I totally get that the blogger was giving credit and therefore felt he had done the right thing.  But he’s wrong.  I’m not claiming to be a lawyer or anything, but here’s an easy one:  if a blogger has a common use statement on their blog, you have to follow that.  They generally lay out exactly how  you can use the content and give credit.  ”thanks to so and so for this post” is NOT acceptable.  If the person does not have the common use statement out somewhere, you shouldn’t take that to mean it is a free for all and start grabbing their content.  In fact, it is more likely that person has someone scanning the internet for these scenarios.

So what should you do if you like a blog post?  First, always give credit up front.  It should be incredibly clear to the reader who wrote the post.  Link to it even.  Don’t lift the content and copy and paste.  Instead, discuss the article.  Add thoughts or comments, site specific quotes and react, or expand on an idea.  Write it as if you got a chance to talk to the author and got to tell them about your feelings to their face.  It is entirely possible they will see the link back and see your article.  Much better attention than a note from their lawyer!

Copyright seems tricky but the reality is, what someone else writes belongs to them.  If they are willing to share they will tell you.  And if not, don’t use it.

But I was impressed  because it was genius.  If we had even the most tenuous relationship, when I called if the person could say we met somewhere or talked at some point and they truly thought I’d be interested, I’m hooked.  To tell someone they made enough of an impression on you that you remembered them when something came up is a huge ego boost and would definitely get my attention.

So do this the way it was intended.  Go to a networking event and meet people.  Jot down on the back of their business card something they said or something they are interested in.  When you follow up after the event, don’t just send a “great to have met you” email- instead, include in it something that is based on what they discussed; something they would truly be interested in.  If you don’t have it electronically, send it hard copy.  But be sure to put your name on it and have the note say something to reference your conversation so they have a context.  At the end of the day your messages will get noticed and people will think of you as someone who really pays attention.  Meanwhile, I’m not returning this call.  But I’m still impressed.

First, he wore a dress shirt and tie but had his sleeves rolled up.  He didn’t come dressed to the teeth – he came dressed in a professional but accessible way.  Next, he asked good questions.  We have all been told to ask our clients, “what keeps you up at night?” and that’s one he asked.  But then he listened and paid attention to the answer. He took notes, obviously while the people were talking, and then at the end, gave a summary of the meeting where he was able to reference specific things each person said.  So he started the meeting stating he wanted to hear their issues, he listened and took notes, and at the end was able to explain to others what they said.  How  do you think those business owners felt at the end of that meeting?

Wouldn’t this be much easier to do with your clients? After all, you don’t have to line up secret service or shut down blocks of traffic to have a meeting.  Sitting down with your clients in a casual atmosphere, asking good, pointed  questions about their business and then being able to discuss those concerns after the meeting go a long way in showing how much you value their business.  If you can’t be there in person, schedule a phone conversation and really ask those questions that they want to answer – “what keeps you up at night?”; “what are your biggest challenges in the next 6 months?”; “what one thing could have a large positive impact on your business?”; etc.  And then, do what you can to follow up.  If the one thing that could positively impact their business is finding a specific type of customer or breaking into a specific company, see what you can do to help.  If the thing keeping them up at night is cash flow, think of ways you can help or bring in a speaker to talk about smart money management strategies. Find ways to show you were listening and you won’t need a press conference to announce you had the meeting.  You’ll need one to announce how much you’ve grown your business!

SEVEN printers later, I have two quotes. One came with two sentences of “we’re here in the mornings to talk about this” and the other doesn’t even have any text on the email!  And worse?  One of them sent me a note back the first time around telling me why they couldn’t take on the project (too small of a quantity, etc.).  I had to write back additional questions to get them to consider the job!  Four of the others didn’t return phone calls or emails and the fifth one was very service-oriented, but was three dollars a piece higher than is in the budget. So now I will take my business to the people that at least have some information in their email, but I am left feeling extremely unhappy with the whole experience and will continue looking for a good printer.

Can you imagine your customers feeling like this?  I’ll bet big money the owners of these print shops have no idea this is what I’ve gone through.  I’m confident they are all (most) nice people who care about their businesses.  I am hoping nothing bad happened to the first one!  But, at the end of the day, six printers will lose business because I couldn’t get them to do their jobs.  It has been said before, but obviously could do with repeating:

Respond to people – if you are not going to be in the office, set up an out-of-office message and TEST IT.
Every communication with a customer or prospect is a marketing piece – be sure you represent yourself well at all times.
When sending quotes or contracts, keep in mind this is an email that will be saved so make sure you put some context into the email itself.
Talk about what you CAN do.  Can’t run 100 pieces?  Tell the prospect you can run 250 and 100 is not in their best interest due to the high cost.
Follow up.  Not one single company has followed up on their information. It was left to me to handle.

