The refreshing nature of positive news sure seems to be catching on with the folks in Valpo.

To date we have told over 1,700 stories about kids, adults, organizations, sports teams, churches, leaders, fund raising drives, events, and anything else positive going on in town.
We have posted over 500 events that have been held in or around Valpo, ranging from fun activities going on downtown to concerts and plays at the high school, universities, Memorial Opera House, and Chicago Street Theatre, to charity golf outings and community volunteer opportunities, along with business meetings, social gatherings, and presentations put on by one of the 50 houses or worship in town.

And just think, we’ve only been around a couple of months.

Starting this weekend, we will start to hit every house in town with a full page, 2 sided, 4 color ValpoLife.com postcard that demonstrates how to sign up, get engaged, contribute, spread the word, and put your company in front of this audience we have quickly built on the foundation of that positive focus, in a time where you really need to go out of your way to find truly good news.

Even yesterday alone, we produced two new videos on the opening of the new YMCA, another Concert in the Parks music video, and the Town Hall Downtown meeting with Mayor Costas and the expertise of Hyett-Palma. That builds on the leadership series of interviews we have done, profiles on athletes like Jerrick Suiter, and the hugely popular, What I Love About Valpo series of street interviews. That video library is growing fast — we just passed 100 videos on the site, and we are closing in on 3,000 videos played since we started tracking the number of video views in early June.

And the reach of good news is spreading. We flew past 800 fans Thursday on Facebook within days of passing 700, and within three weeks of passing 400, and we have over 500 followers on Twitter, On Monday we held an Ice Cream party to celebrate some of that success with about 150 people coming out to join us at Valpo Velvet. Today, we should surpass 90,000 page views since we started just 3 months ago.

We’ve grown so much recently that one of the local morning radio DJ’s now uses ValpoLife.com headlines in his morning newscasts since there is so much good local content that we cover.

I swear we are not bragging, because we still have many miles to go in order for this to be thriving on every measure. Our end-goal is to be a permanent and significant contributing member of the community, which is our staff’s only true measure of success.

I just know that many of you are the folks that have been rooting for us since the beginning, whose early support helped us get this site to where this is today, and who have wished for our success from the second you heard about the premise behind the site and our goals. I want you to know your work, hope, word of mouth, and outward support continues to build an incredibly positive momentum beyond even what we thought it would be.

This positive thing sure seems to be catching on.

Wikipedia tells us that Memorial Day is a United States federal holiday observed on the last Monday of May (on May 25 in 2009). Formerly known as Decoration Day, it commemorates U.S. men and women who died while in the military service. First enacted to honor Union soldiers of the American Civil War (it is celebrated near the day of reunification after the civil war), it was expanded after World War I to include American casualties of any war or military action. Many people observe this holiday by visiting cemeteries and memorials. A national moment of remembrance takes place at 3 p.m. Eastern Time. Another tradition is to fly the flag of the United States at quarter-staff from dawn until noon local time. Volunteers often place American flags on each gravesite at National Cemeteries. Many Americans also use Memorial Day to honor other family members who have died.

Overtime, the meaning of Memorial Day has been expanded to include not just those who have passed serving their duty to our country, but to all men and women who have served, or are serving in any branch of the military. Locally in Valpo, the VFW and the American Legion have a variety of activities planned for that weekend starting with a Friday the 22nd 9am effort that will begin at the Amercian Legion where volunteers with gather to go out to local cemeteries planting flags on Veterans Graves, and the VFW has activities planned for that weekend, as well as a major event on June 14th where at 6pm they will gather at the VFW hall to bury flags on behalf of the deceased veterans with a flag burying ceremony to commemorate Flag Day with flags that have been contributed throughout the year. The Parks Department invites us to gather at the Service Memorial at the Veterans and Volunteers Plaza located at Foundation Meadows Park at 8:30am Friday May 22nd. Mayor Costas will speak, the names of those that have list their lives in the line of duty will be recited, and the Vietnam Veterans Chapter 905 will serve as the color guard and play Taps.

There are also no doubt countless BBQ’s held by veterans of wars ranging from WWII, to Vietnam and the war in IRAQ, as well as other community events that we would encourage you to be letting us know of so we can spread the word to others in Valpo that may want to participate with you and your group.

