businesses were put in the position of having to cozy up to YELP in order to be assured of positive reviews muddied Yelp’s reputation as a trusted source. Merchant’s Circle seems to have had issues with consumer preferences being ignored as well. The lesson: If you have a small business, what you definitely don’t want is to sully your own reputation by association and/or not understand a company’s built-in bias, preferences and terms.

Still, I believe it is better to give people space to course-correct than vilify questionable behavior  interminably (I certainly don’t have first hand experience of YELP so I can only be wary).  At any rate, it does send me down the path to explore issues in more depth on my own (I’ll keep you posted) and to encourage you to read the reviews below.

So, check out the following articles from those who can speak with more confidence, and my nod in support of those sources which can point me toward informed decision-making.

On FourSquare:
http://www.colinalsheimer.com/foursquare-friend-requests
http://www.mpdailyfix.com/do-you-play-foursquare/
http://techcrunch.com/2010/02/17/please-rob-me-makes-foursquare-super-useful-for-burglars/

On Yelp:
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_11/b4170027355708.htmhttp://www.yelp.com/biz/yelp-san-francisco
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/03/technology/start-ups/03yelp.html
http://techcrunch.com/2009/04/15/yelps-new-and-improved-iphone-app-officially-hits-the-app-store/

On Loopt:
http://techcrunch.com/2010/02/08/loopt-partners-with-mobile-spinach-to-offer-location-based-deals/
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/loopt_iphone3g.php
http://www.wirelessandmobilenews.com/2009/11/lbs-loopt-adds-pulse-and-partners-with-navteq-zagat.html
http://download.cnet.com/Loopt-for-iPhone/3000-12941_4-10863030.html

On Google:
http://techcrunch.com/2009/12/16/check-in-google-foursquare-loopt/
http://www.quickmark.com.tw/En/info/Show.asp#sw5

On Gowalla:
http://gigaom.com/2009/10/14/gowalla-vs-foursquare-who-will-win/
http://mashable.com/2009/12/25/foursquare-gowalla/
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/gowalla_is_the_anti-farmville.php
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/gowalla/id304510106?mt=8

On Merchant Circle:
http://www.killerstartups.com/Web-App-Tools/merchantcircle-com-promote-your-business
http://www.sugarrae.com/merchant-circle-can-kiss-my-consumer-ass/

Managing Your Email

I happen to think email is great.  When my phone is not working or my connection to the printer clogged, most of the time, my email is still chugging.  It is the one stream that seems to be reliable, even if it doesn’t exactly manage itself.   I love the capacity to get reminders about calendar events and to group emails via filters so that low priority items are literally “out of my sight”.  This minimizes my freakin’ out, obsessive-compulsive tendencies, my reaction to overwhelm.

Still, there are tricks of the trade to make your life easier.  Here’s what I’ve learned (for a more in-depth look at these options, click here):

• Have several email accounts to suit different purposes.  I’ve divided things up so that I have one account for personal emails and pressing communications, usually work-related.  Use online google email in conjunction with desktop email.
• Create folders that put like-minded activities together.

• Don’t let vacations or intense time demands screw you up.  Use AwayFind to auto-respond when you are away and for designating the important senders of information within your network so that their important messages get through to you via an address that pops their message into your mobile.  AwayFind essentially singles out the important, ‘must respond to’ messages eliminating the need for staying glued to checking your email box all day.
• Take advantage of mobile email capabilities.  There are tons of apps which you can search for, just using the word ‘mobile.” I like using things like JOTT which can take my voice messages and turn them into email messages or turning calendar information into email reminders.  You can go overboard on reminders but this I make sure to limit where I can.  For example, when I set up my Google calendar/send to configuration, I limit what calendars or To Do lists I really want reminders for.
• Set up Google Gears.  This enables you to view Gmail offline, which makes access much easier.
• Have a plan for backup.  Check out online backups like Mozy.

NOTE: With limited time, patience, and interest, what should guide you is your desire to simplify. It could be a really fine-tuned filtering/rules setup so your inbox doesn’t get to be “too much”, or using several accounts so that keeping up information is separated out from the day to day urgencies.  You can even consider unsubscribing and/or having newsletters and the like sent as RSS feeds.  And believe me, if all this leads to an empty inbox, it will be a joy.

Screencasting: when, why and with what?

I’m a huge fan of screencasting.  Although I’m not selling software products, I do sometimes need to explain to people how I do things on my computer and with a stream of graphics or a short video, they can see what they need to do. In short, it’s an educational resource at these times for the people I’m helping.

Then again, I can’t tell you how often I use this type of software to make use of a website idea. Without such a tool, whatever has come into view would be relegated to the scrapheap in my mind. So, at these times, it is a memory resource for me.

But for you, artist extraordinaire, screencasts might become a third kind of resource. You might want to share special tips on a process to paying clients or a technique from start to finish to get people interested in taking your classes.  Screencasting using webcams are ideal for this.

Once you establish how screencasting can be of use to you, you’ll need to decide on the best tool. If you’re going to be regularly uploading 0very small segment videos via your webcam (5 minutes or less),  something like Jing is going to make a lot of sense.  Be aware though, it is flash-based and therefore won’t work on mobile devices that don’t support the use of flash.  Iphone users, you’ll be standing at the back of this line on this one.  Download the version you’ll need, Mac or Windows, and know that the webcam feature wil cost you fifteen bucks.

However, using a similar product like ScreenToaster 2.0, it looks like you can export to Flash and AVI and change the speed of your videos (faster or  slower), and access it from anywhere  since it is browser-based.  So, perhaps your screencast can find a home on mobile.  Worth experimenting with both, especially if you’re one ready to give short demos or tutorials.

And if you’ve found other applications for screencast software, e.g., for review of the contents of creative media, like book or DVD reviews, we’ld love to know about your stories.  Perhaps, you’ll be making a screencast of that too!