Don’t make things hard for customers because they won’t do business with you.  Instead, make it easy because service is everything!

At a recent networking event a man asked me my favorite movie as his opening question.  I suppose there is something telling about my choice (I like the Lord of the Rings and if you are going to tell me that’s three movies, then I like the middle one) but in reality, we ended up talking about movies in our little group and not about anything any of us could use the next time to connect.  In fact, I don’t remember his name or his company – just that he liked the Godfather.  So was that a good question?  He was unique, but didn’t get anything useful so I would say no.

Another person upon introduction asked me my biggest challenge.  I quickly fished for something that was inocuous enough I didn’t mind telling a stranger (I believe I said something like while I love my existing clients, I need more just like them!) and then turned the table on him.  We then spent the majority of the time talking about HIS biggest challenge and I ended up introducing him to someone else at the meeting who could help.  I don’t remember him either.  Nor did he follow up and thank me for the connection.

So what are good questions?   In truth, any question can be good or bad depending on the situation and the person you ask.  I recently got great results when I asked what brought the individual to the meeting.  Turns out they were looking for ways to get better at marketing so we had a lot to talk about.  While she did most of the talking, by the end she walked away with information that I was able to mention in my follow up after the meeting and we are in discussions to do a project.  Reading a little on different industries can also help because when I meet someone I can ask something very specific.  Things that start, “how are you affected by…” or “what challenges do you have with…” can lead to very interesting conversations and sometimes are so timely the person wants to talk for a long time!  The other questions I love to use is when I’m in a small group at a networking event, I will ask a question that is more for another person in our group.  If I ask something like, “how does your practice relate to what Janet does in financial planning?” or something along those lines, it gets the two people involved in a discussion and they both get to look good.  Generally at that point I get to sit back and take mental notes so I have a wealth of  information to follow up on later.

A good question at a networking event is one that causes the other person to talk about their business in a way that allows you to figure out how you can help, and that causes them to remember you once you have walked away.  So plan ahead and have 5-7 questions ready before you go.  And stop reading people that don’t give you the real advice!

Listing your business with browsers and other directories can be a great resource and I highly recommend it.  But after that, you have to think about who is your audience and where are they.

Twitter is a wonderful source for information or research.  I love it.  But the majority of my prospective customers aren’t on Twitter. So the time I put in is for my own benefit and not for prospecting.  On the other hand, most of my prospects are on LinkedIn so the time I invest on  LinkedIn yields prospecting results.  Facebook is not a good tool for my business because that isn’t where people go to talk about small business consulting.  But they do go there and talk about medical issues so it is right for my client, After Hours Family Medicine.

When you start working with a social media consultant, it should start with the same type of discussion as a good advertising agency.  Who are you trying to attract, what kind of profile can you build of those prospects, and where are they when they look for information like you are offering.  From there, you can invest your time in only those areas that make sense for your business.  And not waste your time on things that won’t help meet your goals!

I got my new computer home and spent the evening installing software as one should never try to copy software installations from one machine to another as well as downloaded the backup file.  I chose to download the entire file so that took a good part of  the night as the file is quite large (I could have downloaded it in pieces which would have been faster but I was functional enough on an older machine to just want to get it done.).   But, first thing in the morning, I had my entire old computer at my finger tips.  The best was about 3 minutes after it downloaded I had Outlook back up and running as if nothing had ever happened!  I was able to move all my files quickly  and easily and was back to work in no time.  In the past, it has taken up to three days to get everything found, copied over and settled in but not with my backup.

Now, had I not had this backup, I would have been in real trouble as my old computer can’t run more than 1 hour without overheating.  So the fact that I didn’t need to worry about getting things copied over was a real benefit.

So the question is – ARE YOU BACKING UP???  I highly recommend running a small test of your backup procedure BEFORE you need it.  Create a file that is for testing purposes and delete it.  Then restore it from the backup.  This give you the knowledge you need to handle the situation when it comes up.   Also, knowing the backup is working is HUGE.  Backblaze was a really great utility for me and I highly recommend it but there are many out there that can work. The bottom line – BACK UP YOUR FILES!