My goal, is to provide a reminder of what all these men and women, young and old, have done on behalf of the rest of us, whether they have laid down their life to defend our freedom, or they have put themselves into a position to do so, all because they believe so deeply that our freedom is worth making the ultimate sacrifice for. Let’s also not forget, that for every member of the services that gives up their life serving to protect our freedom, there are likely hundreds or thousands of individuals who are making many other sacrifices that may go unnoticed as we each go about our busy lives.

They are there to protect our freedom, though by committing to military service, they have ultimately sacrificed their own freedom. When one of them signs up to join one of the service branches, they effectively give up control over their own freedom for whatever period of time they commit to the military. They have no say as to when they will be called up, they have no say in where they are going to be deployed, they have no say in whether that commitment keeps them away from their family during their marriage anniversary, their children’s birthdays, their mother’s cancer surgery, the passing of a loved one, the annual summer trip to visit their family, Christmas, Hanukkah, or the graduation or big game of one of their children. They don’t get to decide after taking on the job, that 6 months later it is not a good fit for them like the rest of us do, and have the chance to go on and do something else that makes them happier, earns them more income, or shortens their commute.

Some of you reading this may not be in favor of the IRAQ or Afghanistan war efforts, or any of the other military activities, though that is a political difference that should have zero impact on your appreciation for those that respond to the call of duty that these men and women step up and take on. These folks don’t get to decide if they are in favor of the assignment they are on, or just resign because they are being called up for their 2nd or 3rd tour of duty that is putting a huge strain on the families both economically and personally. They get back on that plane, knowing full well the risk they are putting themselves in front of, and watching the tears of their children, their mom or dad, their wife, or their husband, who are going to miss their loved one dearly. Each of those people know in the back of their minds that this could be the last hug or kiss they get, at least for a while, and perhaps forever.

So what can you do about it that shows your appreciation and honor for what they have done, and are doing for us?

1. Attend one of the many ceremonies going on over the next 10 days that honor our veterans and our current serving members.
2. Visit one of the cemeteries in the area, and bring your kids, to remind each of you what being in the “service” truly can mean.
3. Raise your flag on that weekend and throughout the year, so that those who serve or have served, and those related to those fine men and women, see an overflowing visible reminder of the appreciation we have for what they do on our behalf.
4. Next time you are in a restaurant, at a gas station, or buying tickets at the movie theatre and see a member of the service, pay their bill. Most of these folks have made some kind of financial sacrifice as a part of their service, so chipping in for their lunch or buying them a tank of gas in really just a tiny down payment on the future of our freedom in honor of sacrifices that we ourselves are unwilling to make.
5. Teach your kids to respect those in the service, to say thank you every time they see someone from the services, and to go up and shake the hand and look the service person in the eye when they express their thanks, which is the least any of us can do to demonstrate our appreciation.
6. Stop by the VFW hall, the American Legion, the local service recruiting office, or anywhere else you see service men and women congregating, and meet first hand some of these folks that are going out to fight to protect our rights.
7. Contribute to the countless charitable causes that each serve to help veterans with their health care, with the financial strains that joining the service can bring to their families, and can bring them food, movies, gifts, equipment, or anything else to make their time spent away from home a bit safer and more secure.
8. Support spending programs that serve our military, regardless of what political party you are a part of, because providing for quality health care, buying the equipment that keeps them secure, giving them educational opportunities, and paying them as much as we possibly can, should have zero political boundaries associated with them.
9. Make remembering their service a year round part of your life and that of your family. It is great to offer them special thanks on Memorial Day weekend, Flag Day, and the 4th of July, but these folks are doing their job on our behalf 365 days a year, and 24 hours a day. The thanks they deserve are just as important on a cold day in winter as they are on an early summer weekend at a BBQ.
10. Send ValpoLife.com a photo and a few comments for anyone that has served in the armed forces, or is currently serving, so that as a community on the web, we demonstrate huge visible support and thanks for our dads, brothers, sisters, children, or neighbors that protect our right to go to that BBQ, visit our family, watch our kids ballgames, or travel safely, knowing that we are a part of the greatest country in the world, and are darn lucky to have them protecting that way of life for us.

