"Why reports of Nevada's Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated"

This morning I had the privilege of attending a joint breakfast sponsored by the Northern Nevada Development Authority, the Carson Valley Chamber of Commerce and the Business Council of Douglas County.  The two main topics were to recognize the export achievements of Aervoe Industries and to hear Nevada Secretary of State, Ross Miller speak about what he called "Forging a Path to a New Nevada Economy".

For more than 40 years, Aervoe has been a recognized leader and manufacturer of industrial use products including paints, specialty coatings, cleaners and lubricants.  Today they were recognized for executing a strategic change in their approach to export markets throughout the world.  When the construction and commercial real estate markets crashed, Aervoe CEO David Williams watched many close friends lose revenues and lose businesses.  They realized that they needed to make a real change.  Today, they were recognized by national and local officials for the success of efforts to expand into new international markets.  Kudos to Aervoe, their management team and US Commercial Services staff that helped make their dreams a reality.

Mr. Miller started his talk with a lightness that beguiled many of the challenges that the local economy is facing.  He showed headlines that broadcast doom and gloom yet to tell us that many of them were decades old.  And he used this to make the point that when a roadblock was put in the way of the Nevada economy (i.e downturns in mining, changes in California divorce law), that Nevadans always bounced back with new ideas and new industries.  And he backed it up saying that the numbers are showing that a recovery is happening right now.

And how is his office doing their part?  By launching whynevada.com, his office is providing a central source of information about why businesses should locate in Nevada.  They also want to eliminate barriers to licensing and reporting so that business ideas can get out of the garage.  They are also going launch a business portal this spring that will guide businesses through the process of starting a business in Nevada.  He said that it would be a "do it yourself hub" that would minimize the need to have an attorney to just get started.

To show that turning around the Nevada economy was possible, he cited the turnaround in Denver that started in the '90s and the industry clustering strategies employed by Utah as examples of successes in the Western US.  Yes, he admitted that there are still media reports broadcasting economic doom in the state and in conclusion, he confidently stated that "we are on our way back".

Webinar review: What No One is Telling You about your Content Marketing Strategy

Awareness Inc. (www.awarenessinc.com) has been a great resource in learning more about Social Media.  Now, it's fair to say that many folks out there are doing seminars, webinars and presentations about the in's and out's of SoMe (that's a new one I learned yesterday).  While many that I've seen have been outstanding in their own way, yesterday's webinar by Jason Falls got to the heart of the issue.  Jason did a great job of making what seems like a "black box" to some just beginning to investigate this new phenomenon, another tool in the overall marketing strategy.  Of course, there are many complications that SoMe brings up that traditional marketing tools can provide, and yet there are basic and simple concepts that everyone should remember.  And this matters for the casual user or the sophisticated marketing professional.

Here are the four keys to approaching content strategy that Jason outlined yesterday:

1. Content is King - Yes, we've all heard this before, but what does it mean in this new world of marketing?  It means that you need to be engaging.  With traditional media we have been used to a one-way conversation.  TV ads blare at us.  Print ads getting in the way of what we are trying to read.  Loud pitches on the radio interrupt our groove in listening to music.  Now we have DVR's, eReaders and MP3 players that help eliminate much of the cacaphony of ads trying to blitz us at every turn.  With the advent of SoMe and other ways of getting our much needed content to support our personal belief structures, we want to have the choice to engage, observe or ignore.  So content needs to be written and produced with the audience in mind.  Period.
2. SoMe can be a conversation and even more important, it inherently is a measurement tool to find out how the interaction is playing out.  And this conversation is all about enhancing your brand, protecting your reputation, building community, driving sales and leads to your door, research & development and customer service.  All of these mean creating a relationship and having a conversation is required to do that.
3. In creating a relationship with the consumers of your content, you have the ability to answer many questions about them, find out what resources or knowledge you have to offer that has perceived value and engage them in a fun way.  With the intent of solving problems, listening to needs and truly being engaging, SoMe offers new methods of creating a connection that does not exist in traditional marketing.  It's all about creating a two-way connection.
4. Just as traditional marketing is used in trying to reach a market strategically, the use of SoMe must be considered strategically alongside traditional marketing techniques.  Not only do certain SoMe alternatives have different orientations, you communicate differently depending on the types of engagement users are seeking.

So, a big thank you to @JasonFalls for his outstanding presentation.  If you want to learn more about Jason and what he has to offer, check out his website (www.exploringsocialmedia.com), connect with him on Twitter and kick your knowledge of social media into the stratosphere!

Having trouble budgeting and forecasting?

So, there are many people that are considered visionaries.  For general market and sociological trends, folks like Alvin Toffler and Faith Popcorn have provided their personal insights into the future.  They do extensive research.  They need to analyze a lot of data because the complexity of the environment they are considering is enormous.  With all the raw data that is out there, how do they do it?  They employ lots of people to summarize vast amounts of data.

Closer to home, the question you have to ask yourself in planning the future of your business or organization, “Is it important to my strategies and what level of research do I need to perform to assist in properly positioning my organization?”.

With the power of technology, there are many disciplines that are continuing to advance the ability of being able to predict the future.  Weather is something that we all pay attention to in varying degrees.  From agriculture to the daily commute, everyone has an interest in the weather.  And as computers have become more powerful, so have the predictive models.  And it seems that weather forecasters are just as wrong as before.  And predicting weather still eludes many forecasters when the best true predictor of the weather today is still yesterday’s weather.

