Tim Bursch

I hope you had a good week. Here’s are some of the best ideas that impacted me this week:

1. Readers lead. Books still matter.
2. This is about conversation. Are you joining in and commenting on blogs?
3. It does work to help people and your business at the same time.
4. Pizza places are doing good marketing. They’ve got me thinking here and here.

What impacted you this week? Share it.

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If you need to find a business, do you call or look online? I look online.

I recently filled out two web forms. I waited a few days because it was the weekend and I wanted to at least give them the benefit of a doubt. Still waiting. No response.

So, why would you have a door to you company that no one answers? It is like having a phone with your voicemail not set-up. Please don’t put something out there unless you are going to cover it. Same could apply to Twitter or an email newsletter. Do you have a sign-up form, but only deliver content sporadically?

I know I don’t always call or email people back immediately. That’s not the point. The point is coverage. If you offer a customer a connection point, cover it.
Here are some ideas for consistent coverage:
-One person owns the online entrances
-Rotate the weekend coverage (we don’t want to wait two days or we’re going somewhere else)
-If you have an autoresponse, set realistic expectations and follow though

What would you add? How do you cover your connection points?

Image by: madmolecule

Tags: contacts, online, web.

I had the privilege to be part of KaneCo’s first monthly business book club. The book: Linchpin by Seth Godin. The group: all rockstars.

We had a lively discussion about work, being remarkable, and bucking the system. The book was good, but I think what Jen is building is even more interesting. She wanted to read more, connect with business leaders, and learn. I think she’s building community. Taking things deeper. Bringing others into learning together.

Okay, why not just have coffee with your friends and talk about a book you read last month? That works. You could just read great books in isolation too. You might miss a piece that someone different caught.

I don’t know about you, but when I’m in a good book I want to talk about it. I share pieces with friends and my patient wife. And it’s more than just being about a book. It is being open and transformed and learning. I think we all want more community. We are wired for connection as Seth says.

So, here’s my question for you: What is something you are practicing (reading, writing, blogging) that you could invite others into?

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I was listening to this podcast by 37signals on work. They tell the story of MeetUp and how they tackled a huge amount of projects.

You can listen here. What got me was the paradigm of work. Did management assign each team a project? Nope. Management told them to figure it out and literally left the room.
The developers self-organized around projects they cared about and went to work. Wow. Is that even management?

Seems like leadership. Both at the top and the bottom. The managers trusted that their teams would create solutions in freedom instead of control. The teams took that belief and trust and lead forward.

So, how would organizations create more space for teams to bubble-up solutions?

Here are a few possible key elements:

• Absolute trust. We are all adults. So give people the chance to be responsible.
• Respect. Be confident in others ideas.
• Collaboration. Not competition.

What else would you add? What other stories of bottom-up leadership have you heard?

Tags: collaboration, leadership.

Do we own our networks? I’ve been thinking about this for a long time. Now Shannon’s post has me thinking some more.

The old strategy has been and still is for some to collect contacts and keep them to yourself and for your own goals. If you get a new connection for your network it’s a hash mark on your networking scoreboard. The more people in your address book/Rolodex/Blackberry the more successful you should be. The aggressive card collector wins. Swim with the barracudas right?

What about generosity? About 7 years ago I stumbled upon Love is The Killer App by Tim Sanders. It’s the simple concept of sharing your knowledge, your network, and your compassion and it fits with the growing online networks. Simple result: The person who shares the most actually wins.

Here’s the deal, did we ever own our contacts? I hope not. They are real people with their own voice and their own choice. What if we looked at this whole interconnected web of relationships as THE network instead of MY network? Would you hoard? Take? Or how about contribute, invest and then share.

What do you think? Is the network yours or ours?

Image by: cloudzilla

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So, we read more today than ever before. If you are like me you get most of your information and news online. And more and more from blogs.

Reading is great. You can learn a lot. You can hear new voices and discover different paradigms. But here’s the deal, if you are only reading, you might be missing out on a conversation.

More content being created today is not just out there with the hopes of being read. Not only is that one-way, it is just plain dull. We all want comments. We want to be heard and have it reflected back to us or challenged.

I have personally made some new connections and met awesome people through commenting and engaging in the conversation.

So, next time you read a blog, try sharing a comment. No, it doesn’t have to be ego-stroking or a pat on the back. Just be honest. Use your voice. Connect. We need you in the conversation.

Image by: Emborg

Tags: comments.

I found out about The Pants on the Ground video from my son. He saw it at a friends. Hilarious.

I talked about it with another friend, showed it to my wife and daughter. More laughter. So everyone’s talking about General Larry Platt and his song. We are sharing this story.
I then clicked on a link in twitter for the video above and being Viking’s fans, I roared some more. These guys are sharing the same story.

So, what happens to a business team when they share a common story? Probably not the manly pats, but fun? Sure. What if you shared one fun story each week with your team? And then you found some application together? Larry did not give up. He didn’t care about his age. How about when a prospect says no? Have fun with that and find another prospect.

A story connects people. It can bring out joy and smiles. What do you do to connect your team?

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This is a guest post by Josh Becerra. Josh is a social entrepreneur and internet start-up guy. He is the co-founder of localtweeps.com and buythechange.com. Josh is also part of a Minneapolis Co-working space called The 3rd Place. Check it out. You can follow him on Twitter @joshbecerra.

Today I was sitting in my neighborhood coffee shop as my neighbors filed in to get their cup of Joe before heading into the office. What amazed me is how everyone standing around waiting for their order was glued to their phone. They were probably checking email, reading the morning news, updating their status on Facebook or Twitter, or becoming “Mayor of Lori’s Coffeehouse” on Foursquare.  Nobody was actually talking on their phone…they were just mesmerized by the glow.

This got me thinking about how these days my Twitter stream and Google Reader is filled with research, reports and studies where analysts identify the top trends for 2010. Buzz words like “Hyperlocal”, “Interactive Local Media”, “Mobile Local Media” seem to be on everyone’s top trends list – and rightly so.  Location and geo-targeted advertising has been an elusive revenue stream. But the mix of technology, usage and advertiser trends is pushing the pace of change. Today I can walk down the street with my smart phone in hand and know what businesses are around me, who has something on sale and who is offering coupons.  Using the same technology I have the ability to geo-target my friends so I can always keep track of the people I know.  So what about the people I don’t know – but might want to get to know better – my neighbors?

It seems most people think about hyperlocal in the context of “an individual’s relationship to the people, places, and things that are located around them at any given time via geo-targeting.” So here are my questions:

Is there room for a second definition of hyperlocal as “an individual’s relationship to their neighbors and neighborhood?

And does anyone else care besides me?

Update: Correction- The 3rd Place is in St. Paul, MN

Tags: hyperlocal.

Do you ever wonder about making tough decisions and changing this world?

Read this.

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Today we remember Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He had a dream and vision for something better and bigger. Still we have not seen his vision become a complete reality. Thank God there have been some changes, but we still deal with racism, poverty, and segregation in  this country of ours and abroad.

So, today I just want to take this space to say thank you. Thank you Dr. King for saying your dream out loud. It inspires me still today.

If you have a dream stop sitting on it. Share it.

Image by: BlatantNews.com

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