Sending us your photos, comments, or a brief story is quick and easy. If you are a member, just login to the site and go to the Members area, and click on Contribute Articles, where you can easily post an article that you write, a handful of bullet points that we can turn into a short story, and ideally a photo or two of the service man or woman that you want to recognize. If you are not a member, it is just one more reason to sign up for membership, along with all the discounts and special offers that area merchants make available to ValpoLife.com members each week, and the weekly Best in Valpo newsletter that keeps you on top of the best stories, photos, blogs, and videos of the week. If you are not a member and just want to email us a quick note and attach a photo, you can send those to contribute@valpolife.com This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it and we will get those up on the site right away. If you do not have a photo, or a particular person that you would like to recognize, but would like to pass along your thanks to this group as a whole, you can write us a short note and use the same means to contribute that to us.

We will be running a continually updated article and photo gallery throughout this weekend, the upcoming week, and all throughout Memorial day weekend, so take a few minutes Valpo to show your appreciation. It is free, easy, and the least we can do to say thanks to these brave men and women who protect our right to grill a couple burgers and gather with friends, and enjoy the full breadth of freedom, that even those in the service don’t have as much of as we do. Thanks for getting involved, and I look forward to reading your stories and putting a face on the character that makes this country great.

The questions might keep them out of trouble, they might help them to take advantage of opportunities they have in front of them, they may help them to make the best choices of who to be associated with, and they certainly help to make sure they are growing, learning, and making healthy choices for their personal life.  It comes as second nature for us all to grill those kids so that they can achieve their best potential, and to avoid the landmines that could limit them now or down the road.  They serve as a regular reminder of how important it is to be communicating with them, and how much what you need to be doing to help them changes with every day and year.

The concept holds true with your business as closely as it does with your ever changing children.  If you are not continually asking your business, your customers, yourself and your staff, the kinds of challenging questions that ensure everyone is doing what they need to be to grow a healthy business, it is easy to get off track, and not spend your time doing what is most important to your short term and long term success.

The list below is great place to start, and hopefully will serve as an eye opener to the kind of questions that you need to be asking of your business.  You won’t likely have answers to many or all of them, though if you hope, just like your teenager, that your business continually grows, succeeds, and wherever possible, avoids the pitfalls that can limit its true potential, it is time to begin the grilling.

1.    Are you actively seeking input from your employees on what the company can do to improve?
2.    Are you as efficient as possible is doing what it takes to operate your business?
3.    Are you and your entire organization flexible or resistant to change?
4.    Where would you like to be in 1 year, and are you doing the specific things that will actually make that happen?
5.    What are you doing right now to grow your business, regardless of the economic conditions?
6.    When did your network last grow in a significant new way?  That could be the calls you make to new prospects, lunches you have with key contacts, a Chamber event you attend, or that could be the people you are connected to on LinkedIn, Facebook, or Twitter.
7.    What truly makes your company unique and would every employee in the building say the same thing if someone asked them?
8.    What is your competition doing now to market themselves and to improve their product, service, or pricing that you could learn from?
9.    Do you and all of your staff really want to do what it takes to grow or are you more just wishing it would happen?
10.    What are some specific things that each of your staff could improve upon and do they know that?  Are they actively doing something to make that improvement?
11.    What is working right now for your business that you could do more of starting right now?
12.    What bad ideas or bad habits do you need to stop pursuing or quit doing as soon as possible?
13.    When is the last time that you asked your staff, “How am I doing?”
14.    What does your quietest employee have to say about your business and any ideas they have?
15.    How much of the last week or month have you spent working on your business versus the majority of the time you spend working in your business?
16.    Do you expect and accept candor from your staff, and do you deliver the same in return?
17.    Who does not know about your business that should?  What are all the ways that you can use to make those people aware?
18.    When is the last time you said thank you to each member of your team?  What ways are you using with each one to ensure they feel that appreciation?
19.    What keeps you up at night, and who in your business can help you attack those fears so you protect against them or battle through them?
20.    Are you and the rest of the team having fun doing what you are doing?  What small adjustments could you make or could they make in order to make their job, your whole environment, and the culture of the company a better place to spend their time?

