A Way to Get Facebook Fans to Actually Buy

The Future Of Business

The Creative Cities Summit was a fabulous 2 1/2 day event held here in Lexington Kentucky last week.  Most of it was TED-quality, including the hallway networking.  The conference rooms were filled with “Linchpins” – people literally changing the world right now (and, I believe, some that are about to.)

March Madness Marching Band

The event was not opened by gentle flashing the overhead lights for people to come in to sit down, but by the wonderful March Madness Marching Band…. who, to my delight, made people spill their coffee with pure acoustic energy and enthusiasm…It was wonderful.

We had amazing presentations from Ben Self, Bill Strickland, Charles Landry, Rebecca Ryan, Jeremy Gutsche, Richard Florida and the best Pecha Kucha presentation set I’ve seen with Nathan Cryder, Griffin Vanmeter, Saraya Brewer, Jay McChord, Colin Wallace, Wayne Hall, Ben Askren, Todd Willey, and  moving poetry from Donna Ison.

The sessions were glued together with a spectrum of music, from circus-folk to *amazing* hip-hop, to sweeping piano, the exotic Mecca Studio, and talented guitarist Tee Dee Young… and many more I’ve not listed.

Topics ranged from livability, walkability, entrepreneurialism, social change, sustainability, technology, diversity and recovery.

I wanted it to be like pouring an energy drink over the sleepy Lexington business community… it would taste the elixir, blink its eyes, and begin doing something to change the city.

Then I overheard a conversation between two head-shaking Lexingtonians at a table near ours after one of the “edgier” presentations that went something like this:

That was different – we could never do that type of presentation…we have to be more “business like.”

At first, I thought nothing of it… but then I fully processed the message….

Devine Carama

What exactly do they think of as “business-like” and why do they think that this is sustainable?

• If “business-like” means “shush” and keep your voice down…as if inside a mausoleum….
• If “business-like” means you require the “wierd” people to modify their behavior when they meet with you….
• If “business-like” means nod in agreement with anything the crowd is saying (especially if the politicians are watching.)…
• If “business-like” means you must look and dress like everyone else…
• If “business-like” means young, white males with well-known family names…
• If “business-like” means never take chances, take the safe route which avoid failure (even if it requires mediocrity)
• If  “business-like” means your brilliant young team members must “pay their dues” at the copy machine before they are given a voice …
• If “business-like” means you focus on boosterism rather than real results.
• If “business-like” means that you “close the comments”… and disallow public criticism.
• If “business-likes” means invite the “wierd” people to your office as entertainment or consultants, but never hire them….

…then, I predict, you will be out of business soon.

Todd Willey

To me… the future of business will be much like the facets of this event… edgy, loud, unconventional…

It will make many shake their heads.  And spill their coffee.

You will be hit from all sides by things you never see coming…

• It will require large numbers of high-energy participants.
• It will make reams of money.
• It will leverage the creative energy of everyone.
• It will offend.
• It will delight.
• It will be ignored by many as “strangeness.”
• It will make you lose your best employees.
• It will destroy competition.
• It will complement our universities.
• It will attract and retain talent.
• It will put you’re city on the map… if you have the courage to actually do it.

Move over establishment… things are about to get a bit noisy.

Words To Keep You Moving Forward

I’m a bit of a quote junkie. It’s just so comforting to know others have been where I’ve been and found their way to something better. Or to discover just exactly the words I need to hear to keep me moving forward with my businesses and other goals in life.

That’s why, every so often, I like to share a short list of my recent finds and current favorites with you. May they inspire you to take more chances, live life to the fullest and be phenomenally happy and successful in whatever you choose to do!

1.    ”There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.” – Albert Einstein

2.    ”You’re not going to do good work if you’re not choosing something because it inspires you.” – Maggie Gyllenhaal

3.    ”People don’t read advertising, they read what’s interesting. Sometimes, it’s an ad.” – Howard Gossage

4.    ”Social media is like teen sex. Everyone wants to do it. No one actually knows how.” – Avinash Kaushik

5.    ”Understand that the right to choose your own path is a sacred privilege. Use it. Dwell in possibility.” – Oprah Winfrey

6.    ”A lot of people have ideas, but there are few who decide to do something about them now. Not tomorrow. Not next week. But today. The true entrepreneur is a doer, not a dreamer.” – Nolan Bushnell

7.    ”Begin somewhere; you cannot build a reputation on what you intend to do.” – Liz Smith

8.    ”Where your passions intersect with the needs of the public, therein lies your vocation.” – Aristotle

9.    ”A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.” – Winston Churchill

10.    ”The real contest is always between what you’ve done and what you’re capable of doing. You measure yourself against yourself and nobody else.” – Geoffrey Gaberino

11.    ”The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself.” – Peter F. Drucker

12.    ”Success isn’t a result of spontaneous combustion. You must set yourself on fire.” – Arnold H. Glasow

13.    ”Live a balanced life — learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and dance and play and work every day some.” – Robert Fulghum

14.    ”Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.” – John Lennon

15.    ”Blessed is he who has learned to laugh at himself for he shall never cease to be entertained.” – Shirley Maclaine

Twitter Gives 3 Huge Reasons for Businesses to Use Twitter

19 Billion Searches Per Month, 105 Million Users, 100,000 Apps

If you truly feel that not using Twitter for your business is the way to go, then don’t use it. However, Twitter dropped some pretty interesting statistics at its Developer Conference, which may perk your ears up, if not make you reconsider your position.

1. Twitter Gets 19 billion Searches Per Month.

Search Engine Land’s Danny Sullivan spoke with Twitter CEO Evan Williams who says Twitter gets about 19 billion searches per month. If you compare that with comScore estimates for the major search engines (as Sullivan did here, along with all the caveats that come with that), that puts Twitter in 2nd place, just behind Google – ahead of Yahoo and Bing.

Where Twitter ranks in searches compared to the search engines really isn’t the point. The point is that people are using Twitter and Twitter apps A LOT to find information. I think you can see where this could be useful to know from a business standpoint. By the way, Twitter also just announced a little thing called “Promoted Tweets” – ads that will initially show up for Twitter searches.

2. Twitter has over 105 million users.

Last week, Matthew Daines, the lead developer of our own Twellow did some math and suggested that Twitter had probably surpassed 100 million users. It turns out he was right, because Williams said at the conference that Twitter actually has over 105 million, and adds about 300,000 a day. Once again, I think you can see why this might be of interest.

3. There are over 100 thousand registered Apps

There are so many Twitter apps out there that are making Twitter usable and more efficient to people. There are apps that shape Twitter around a person’s specific needs. This no doubt plays a huge role in Twitter’s growth, which will continue. It also means there are a lot of ways you can use Twitter yourself as a business.

At WebProNews, we recently revisited a Twitter app directory called OneForty. Now this directory has only a fraction of that 100,000 apps listed, but there are nearly 2,700, and that’s still plenty. They are broken down into categories like advertising, analytics, business, email, mobile, monitoring, networking, shopping, etc. There is no question you will be able to find some useful apps there or in another Twitter app directory.