New Technology Services Stickers!

Somebody called me a “Schwag Hag.”

I’m totally owning it.

Some New Branding Around Campus This Fall…

A New Technology Services Sticker Design

There’s No Delete Button on the Internet

I would love to fast-forward five years from now and see how job searches and grad school applications are being impacted by what gets posted online.

I know such filtering in the application process is being used extensively even today; but I see no brakes being applied by the Millenials I interact with, and what they choose to share on the interwebz.

Maybe it will lead to a more forgiving political climate. Maybe it will lead to a more open social structure.

But how will those embarrassing photos from your twenties play out when you’re up for that “big promotion” in your forties?

Think before you post. There’s no delete button – yet – for the Internet.

What’s Happening

I’ve been immersed in my new job – and I’m happy to say that it is going better than anyone has a right to expect.

Sure, it has challenges like any job. But overall, I’m having a blast and getting to work with extremely intelligent and talented people, in a beautiful setting.

What’s not to like?

Since my new position requires a great deal of diplomacy, tact, and a high degree of self reflection, I’m re-examining the ways I interact on social media and in the blogosphere. Not because I want to change or deflect from who I am, but because I don’t want my online interactions to devolve into a boring CIO “coach speak” persona, or become so generic as to become entirely uninteresting.

Gag. Who wants to read that?

Not me.

So, until I find that I have something interesting to add to the conversation, I’m going to be concentrating more on listening and less on writing.

For now.

Getting Paid – It’s Not Dirty

Everyone does it.

Few speak of it openly.

Getting Paid.

We wouldn’t be here if someone didn’t get paid. Your parents did – you’re living proof.

So why are we uncomfortable talking about getting paid?

Double entendres aside, why is it so hard for people to admit that goods and services have intrinsic worth that should be fairly compensated in return for receiving said goods and services?

In part, blame Canada the Internets. Blame iTunes. Blame YouTube. Blame Twitter. Blame Facebook. Blame every “free” service you receive for the perception that content and goods have zero friction, and therefore, zero cost and value.

It’s a lie that has spread too far and too wide.

Alas, content is not free. Neither is the talent used to create said content, whether it be that favorite application you use, that web site you can’t peel yourself away from, or those songs clogging up your phone.

Things have a value, and a cost associated with creating that value.

There’s an old adage that says some people know the cost of everything but the value of nothing. On the internet, most understand this saying as “the cost of everything is nothing, therefore, the value of everything is nothing.”

Weekly, I wind up disappointing someone over this mis-perception. The stark reality is that underlying the act of creation there’s this little thing called “cost of goods sold.” And it’s never zero.

How do the creators of content go about changing the perception that everything online should be freely available, everywhere, at all times?

First, stop being a doormat by giving away your content. And second, be prepared for enduring the consequences of doing so.

Does this sound a little too “get the hell off my lawn?”

Sure it does. It comes with being a grown up.

Just like understanding there’s no such thing as Santa. Not even on the Internet.

Cheap Gas! 3.02 Now Available in iTunes

Cheap Gas! 3.02 is now available in iTunes.

Cheap Gas! is now owned by GasBuddy.com… watch this space for upcoming changes!

New Splash Screen

We Need More Contact, Not More Connections

I have several thousand Facebook Friends and Twitter Followers.

I have a few hundred contacts on LinkedIn.

There are only a handful of any of these that are actually friends who would help me move furniture, or drop me off at an airport.

We have any number of ways to connect to people – social media networks (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn), email, telephone, SMS, Skype, Chat, yada yada yada.

Few take the time to actually make meaningful contact.

I don’t mean a pitch – I mean, create a lasting, personal relationship with the people we titularly are “connected” to.

The past ten years have seen the transition from conducting business primarily in person to conducting business mostly with people we may never ever meet in person, face to face.  Over the past two years, the majority of my business has come from people I have never met in person, and may never get to meet.

I’m not saying this is a bad thing.  But I am saying that this loss of personal contact has caused us to be less effective communicators, rather than more effective.  Seems counterintuitive, what with all the “friends” we have.

In fact, I posit that the abundance of choice in the number of ways that we can communicate clouds our judgment over how we should communicate.

Sure – it’s funny when you see a cartoon about some dude doing the “crackberry prayer” at Thanksgiving Dinner.

Till YOU do it.

I received an email notification from an automated system this morning telling me that an app had failed a certification process.  The offending incident wasn’t actually a flaw in the application itself, but rather was a one-off issue with another service that it relied upon.  A two minute phone call would have adequately communicated this – and now, the basically identical software must be resubmitted to be tested again.

Sure – the communication mechanism served the person reviewing the software beautifully; it failed me miserably, and in the process has added two more weeks of lag time to the release of a new version of software.

All because it was too big of a pain in the ass for somebody to pick up the phone for a two minute call.

We need to make sure we are contacting and not merely connecting.

An Open Note to Mobile Ad Networks – Show Me The Money

It seems like once every couple of weeks I’m complaining about the see-saw nature of mobile advertising rates.  Of late, the rates have been what I consider to be abysmal (sub $4 to low $3 CPM).

