I am fan of vegetables…not just the lovable pop culture staples (raw carrots w/ranch,  baked potato), but the hardcore, traditionally scorned, green vegetables.  Although their deliciousness can be a divisive topic,  few deny they are an important part of a balanced diet and essential to a person’s healthy development.

Disagree?…stay with me anyway – relevance to your organization can be found shortly below…

I credit my parents with my personal affinity for the fresh and green.  With my older sister, my parents took the “You can’t leave the table till you’ve eaten all of your peas” route. It turns out Kristin is almost as stubborn as my father, so by the time the vegetables were choked down and everyone had been fighting for a few hours, it left a literal and metaphorical bad taste in her mouth. She’s picky about vegetables to this day.

Mom and Dad tried a different method with me. I never had to stay at the table till my veggies were eaten – but they did ask that once every six months I give the vegetables I thought I didn’t like an honest try. I couldn’t just make a predetermined decision, stick them in my mouth and spit them out quickly. I had to take a few good bites and really give them a chance.  If I did, I was off the hook.

Little by little I came to like the idea of trying new things, and enjoyed the vegetables more and more.  I believe this same technique holds true for new media and organizational leadership.   It’s our job to guide and inform, not to force ourselves into what everyone else is doing.

As a business developer for MediaSauce, I meet with and speak to a variety of groups, in varying industries every week. Between and within vertical markets, there is a wide spectrum of understanding and adoption of online tools. Rapid Change, Industry Regulations, Technology Infrastructure, Liability Issues, Privacy Problems, Leadership that sees little revenue potential in new tools, and budget constraints are all cited as reasons for avoiding commitment to online as a communications strategy.

If your organization or industry requires that you be more cautious, or you are a later adopter, that’s ok! Organizations in every phase of innovation adoption have good reasons for being there, and there are advantages and disadvantages to each phase. However, much like vegetables, a great online presence is a vital part of a balanced communications strategy and is essential to organizational growth. It is good for you to be connected, and it is something any organization can learn to leverage.

Champions of new media sometimes hurt their cause by forcing the issue within the group, especially in organizations that are slower to embrace new technologies. Their reaction is to list others’ success stories, and when challenged with organizational bottlenecks the value prop doesn’t directly translate.  The trick (like with food) is in the context and presentation.

I encourage you to facilitate a high level conversation around the growth of online communication and how it will continue to affect your organization. Every six months (or more often if possible) bring your leaders together with the objective of simply having an open-minded discussion about the implications of an interconnected, online world.

The goal is to honestly consider costs and risks of pursuing something new, AND weigh them against the opportunities for success and potential for revenue growth. Think about some of the ways that you can use new tools to create relevance and value in everything you do. Consider the costs of maintaining status-quo. These are the conversations that connect and resonate with executives, board members, and organizational leaders.

What will be the outcome of these conversations? I can’t say. The reality is some of the available tools still will not taste right to your organization and that is ok. But, if you are approaching the conversation around costs and benefits, and making an effort to do so regularly, great steps forward will be a natural outcome.

Be careful though, or you may find yourself pleasantly surprised as a new fan of asparagus, organizational transparency, or Foursquare.

Questions/Comments? Please feel free to email me at brad.bierwagen@mediasauce.com or follow Brad at @bbierwag

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The USPS is has been in the news quite a bit lately as it battles plummeting volume, high fixed costs and massive losses.

Proposing no Saturday deliveries and raising stamp prices merely strikes at the branches and does not deal with the root issue of whether our beloved USPS is still relevant.

The truth is – Saturday deliveries or not – this downward spiral will continue to occur.  When the USPS has to keep increasing fees to continue covering losses, it drives more and more communication on-line.  With such a high fixed cost structure, the Post Office will be forced to continue drive prices higher and send their customer base scrambling to consider more economical modes of communication.

The heart of the issue here is our Postal Service is no longer relevant.

A few years ago I was asked to keynote a national panel of CD and DVD duplicators/replicators about the future of their industry.  Guess what, it didn’t go over too well…

As a tool to measure relevancy, I presented a concept of the “recovery time.” I simply asked the audience to consider the ramifications of eliminating their products and services from the marketplace.   The “recovery time” is the degree of pain the market would endure before the product’s replacement leaves us no longer wanting what we once had.