Let me ask you this.  When you are planning your budgets for the next year, what is the most difficult to predict, revenues or expenses?  I would guess that most of you have a harder time with predicting revenues or sales or the “top line”.  For this post we’ll spend more time talking about forecasting revenues for your product or service.  Most expenses are fairly predictable.  Most expenses are either fixed and therefore, the same as last year, or they are variable with revenues.  So unless you have a good idea where your revenues are going, then your variable costs will be just as wrong as your predicted revenues. 

When forecasting revenue, using a little science and a little art is required.  The science part is when you look at past revenues and look at three characteristics: 1) the overall level of sales, 2) the trend and 3) the seasonality of your business.  For the more mathematical minds out there, this is y = a ± bx ± cx².

The level of sales has to do with the base level of past sales. The easier way to think about this is either you are General Motors or you are a main street gift shop.  When looking at the past 2-5 years, you can generally estimate the base level of your revenues.

The trend of your business is which direction your business is going (hopefully up and not down) and to what degree of growth or decline you have experienced.  If you have experienced a 5% annual growth in revenues over the past 2-5 years, then it would seem most likely that your revenues will continue to grow, all other things remaining equal.  In these economic times, this number is probably the most difficult to predict.

The seasonality of your business is more dependent on what you are actually selling and when your customers want to buy what you are selling.  This is just a guess but I can imagine that snowboards probably sell better during the winter than in the summer and bicycles probably sell better in the spring and summer than in the fall and winter.  These are just a couple of examples.  You have to look at your entire marketing plan to find out what affects the selling of your product or service. 

I have described the basics of the science of predicting revenues for your product or service.  The art of forecasting is a little trickier.  As we all know, the past is not necessarily the best predictor of the future.  The external environment always has something to throw at you that can make you scream.  There may be market trends that are different from your business’s trends.  Interest rates may go in an unpredicted direction.  Competition may get a new cost advantage and put pressure on you to lower prices, thus lower revenues.  Others may be increasing their promotional budgets causing you to lose loyal customers. 

These are just a few of the possibilities where the external environment can significantly impact demand and revenues.  The trick is to try to get as much information as is financially feasible.  Now comes the balancing act.  The more information you have and the more time you invest in budgeting, planning, forecasting or estimating, the more accurate you will be.  And at some point there is a point of diminishing returns.  And there is point when you need to pay attention to the day-to-day operations of your organization.

Just remember one thing: your marketing plan is what directs your business and what will help in your ability to accurately predict demand and revenues.

Are you going BIG or going home? Coaching and consulting in today's business world

One of the great things about being a member of ProNet in Reno, a member-based organization of unemployed professionals, is the quality of speakers at the Monday morning meetings.  Yes, the meetings are required to be an active member of this non-profit, and the speakers are always informative, interesting and timely.  This past week we had a speaker that blew everyone's socks off.  Brian Sharp is a speaker and business coach with his own firm, Go BIG.  Now you are probably thinking that you've heard it all, seen it all, played the game and bought the t-shirt, yet I have to say that Brian (sorry but he's a little too young and hip for me to call him Mr. Sharp) hit home for those of us that were lucky enough to listen to his down-to-earth style, simple strategies and stories that came from the heart.  Check out his website Go Big Company to see more about what he has to offer.

Being from Northern California and having lived in San Diego for 15 years, I really could relate to the surfing analogies that he used.  Great imagery defined him right from the start.  And what does the B-I-G stand for in Go BIG?  Believe-Identify-Go Big. 

Starting with Believe, he laid out the idea of starting the day on purpose.  Use silence to clear the mind.  Have gratitude for everything you have in life.  Speak affirmations to bring yourself into greatness.  Visualize the results.  He's probably not the first to say these things or to even say them together, but Brian gave us all a road map that would help us believe in ourselves.

Moving on to Identify, this section was all about being focused and fanatical about setting priorities, creating strategies and committing to activity that will meet those goals.  He even quoted Yoda - "Do or not do, there is no try."  The most critical point was to define what a good day means to you.  So many times we spend the day defining it by what doesn't happen or what happens to us that we see as negative or detrimental to our planned progress.  He offered a great tool - identify 2-3 things at the beginning of your day that would make it a great day.  Then guess what?  Work towards accomplishing those things.

Last was Go Big.  This section was all about personal motivation, sacrifice and commitment.  He urged us on to get out of our comfort zone.  Be willing to push ourselves beyond what feels comfortable.  Look at the water's edge and be willing to take a chance.  He quoted the Dalai Lama, "Measure your success by what you had to give up to get it."

So in the end, Brian left us with simple steps to live life to the fullest.  Cuz it's simply worth living.  COWABUNGA, DUDE!!!

Politics in the playground

When was the last time that you had a conversation about politics with an second-grader?  It's amazing how simple their perspective can be.  I had to share this because it just tickled my funny bone a la Jack Linkletter's "Kids Say The Darndest Things".  So Bethany is listening to the radio with me (NPR) and she blurts out, "I think I want to be a Democrat."  So I'm thinking to myself that there must be some context for this, so I ask her why.  She says, "It's because the Republicans have so many rules."  Of course, second graders basically want to play and be creative and rules frankly just get in the way of all that. 

A while back she had mentioned that during recess that they were playing "Democrats and Republicans" like it was some modern day version of Cowboys and Indians, so I asked her another probing question to see what all this meant to her.  "So are you guys still playing Democrats and Republicans?", I asked.  She replied, "No, we quit playing that a couple of months ago because it was too boring."  Now at this point, I couldn't contain my laughter.  The humor I saw was that the real Democrats and Republicans have quit "playing" a long time ago.  And I had to explain to Bethany that I wasn't laughing at her but with her but I don't really know if she got it.  The truth is that she and her friends really got it.  I hope that the real politicians far and wide can figure out how to play well in the sandbox because it affects the rest of us playing the game of life.