I created a tag cloud from the text of Obama and McCain bios located on their website.
The larger the word, the more it is emphasized in the candidates bio.
Special thanks to http://tagcrowd.com for the tagcloud.
I recently interviewed Beth Seabright, managing director of Tucker Arensberg, P.C., about her program to motivate young associates at her law firm to take business development initiatives. After you read this great article, check out how the program worked in a bit more depth by reading the below:
1. Did you provide your team with additional resources to point them in the right direction. For example, did you create a list of possible speaking engagements for them to attend, or were they expected to research this on their own?
I did provide additional resources for them. I suggested publications for articles, speaking engagements, networking events and occasionally set up lunches with my contacts that I wanted my attorneys to get to know. I coached them through phone calls when they were reaching out to contacts for the first time and walked them through various business development scenarios. I helped the Associates to get to their goal in any way that I could.
2. Did you post people’s point score continuously and publicly?
I sent out the results every two weeks to our Associates and occasionally included our Managing Shareholder.
3. Did that create a competitive or a collaborative environment?
I would say more motivating than competitive. A few Associates that were not making the time for the program initially saw that other Associates were making progress toward the goal and were inspired to meet with me to put together a plan to catch up with their colleagues.
4. What was the logic behind assigning which point values to which activities?
The more difficult the task, the higher the point value. I made a list of all of the activities included in the program and ranked them from simple to challenging. For instance, meetings with me: easy - Associates received 2 points/meeting. New clients were worth 10 points.
5. And lastly, have you been able to correlate a dollar amount to the biz dev challenge–ROI?
To be honest, I did not go back and correlate dollar values to the challenge, simply because a lot of the value in the program was planting the business developing seeds with the Associates. While our more senior associates brought in new matters and clients, which I could easily correlate with a dollar value, our younger associates were setting up meetings and writing articles for the first time, activities that were not going to create instant new business.
Quiver&Quill commentary: If I ran a business development program for a law firm, I would use a similar framework to motivate my young associates. Here’s how it would work:
The process starts by answering one of two questions:
The next step — turn the young associate into a resource.
Incent them to attend lectures, visit social networks, read niche publications and develop a personal interest in the areas that matter to prospects. Finally, place them into situations like conferences and events where they can help prospects and demonstrate their resourcefulness.
(Image courtesy of Krishna De, from Flickr)Children are less likely to lose touch with their friends because they’re connected by social networking sites from the moment they begin school. This was not the case with my parents’ generation. I recently reconnected on Facebook with a friend from middle school. Within two days, five of my other middle school classmates had reconnected with me. There was something exciting about looking at their profiles to see who they’ve become, how their faces have changed and how their personalities haven’t.When today’s kids grow up, their entire social network will age with them. They will decide who to remove from their networks and how much access to grant those who remain, rather than seeking out old friends. How will this affect their sense of who they are, who they were and whom they consider to be their people?
I love this lil’ email from Daily Candy. It’s personal, engaging and perfectly sassy. The signature is brilliant: “We look forward to working with you.” It welcomes me as a member of a team and creates the expectation that they want to help.
American Public Media’s Marketplace, a national radio show, has a great interview with E&J Gallo Winery CEO Joe Gallo called “Growing up in the wine industry.” A few highlights:
“There are two big decisions to make in life: What you do and who you marry. And a lot of people get one right and not the other.”
“I’ve been guided by my dad’s philosophy on what it takes to be successful in business:
-Stay independent
-Hire good people
-Strive for perfection
-Never be satisfied
-Don’t plan too far ahead
-Have a sense of urgency
-Work like hell
-Be lucky
Listen to the entire podcast here:
http://marketplace.publicradio.org/display/web/2006/11/16/growing_up_in_the_wine_industry/
Do we want choice, or just the perception of choice?
I believe we are most persuaded by marketing that simplifies the act of choosing.
Here’s why:
Originally uploaded by Jason DeRusha
I pay at the counter at my favorite lunch place. Most people do not tip even when they sit and at this little dive. I’ve noticed that when people pay with a credit card, they always tip well. And when they pay in cash, they seldom tip.
When they pay with a credit card, the receipt is printed with a blank line for the tip. And when they pay in cash, there’s obviously no such line.
It’s the expectation of leaving a tip—or the fear of insult surrounding leave the tip line blank, which causes many people to tip when paying with a credit card but not when paying cash.