So what’s the point?  First, PLEASE review your mailing lists and see who you are sending messages.  And have a “why” you are sending them a message.  Have someone on a list but don’t know why?  Off they do.  If they miss your messages, they will call.  It is even better if the person knows how they got on your list in the first place.  If you’ve had a conversation or met at a trade show (AND INFORMATION WAS REQUESTED), have that note somewhere easy to find so you know why they are on the list.  One thing I’ve started doing is when I meet someone at a yearly event, after sending my “nice to have met you” emails I put a calendar reminder in around the time we would sign up again.  That way I can send them a note and ask if I will see them at the show again.  Makes a person really feel special!

Next, have your messages proof-read.  There is very little that is more distracting than a bad sales message.  I can’t tell you how often people will get caught up in how something is written vs. what it says.

Finally, understand the tools you are using.  If it is something new, contact a few close associates and test it on them first.  Include yourself in any batch item sent so you can see what happens.  That way if there is a problem, you’ll be able to send a correction right away.  Most people can understand technical difficulties but when there is no explanation, they assume you don’t know what you are doing.

So be thoughtful about your contacts and messages.  Without that, you give the absolute wrong impression.

Need a new elevator pitch?  Start with what you want clients to say after you complete the work.  If you want them to say, “they were amazingly fast” or “I couldn’t believe the service level”, build your elevator pitch and service offering with that end in mind.

Need to develop training materials?  Start with what the attendees should have at the end of the class.  (One nice thing about this is generally classes end up more hands-on when you build them this way.)

Need to develop a new service offering?  While this one sounds more complicated, again you can begin with the end in mind.  If you can envision what you want your customers to walk away with at the end of the project, you can build a service offering that genuinely meets a need and you can build your marketing messages as you go along.

Begin with the end in mind is also a great check on decision-making.  If you have a tricky situation and aren’t sure which way to go, mentally walk down each path to the “end”.  You may end up with several possibilities, but it will help you determine where the risks are and what you are actually risking.

This particular habit is one of those that can apply in many, many ways and help you develop solid plans, decisions and programs.  Where do you begin with the end in mind?

But, what can one do to help one’s self out of this situation?  Whether it is writer’s block, or not solving a critical problem, or just losing your “mojo” as I’ve heard it called lately, here are 5 ways I use to get out of it.

1.  Call someone you haven’t spoken with in awhile – seems pretty basic, but a conversation with someone who hasn’t been in your day-to-day can often give you a different perspective on what’s going on and just refresh your point of view.  Not to mention you get to retell all the good stories which puts you in a better frame of mind.

2.  Read something completely unrelated.  Personally, I like Mental Floss which is a quirky, trivia magazine.  They do a feature on a different part of the world, they talk about all kinds of fairly random topics and you sound brilliant at your next networking event when you can whip out off-the-wall facts about things.  But the point is, it isn’t about business in any way.  It is about physics and poetry and  new advances in science, and geography and culture.  But, the process of reading about those things can often give you a whole new insight when you return to the problem at hand.

3.  Pick something totally unrelated and try to incorporate it into the situation.  Generally I run into walls when I’m trying to solve a problem.  So when that happens, one thing to do is pick something completely unrelated and try to incorporate it into a solution.  For example – I was trying to come up with a new slogan for a customer and was completely stumped.  To bring in something unrelated, I randomly selected an album in iTunes to play and tried to incorporate the music.  That led me to reviews of the pieces which in turn gave me different words to consider and wah-la!  A slogan was born!

4.  Color in a coloring book, put together a puzzle, or do something fun but structured.  I know – that sounds weird.  But think about this: you are trying to work through something and are stuck.  So you give your brain something else to think about that is fun, but isn’t completely creative.  When you color (and yes, I mean INSIDE the lines) you select the colors to go next to each other, but the design itself has been dictated so the decisions you make are minimal.  Giving your brain a rest from focusing on the problem at hand gives your subconscious a chance to give it a try and the structure of the activity keeps you engaged.  At the end you may solve your problem as well as decorate your refrigerator!

5.  Talk it out with a friend.  I can’t tell you how many people call and want to talk about something, but by the time they have finished explaining it they found their answer.  The process of verbalizing it is incredibly powerful and having someone else listening can make all the difference.

Here are some of the ways I find to get out of a rut.  What do you do?

My first, and primary reason, to love FoxIt is the speed.  PDFs open in a fraction of the time whether it be while browsing or from my hard drive.  There is no hesitation and I’m moving on with my day much, much faster.

The second reason to love it is the ease it offers to share information.  I often come across articles I would like to share with clients but it may be just a piece of the article or I may want to make a comment about it to them.  I can certainly include that in the email, but for real impact, I love using the Foxit features that let me draw arrows, insert comments, and call out text.