In addition to its application for the CD/DVD industry, I asked the audience to consider the “recovery time” of the newspaper industry, the corner video store, and the Postal Service.  Think of the long-term disruption if each of these were yanked away never to return.

Think about your own business and more specifically, how relevant are you to your clients and prospects?  If you’re feeling the world would have a short recovery time in your absence, it’s critically important start defining your real value by asking a few questions:

1. What would your 10 best customers say they value most about you, beyond your product and service?
2. What root issue, pain, or gap does your organization’s product or service solve/fill?  (Think transportation not wagon wheels, think editorial content not a physical newspaper)
3. What are your organizations unique talents?
4. What are there things you ask your customers and clients to pay a premium for, because you do them better than anyone else?

By asking yourself these sometimes uncomfortable questions and framing your discussions around them, you are addressing your business challenges at the root, and you may just find the additional relevancy and margin you’ve been seeking.

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#1 Thing You Need To Know from This Post:

The single most important asset of any non-profit organization is its relationships with its volunteers, donors, and other stakeholders. If you treat these relationships like sacred data collections instead of an engaged community, you are at risk of becoming irrelevant.

A More Detailed Exploration:

I spend a good portion of my time traveling across the country to attend conferences and meet with clients and prospective clients. Even in this digital era, the custom of exchanging printed business cards is alive and well. As you can see from the photo to the right, I have quite the collection.

But don’t confuse that collection of cards for a robust network of strong relationships. Getting the card is just like adding a new person to your organization’s database. If you do nothing to build the relationship, that business card becomes an artifact proving very little other than that you once had contact with the person.

The Historical Role of the Database

Common wisdom says that you can measure an organization by the number of people who are in its database. Historically, a central staff maintained this database and treated it like a sacred collection of artifacts. In an era when information didn’t flow so easily and it was very difficult to connect with people you’d never met, protecting that collection of records at all costs was a self-evident truth. After all, these records had taken a great deal of work to assemble and represented the lifeblood of your organization.

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Last week, I had the pleasure of presenting a half-day workshop entitled “Social Media for Cause Marketers” at the 2009 Cause Marketing Forum.  We had a full house partake in this fast moving, high energy workshop. I was very pleased with the audience participation and the solid exchange of ideas.

The highlight of the program was the lively breakdown of five case studies, which starts on slide 99.  The final one (starting on slide 115) was a behind-the-scenes view of www.pledgetoendhunger.com, which includes various analytics and measurements.

All of the slides I presented are included here.  The remaining slides were from the four companies sponsoring the workshop and can be found via www.causemarketingforum.com.

If you attended, what did you think? If you didn’t, what are your questions and thoughts?

Find me on Twitter:
@scottyhendo

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The #1 Thing You Need to Learn from this Post:
Focus on running your own race and you’ll win it every time.

A More Deeper Exploration:
Regardless of your passion for horse racing, the Sport of Kings provided an inspiring lesson from this weekend’s running of the 2009 Kentucky Derby.

Never mind that Mine that Bird was a 50:1 horse. Never mind that he was trained by a cowboy living in New Mexico and didn’t have a jockey until just before race week. Never mind that he got bumped coming out of the gates and pushed to last place. Never mind that he was so far back halfway in the race that you might have mistaken him for a horse warming up for the next race.

All that matters is that Mine that Bird won the 2009 Kentucky Derby by one of the largest margins in its history. He did it because he ran his own race and played to his strengths throughout.

If you haven’t seen the race, take two-and-a-half minutes to watch. Notice the horse in the way, way back (1:10). Notice him turn on the afterburners during the final turn (1:35). And see him thread the needle on the rail (1:52) before crossing the finish line far ahead of the crowd.

What lessons can you draw from this?

Find me on Twitter:
@scottyhendo

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INDIANAPOLIS (Feb. 19, 2009) – The Indiana Economic Development Corporation’s Small Business Development Centers (ISBDC) have partnered with Carmel, IN-based MediaSauce, a national leader in online strategies and audience-driven web development, to educate Indiana entrepreneurs on tapping into new-media resources to help grow their businesses.