If elite athletes at the highest level cannot accomplish their goals without a coach, what does that say for the progress of anyone, at any level of an organization? Everyone needs solid, objective advice about how to make progress in the direction they need to go. The best coaches—the Phil Jacksons and Greg Popviches of the world (who have been coached themselves by other coaches along the way)—have been able to accurately evaluate the talents of their team, in order to put the whole organization in the best position to succeed. The coaches provide the game plan and the direction for their teams and organizations to achieve great things.
Coaching is not just limited to athletics or business. Many other disciplines include a coaching aspect in some shape or form. Certainly, the traditional music teacher fits the role of a coach. Anyone who has ever sat through a music lesson has had the phrase “Practice doesn’t make perfect, perfect practice makes perfect” pounded into their brain from a teacher or a coach.  A teacher with an outside perspective, whose goal is to guide you to outstanding success, can quickly observe imperfections in technique or expertise that need to be refined and assist in making that progress.  Even seasoned performers have coaches in many forms. Professional musicians will enlist coaches to aid in the interpretation and technical approach to a performance, and even to aid in the selection of the repertoire.
For most humans with any kind of ego, it’s a difficult task to objectively evaluate anything they do, whether it is playing basketball, playing the violin, or developing a marketing strategy. Some musicians will seek out a coach to help them overcome a plateau when they feel like they are in a rut and have difficulty progressing technically or creatively. Performing musicians also will often seek out a coach to help them prepare for a special competition or performance. In these cases, a coach can focus on very specific issues; anything from the proper technique for a very difficult passage to stage presence and staying in close rhythm with the rest of the band.

Shouldn’t this apply to the business world as well? Shouldn’t every company have someone who can help objectively evaluate talent and put together a game plan to direct the organization to achieve great things? If you feel your business’ growth is leveling off or experiencing a downturn, be a smart leader and recognize the need to keep a fresh and objective viewpoint before business begins to turn south. If the foundations of great talent and exceptional direction allow for success in athletics (competition) and music (creativity), shouldn’t the same principles lead to success in the business world? As a leader, are you spending enough time making sure you and your organization are going in the right direction and making progress going after that ultimate goal?
Create your own championship or masterpiece by doing your best to evaluate talent and shrewdly and decisively navigate your path to achieve that end goal—whether that goal is an annual sales mark, a clientele quota, or any other benchmark you set for your company. Most highly skilled professionals—whether they are musicians, artists, athletes, or business managers—need coaching. Every Olympic athlete and New York Philharmonic violinist has one or more coaches that specialize in their particular area.
Perhaps it is just human nature to think a coach isn’t necessary for you or your organization. After all, speaking as an entrepreneur myself, if we have come this far without one, we may be confident enough in our abilities that we think coaches are not necessary.  However, what we are really doing is handcuffing our organization’s potential for growth and development with our own limitations and biases. Tim Duncan and Kobe Bryant are clearly confident enough in their abilities to achieve great success. They recognize, however, that every high-performance individual, regardless of skill or industry, receive regular and consistent coaching to help them reach their highest possible performance level. It is unclear why any leader thinks they can achieve their ultimate goals on their own when the best performers in every industry, also in pursuit of excellence, have coaches that help them continually maximize their talent.