I would love to see how asking customers paying in cash, “do you want to leave a tip?” would affect how many of them do. So, do you want to leave a comment?
P.S. I am currently at blog group deciding whether to delete this post or explain it further. The point I want to emphasize is the “do you want fries like that phenomena” that when people are asked directly they tip. This restaurant is a little take out place, I appreciate their service and acknowledge it often with gratuity.
I work with 40+ sales reps from both local and national media companies every month placing digital media buys for clients. Most sales reps fail to close a deal or earn a repeat order not because of their digital knowledge or skills, but rather shortcomings in their service.
Here are a few common mistakes:
1. Treating an agency’s smaller and larger clients differently. The size of the client does not always correlate to their budget on a particular campaign.
2. Renegotiating rates during a media buy rather than scheduling a time during the planning process to discuss.
3. Failing to provide added value—or offering no incentive to clients who continue to renew orders.
4. Failing to offer ideas and suggestions to enhance the campaign.
5. Selling out of inventory without informing the agency ahead of time.
6. Only talking or emailing the agency when they are placing a buy—this will guarantee a strictly transactional relationship.
7. Failing to inform the agency about changes to the media website and its essential stats (uniques, TOS, impressions, new content and sponsorable assets)
8. Failing to provide the agency with a wrap up report
9. Complaining…about the size of a buy; the fact that a competitor received the same buy; the urgency with which a buy needs to be executed
10. Forgetting reoccurring advertisers in favor of short-term profitable opportunities
11. Mistaking when the agency is looking for an idea versus when an agency has an idea and is searching the right digital venues to execute it.
12. Failing to hit deadlines. This is both when the campaign goes live and when the campaign has concluded.
13. Failing to deliver all the media that the agency booked—and informing the agency after the campaign has ended.
Here are a few ideas from my reading that I found intriguing this week:”Forty percent of all mothers in the U.S., believe it or not, are on Myspace. Twelve percent of all internet minutes are spent on Myspace. Forty-five percent of all users on Myspace are over the age 35,” Chris Dewolfe, CEO of Myspace in Business Week, 6/2/08.
“Life conspires to beat the rebel out of you,” Bogusky says, dropping one of those lines that could be either authentic on-the-fly wisdom or something he once saw on a T-Shirt. “I was at a meeting at Nike recently with a bunch of senior people, and that’s just the thought that went through my head. For everyone at the table I could see how life was trying to beat it out of us.” Alex Bogusky quoted in Fast Company, June 2008.
While I’m not a gamer, this game might just make me one. Thanks to @jowyang for pointing this out.
Twitter gives a context for the mundane. Life’s small details are no more or less important than they were before Twitter, just now more people are paying attention to them. And I think that is a good thing.
It’s cleaning day. It’s discovery day. After sorting through papers for the past coupla hours, I discovered a letter an old mentor of mine wrote.
He’s a world famous author. When I was 10, we lived across the street from him. His wife made us tea, and we watched Ken Burns documentaries and talked about World War II and sailing. He gave me the first book which made me want to read, “The Count of Monte Cristo.”
I moved away a year later. We stayed in touch via email. When I graduated college, five years ago, he wrote me this :
“Zachary—I’d guess you are cut out to be a writer. Think you’d have the talent, brains, etc. Do you have what it takes to go down that long and lonely road which you have somewhat accurately foreseen? Who knows? I don’t. Neither do you. It ain’t an easy trip.
You’ll need to know what sort of writer you will be. Fiction or non-fiction. If non-fiction, a reporter of the world (a fine skill) or someone like George Orwell, and many others, who show us reality filtered through their own value system. If fiction do you pick one of then “genre” and within it, do your thing? Or do you try to appeal to the academics who control the world of literary criticism and sign up for whatever is the current darling of the English Professors?
Whatever you decide, I think you have to decide to write for two people. One is yourself, and one is that worthy reader to whom you wish to deliver your image, your vision of a street scene, your memory of two people getting acquainted. Early one, decide if you want to be published. If so you must face the reality of the world of publishing and aim at an audience large enough to provide some sort of sales…”
If I were to write, I hope to capture those Sunday afternoon of drinking tea and talking about the war with my neighbor.