The ISBDC and MediaSauce will present a four workshop series titled, Strategies for Business In the Digital Age. Each workshop will deal with a focused subject including topics such as business internet strategies, using digital and social networking to drive sales, engaging and empowering customers, and case studies of businesses that have used new-media to achieve unprecedented and exponential growth.

(See all of the event dates here and buy tickets for an event in your area.)

In March, the ISBDC’s Strategies for Business In the Digital Age series will begin, with one session offered each quarter in the following communities: Bloomington, Evansville, Fort Wayne, Hammond/Valparaiso, Muncie, South Bend, and Terre Haute. For more information, specific dates, ticket availability, and locations in each area, visit www.isbdc.org or www.businessinthedigitalage.com.

About the ISBDC

The Indiana Small Business Development Center Network is an Indiana Economic Development Corporation program funded in part through a Cooperative Agreement with the U.S. Small Business Administration. Through ten regional centers, the ISBDC provides free and low-cost business advising and assistance to small businesses at any stage of development. For more information about the ISBDC, visit www.isbdc.org.

About MediaSauce

MediaSauce is an Indiana based company and a national leader in Internet strategy and audience-driven web development. MediaSauce helps companies build lasting connections that will drive business in this Interconnected Age. MediaSauce’s proprietary Digital Blueprint methodology identifies organizations greatest opportunities and builds a strategic framework to transform businesses using digital and social media. Learn more at www.mediasauce.com.

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Media Contacts:

Jeff Heinzmann – State Director, ISBDC – 317.234.2086 or jheinzmann@isbdc.org

James Burnes – VP of Development and Strategy, MediaSauce – 317.512.3612 or james.burnes@mediasauce.com

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#1 Thing You Need to Know about this Post:
The only sustainable way for you to create wealth for yourself is by improving the lives of others. Starbucks understands this and so can you. 

A More Detailed Exploration
In case you just missed it in the opening sentence, I have an earth-shattering announcement to make:

The only sustainable way for you to create wealth for yourself is by improving the lives of others.

Despite what you might have heard from others, the only true path to long-term wealth creation comes from the careful balance of private gain and social good. Think about it. You create wealth when a lot of people think what you offer to the world is important enough to them that they pay you money and then keep paying you money over long periods of time. more

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I’ve spent the past couple weeks attending conferences that included a mixture of academic leaders and corporate HR executives. An interesting term that kept coming up was “thought leader” and it seemed everyone wanted to be one.

After giving it some thought, I’ve decided I don’t want to be one.  I’d rather be a market leader.

Thinking is certainly an essential element of being a market leader.  Taking action is important, too.  Though, neither can compare to the most essential element of market leadership: results.

What do you think defines a market leader?

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What prompted the program? CEO Bryan Gray replied, “As the economy continues to shift and there is a level of uncertainty, programs like this are vital to those businesses that want to outwit, under-spend, and outmaneuver their competition.” The event will be results-focused, using specific case study examples that can help business executives apply to their business.

The session will be held at the new Clowes Auditorium at the IMCPL Central Library in Downtown Indianapolis. A limited number of tickets are available for $29 in advance (www.mediasauce.com) or $49 dollars at the door (if available). A light lunch is included with the cost of admission.

Download Press Release: “Mediasauce Announces Election 2008 Business Lessons Seminar“

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Initial Assessment:

Realizing the need that small and mid-size non-profit organizations have for quality fundraising counsel, a group of experienced fundraising professionals developed a business plan to provide their high-level services on a more economical fee structure using the Internet.  These visionary leaders chose MediaSauce as their strategic partner to bring their business plan to life. 

Strategic Recommendations:

• Develop a Strong, Cohesive Brand – We started with the fundamentals of company name, tag line, and visual identify. We helped them create an image that evoked the feelings and thoughts they wanted. This branding was implemented in all digital and print collateral.
• Build a Robust Platform to Drive Business – To provide their high-quality services at a lower cost, we created a website that could drive new business and serve as a portal for existing clients to access different levels of service. Video introduction, webinar announcements, and an easy-to-find event calendar.
• Focus on Usability - It is vital to create a strong user experience when visiting their main site. With usability as focus, we created a clean interface with highly intuitive navigation.
• Blog to Become a Thought Leader - Professional service providers depend on their knowledge. Blogging was a natural fit to help establish Achieve as the thought leader in the non-profit market.

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