Book Written by Pip Coburn
Book Summary by Chris Mahlmann

In the last year or two, how many times have you heard the word “change”? 1,000? 10,000? Between the political campaigns, the economy, and the world all around us, “change” seems to be as inevitable as death and taxes. The business world is no exception. Things are changing every day, particularly technology and how it impacts our personal and professional lives. Change is also the heart of Pip Coburn’s book, The Change Function: Why Some Technologies Take Off and Others Crash and Burn. The book looks at companies that are technologically-based and examines the shifts, both small and large, these companies must undergo to fully transition into the markets in which we operate today.
Firms in the high-tech industry know how difficult it is to get a product or an idea to break though the clutter of endless innovation. Once that idea finally does stand out from the heap, the firm still needs to get that product adopted and in to people’s hands to recap the rewards of that great idea. In the book, Coburn explains how to move to a system in which you are talking to customers and listening to their concerns, then creating or altering your product to fit those needs, and in turn, fitting current demand instead of inefficiently creating new demand. “Engineers and designers are not responsible for product success, end users are,” he presses. This end-user perspective is part of “The Change Function”, a concept that every business needs to understand, not just those in the high-tech field.
Coburn’s Change Function uses “Moore’s Law” and “Groves Law” as examples of commonly held, but fazed-out beliefs by which many companies still abide. Moore’s Law shows a long term trend that predicts the number of transistors that can economically be placed onto a microchip will double every two years. Grove’s Law is an engineering-focused law that says high-tech firms should focus technological developments that are ten-times better than anything currently available. Both of these ‘laws’ underscore one of the main operational fallacies in the tech world today: developing technology for a problem that doesn’t exist. Coburn bases the premise of the book on the idea that many individuals have a high resistance to new technology. These individuals do not trust new technology and often aren’t interested in the learning curve often associated with new technology. The adaptation that companies need to employ is the idea that instead of stretching the limits of what technology can do, high-tech firms should use what is currently available to help solve customers’ problems. As Coburn puts it, companies should move away from being “techno-centric” to “customer-centric”.
It shouldn’t take a rocket scientist to figure this out, though. If you look at the high-tech marketplace and you look at the products and services that have thrived, you will see that instead of reinventing to wheel, the most successful technological products are the ones that offer an incremental change on the user’s end from existing technologies. DVDs didn’t reinvent the wheel when they replaced VCRs, the iPod isn’t a lot more difficult to operate than a portable CD player, and digital cameras have replaced standard film cameras without changing the basic functionality of the camera. Popular technological advancements have come incrementally, because there is an audience for incremental change. There is no audience for technology that cannot be easily harnessed by the user.
The Change Function is explained as the change in the mindset of your company that no longer uses these outdated laws and theories and instead chooses the new, user-focused mindset. In the book, Coburn decrees that high-tech firms in particular need to listen to their clients in order to customize products to exact user specifications.
The book is a recommended read for leaders and managers of technology-oriented firms, or firms whose business operations depend heavily on technology. The book offers several new and innovative thought processes, many of which are aimed at those electronic-based businesses. Even if your company is not a high-tech firm, there are still some principles and processes that could still apply across all businesses. Overall, The Change Function offers some good advice for businesses that are stuck in the rut of 20th century operations and need to move forward and join the 21st century business community. The world is changing and so is the way we do business.

Aristotle had Plato, Nikolai Tesla had Thomas Edison, and even Steve Young had Joe Montana. In today’s world, ten-year olds want to be the next LeBron James or Peyton Manning and

Emulate the Principle, Not the Person

thirty-year olds want to be the next Donald Trump or Tiger Woods. Role models have always been an integral part of our culture, though we see every day a danger associated with wanting to become someone else. There may be a million reasons to aspire to be like someone you admire; role models and mentors can be incredibly inspiring. They allow us to set goals, mirror an example, and follow in someone’s footsteps.

But do you really want to be someone else? Do you want their whole life, or do you just want an aspect of it?  You may admire someone because of their work ethic, intellect, leadership, personality, or their outlook on life, but don’t make the mistake of focusing just on the person alone. Donald Trump said it himself, “You don’t want to be the Donald. You just want to achieve what he has achieved.” LeBron James touched on the same point in a recent Nike ad:

Redirect your focus on how that person got to where they are. How did Donald and LeBron get to where they are?  Dedication, hard work, focus, passion, shrewdness, etc.; all contribute to a good role model’s success. So, don’t just look to the end product; look at the means by which the mentor traveled to achieve what they have achieved. The principles, as great author Steven Covey often says, are where your focus should be.

Without a DNA match, you cannot be that person. You are aiming for the impossible. You can desire to be a person because of what they have—money, fame, that new BMW. But, how did they obtain these things? Were their principles and methods ethical? Were they sustainable through hard work? Do you really want all their stuff and the hard work that goes with it, or just the stuff? Are you willing to do X (whether good or bad) to get that stuff?

Often times, your role model has made a substantial personal investment in what they do. The opportunity cost of matching what your role model has achieved generally involves a large amount of time, money, and missed experiences. Ask yourself; are you in the position to sacrifice time, money and experiences?