This is particularly frustrating if you’re serving up between 500,000 and 1,000,000 impressions per month.

And seemingly, just as often, I’m approached by competing ad networks wanting me to switch to their platform.

They always want to talk about how they can pick and choose between several publishers and that their tech is superior.

You know what I want to know?

How much am I going to get paid.  Period.

Seems harsh, but here’s what I’m supplying and risking for switching to any ad publisher: my (or more properly, my app’s) reputation and traffic.

If they are only offering what I’m getting today – or less – what’s the point of even talking?

Today the cycle repeats.  I have an ad network calling to make their pitch, and I can almost predict the spiel.

Mr. Ad Network cubicle guy, you REALLY want my business?

Pay me a signing bonus for switching to your network.  Pay me for the time I have to take to integrate your ad client into my software, unit and system test it to make sure it doesn’t blow up under load, and bake it for 2-3 weeks in the App Store approval queue.

But please, don’t come to me expecting me to switch because you have the best brokering system since bartering began.

Show Me the Money.

Sign o’ the Times Redux

Yesterday I commented on why I wasn’t re-upping on my local Chamber memberships this year.

Today, I’d like to offer up what I consider, in my humble opinion, to be what Chambers of Commerce have to do in order to stay relevant in today’s business environment.

I can actually sum it up in three words: More Meaningful Engagement.

But before I offer up concrete examples of how Chambers of Commerce can provide these improved avenues for engagement, let me restate the problem:

The days of simply joining a local Chamber to see and be seen are a thing of the past.  The existing business environment is entirely too fluid to think that offering a window placard and a free ticket to a golf event is going to sway businesses to fork over several hundred – or thousand – dollars a year in order to be “current.”

Chambers have to offer a compelling argument on how they are helping local business succeed.  And, at least for me, my local Chambers are not fulfilling that function.

More Meaningful Engagement

Chambers are now competing with other pay-for-networking organizations (like So-Social and Red Carpet Mondays) and with free networking events (TweetUps, Bar Camps, Meetup.com).

Offering big ball room events where there is a speaker, little room or time for physical mobility, and no formal channels for follow up ain’t working.

In order to facilitate meaningful networking, events should be offered in venues where intimate communication can take place among a manageable number of participants.  Many chamber events seem to be designed to allow companies to bring along 5-10 people to a catered affair as a means for promoting the Chamber and not for the participants to offer anything in return.  This is good if you work for one of these companies and are looking for a couple of hours to kill outside the office, but not entirely beneficial if you’re looking to do something that can bring business your way.

The format of a TweetUp is probably the most recognizable format for what I’m talking about, and it is tremendously effective for connecting to like minded people or with people who need what your company is selling.

Listen, Not Just Talk

Most Chamber functions are speaker-centered.  That is, a speaker is touted, the audience shows up, and then leaves.

Why not offer events where Chamber members can tell their own business story in an extended format, where prolonged engagement can occur?

Chambers are supposedly filled with businesses looking to tell their stories, but rarely are afforded the chance to do so under the auspices of their respective member organizations.

A great model for this is the Bar Camp, where speakers volunteer to do short presentations in front of their peers.  These events can be single day, and with a strict timeline in place can afford a great deal of information to be communicated in a short period of time to an interested group of motivated people.

Get to Know Your Members

In my five years as a member of one of the local Chambers, I’ve never been invited to visit the Chamber offices (aside from a mass mailing meet and greet) or out to lunch to discuss, one on one, what my business is doing or to talk about where I see my business fitting into the local business community by any staffer of the local Chamber.  Not once.

If you don’t know me, there is no way to know how you can help me.

Make Your Organization Accessible and Accountable

Each Chamber should have a recognizable face in their respective communities, whether that be one or two high profile people, who are approachable and accountable for making things happen.  Social Networking is a good – though not exclusive by any means – place to start.

In short, a local Chamber should have low-barrier to entry means of communication with staffers that are geared toward the way people work today, not the way that they worked in 1995.  I would love to be able to quickly text a message to ask a question of the local Chamber.  I would love to be able to tweet or DM a message to a Chamber Twitter account for a response from the community.  Leaving a voice mail message or an email to be answered a few days later is simply not acceptable.

Make Your Brand “Business” and “Business” Your Brand

Some Chambers of Commerce think they “exist to exist.”  That is to say, the events they provide seem to offer nothing more than a way to generate a revenue stream in order to stay in business, with the value of the content events being secondary to promoting and building business.

In fact, one of our local Chambers (the biggest one actually) has created an overarching parent agency and has subjugated several different programs that were “Chamber” programs as separate “business lines” within the parent organization… with the Chamber itself as one of the subjugated “lines of business.”

Something’s wrong here.  Is the Chamber there to fund a larger parent organization –  and in some cases, an individual – or is it there to promote business, and more specifically, MY business?

If the answer is the former, don’t be surprised when people vote with their feet.

Cheap Gas! Version 3.0 Now in iTunes! Augmented Reality is HERE!