Finally, security doesn’t appear to be a problem with FoxIt.  Obviously as the big player on the market, people looking to hack software will go after Adobe so security holes pop up fairly regularly.  Adobe’s update process can be cumbersome and recently required a restart of my computer!  FoxIt updates but seems to be quick at that as well and doesn’t have the security vulnerabilities that Adobe experiences.

I highly recommend trying out FoxIt!

First, Hunter is a group of independent insurance agents.  That means they represent multiple products and do the shopping around for you.  They can offer a wider array of options than agents tied to one company and can really understand how the different discounts, programs and options from each carrier can work for you.

Second, the people who work at Hunter are awesome.  Whether they have been there 1 year or 40, they all truly care about the customers and talk about them as individuals.  I got to work with one woman recently who, when looking at a 900 person customer list, was  talking about things that needed to be adjusted by individual.  It was impressive.

So all that is great, but my biggest surprise was when I recently went to a part of the office I hadn’t been in before.  Often companies talk about their commitment to customer service.  But in this office, the President’s office is on the far side of customer service.  To get to him you have to walk through the service team.  To be in his office you hear the customer service team helping customers.  And the best part?  When I said something about it, at first the president didn’t seem to know what I meant. It was so natural for him he just said, “I need to know what’s going on”.

As someone who supervised customer service departments before, I can tell you the single best way to find out what your customers are talking about is to hang out in the department.  You will hear one side of the conversations, the discussions after the calls, and see where the customer support team needs help.  In this case, Warren can’t help but know what is going on and that is a real show of commitment.

Many companies talk about valuing their clients, but at Hunter Insurance it is not only reflected in what they do, but even down to where they sit.  Very impressive!

I love to build marketing messages based on sales objections.  You already know what issues people bring to the table and how to answer it, so do so before they even get there! Leading with those objection-answers gives you a chance to show you do understand your customers and why they should make the call.  These can be done as a series of emails, a series of blog posts, testimonials that give the reader insight into why the customer was skeptical and how you overcame it, or voice mails that are left for prospects.  Here’s an example of how to work this:

I recently met with a client who’s prospects don’t trust them.  There are some unscrupulous people in their industry and they are always fighting an uphill battle to overcome those concerns.  We developed a list of what other companies have done wrong, and used it as our messages.  We did an email marketing series as well as used them in voice mails.  We pointed out that there are some companies who have experienced X.  We don’t do that – we do this.  It was extremely effective and yielded 40% more inbound contacts.

It was tough for this customer to come up with marketing messages in the past, but now that the sales team is giving them objections and answers, the possibilities have really opened up.  Try this technique and then let me know how it goes!

I remember my driver’s ed class – we would go to the place in the evening, watch a couple movies about how serious accidents are, go over to the Mr. Hero next door and have fries, and then come back and discuss the movies for 15 minutes. Then the instructor picked us up at our homes, took us driving in a variety of settings and wah-la. Two failed maneuverability tests later I had my license. At Drive Team, that doesn’t happen. At Drive Team, teens learn real, practical information about driving. They learn the limits of what a car can and can’t do. They practice difficult situations and Ken even has a skid car so he can take the control of the vehicle away and teach you what to do. The kids not only learn to be good, safe drivers, but how to judge others’ driving ability and to take responsibility for their driving.

One of the most important things Ken said is he looks at drivers as hardware with no software on how to drive.  He programs them correctly to drive well.  If a driver with several years experience comes in for his 2 hour skills course, he can reprogram them and fix the “bugs”.   I think this metaphor is fantastic.  Isn’t that exactly what learning to drive is like?  After driving for 24 years, I sat in his facility and found out that due to the pressure and speed with which airbags deploy, it is now much safer to have your hands at 9 and 3 or even 8 and 4 than at 10 and 2.  Until Friday, that was a question I was pretty confident I knew the answer!

So first, a big hand to Drive Team and their programs.  Second, how are you writing the software to use your products and services on the hardware of your clients?  Is the programming working?  At Drive Team, when it works it is saving lives!

Now I’m not saying that people should abandon Facebook (although there is a lot of that going around), I will strongly caution people to really think before they post something. You have to assume people can find and see the information unless you are one of the 12 people in the world who actually understand all the privacy options on Facebook. And, that means you keep up with them as they seem to be changing all the time. Always be aware and watch what others post as well about you. There is no reason to mess up the brand that is YOU with something you thought was private!

(A great post on this can be found at Outspoken Media on “Zuckerberg, We Have a Problem”)