I knew I was doomed from the second I saw the word bachelor party in the subject line. It wasn’t spam. It was far worse: the massive group email that you can’t opt out of.
It was sent to my work email. A good friend of my cousin’s sent this particular email inviting the more than 20 guys who received it to help organize a bachelor party. By the time I read the email nearly all twenty guys had responded with a “reply all” to the group. Some messages were essential, like what city to host the party. And others were less so, for example, “LOL Bob.”
The comment threads are just beginning. We’re months away from the bachelor party. As it gets closer, there will be more inside jokes amongst people I don’t yet know arriving like “personal letters” from the Publisher’s Clearinghouse in my inbox.
There is no real way to ask people not to use my work email. If I do, when I arrive at the bachelor party, I’ll be that “jerk” from the email list.
What do you do in a situation like this?
In a few weeks I’ll be in a small village in Colombia trying to impress my girlfriend’s grandparents. And as impressive as Twitter, Facebook, social media and advertising might be, I think learning Spanish is a far more effective way to go here. So I’ve covered my apartment with Spanish phrases and words, and my friend Karlenis hand selected the phrases (i.e., appliance tagging). I’ve also downloaded a few Spanish books on audible. So as long as they ask me one of 50 or so phrases, I’ll be just fine. Hasta manana.
The smell of brick, spring flowers and Fenway-
He sits peacefully in the sun, an old man selling plastic birds.
As a young man, did he sell papers on same corner?
I ask him if I could take a picture.
He nods yes.
I do not want a plastic bird.
I want a photo.
“I would like a green one,” I say.
He passes it to me as if bestowing a secret
“You have to fill it with water,” he says filling it with water.
I blow.
Nothing happens.
“You have to pucker your lips,” he says.
I pucker my lips and blow again.
From the plastic bird emerges a beautiful song that floats above the traffic
How many Bostonians own one of his birds?
And if they played at the same time what magic would fill the streets:
Cars would stop
Women would leave their salons, nails wet, to watch
Cats chasing after the sound of his plastic birds
My friends started a website called Nkd Guru. They are finalist in a competition, and the winner receives a cool million dollars in venture funding. Check out their stuff, and if you like it, vote for them. Even if you don’t like it, their accent and the video is cool enough to earn the vote. And if you love the idea, as I do, help spread the word.
How to vote:
1. Click on this link - http://youbethevc.com/finalists
2. Click the “Join” tab
3. Fill out your info
4. Click the “Finalists” tab
5. And Click 5 GREEN STARS under the nkdguru logo
(NOTE: There is no confirmation per se, the indication is in the form of 5 stars changing color from “white” to “green”)
More than thirty attended the third Rubber Chicken Social Club dinner at Chang Sho restaurant in Cambridge. We shared great food and conversation. In order to facilitate this, everyone at the dinner received a note card with an assignment. The names of three different people at the dinner and questions to ask them were written on each card. The questions were conversation starters based on people’s areas of expertise or interest.
For example, one question read: “Ask Bob how he uses Second Life in his business.” and another “Ask David what the difference is between filming for the web and filming for TV.”
After each course the ten people at each of the three tables switched places. From what I could tell everyone had the opportunity to get to know each other.
My favorite moment of the evening happened when I looked around the table to see everyone happily eating Chinese food and discussing social media, politics, PR, the Cambridge geek scene, investing and mobile user interface design. It felt like one of those movie moments when the soundtrack kicks in.
Thanks for making the Rubber Chicken Social Club a success. If you’d like at attend the next dinner, email me, or send me a tweet (quiverandquill). Bring a healthy appetite and your sense of humor.
A creative ad caught my eye on Facebook today. A young man used a Facebook flyer to ask prospective employers to hire him. When you click on his ad, you arrive at his YouTube page with a short pitch (see it below). I love the concept of job seekers targeting prospective employers with creative techniques like these.
I am speaking at the National Association of Broadcasters next week. The topic of my talk is “How to Activate Listeners Online.” My strategy is to share with the audience that online marketing isn’t just one set of strategies. In fact, there are hundreds of strategies and many critical outcomes which trigger which of those strategies are selected. For example, all of the outcomes below are important to interactive directors of media companies; however, the selection of strategies is contingent on the budget and order of importance of the outcomes. Key outcomes for radio websites:
I’ll put my slides on slideshare.net after the presentation.
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