It Takes a Lot to Be a Tiger

Think of Tiger Woods. He has been golfing since age three. You may flip on the US Open one Sunday afternoon, see Tiger valiantly trying to force a playoff on one leg, and you may still think, “Gosh, I wish I had a swing like that!” After the tournament, you go out to the driving range, grab two buckets of balls, and work on your drive. Monday comes around: do you go and hit three buckets? Tiger would. You see that Tiger has hundreds of millions of dollars in endorsements and winnings; you see the perfect drive Monday on his 91st hole that will put him in position to seal the tournament. You don’t see the Tiger that is at the driving range, fifteen minutes after dark, squinting through the night to see if his 300th iron shot of the day went to where he had planned. You don’t see all of the work he and his father put into his craft since he was three. You see the end product, which makes him less of a role model, and more a center of envy.

If Tiger’s principles, rather than his persona, were your role model, you would go out on Monday, hit three buckets of balls, then go again Tuesday and hit four. He should not be your role model because he birdied the 18th hole to force a playoff on Sunday. He should be your role model because of how he put himself in position to do so. It was the role Tiger’s dedication played in his success that should be your model. What if Tiger fails? What happens if Tiger Woods ends up double bogeying the 18th hole, not forcing a playoff, and loses? Does Tiger’s failure mean you should not admire the hell out of the fact he played with a torn ACL and two stress fractures—enough knee damage that would keep most of us on the couch asking if someone could please hand over the remote?

Dedication, as a concept, is incapable of failure. Tiger’s dedication reveals that he will come back next year and try even harder. Find a way to be your own version of Tiger. Go out and take the necessary steps to follow his principles.

• People change, principles do not.
• Principles are easy to teach and, once learned, easy to follow.
• If the person fails, that doesn’t mean the principle failed.
• It is what is on the inside that counts.

Monkey See, Monkey Do

Principles are easy to teach, though as we grow older and become more set in our ways, they become harder and harder to absorb. We can observe someone’s principles, but altering our principles to emulate someone else’s becomes a hell of a challenge. This is why children often will ultimately hold similar values as their parents. Kids can learn principles easily because they are young and impressionable. If they see their parents demonstrate integrity with their actions and dedication with their efforts, they will learn to do the same.

We are all here trying to make sure our kids know the story of Michael Jordan getting cut from his school basketball team that made him stronger, or how Walter Payton would spend hours running up that hill over and over again.  We want them to respect the path that these folks took, not just the profits they realized. We want them to know the difference between Shaq making millions even though he can’t hit more than 60% of his free throws after being in the league for 15 years, and Larry Bird shooting hundreds of free throws late at night, alone in a gym after missing one in a close loss. Hard work, dedication, perseverance—all are principles that you and your children should be constantly learning from. When we all learn from our role models, we need to be emulating the principles, not the person.

Download a PDF version of thie article here.

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Open your mind and let ideas go in and come out.

If the platform for open and honest review of your business, your people, and all your initiatives is not there, then you have no way to judge how successful all those new and cool ideas are going to be before you invest your time, people, and financial resources in them. Take the time to build a culture of open and honest recognition, where each player in the organization, including you, can improve. Take the time to build a culture and a communication style in your business that recognizes and rewards excellence so you can do more and more of what has always proven to work. Similarly, the gains made through the identification and aggressive improvement of every definable weakness need to be recognized and rewarded as well.

Candid Culture. Mind Open.

Now ask yourself:

Are your ideas on fire?

By pouring on the gas of new ideas and actions to a well-lit fire, you have the momentum to fuel every new idea that should see the light of day. You allow for the ideas to be openly, not defensively, discussed and considered. You will have every member of your team doing everything within their power to help every new idea succeed.

You can effectively deploy the ideas that make the most sense, use your resources most wisely, and expand all of your sales and marketing efforts with the success you derive from the first steps you take. That positive momentum breeds more success, which accelerates your drive and creates a self-feeding cycle that quickly and decisively brings your company to its next level of performance.

Learn as You Go. Improve. Repeat.

Follow up those new initiatives with simple and smart analysis that allows you to constantly evaluate the results of every new activity. Refine the ideas and execution with every new bit of insight you learn from your experiences. There is a bottomless well of new opportunities available just by introducing yourself to new customers, new revenue streams from existing customers, and new markets to offer your products and services.

• Develop a proactive referral program that engages everyone in your network.
• Launch a low-cost educational e-mail marketing newsletter that demonstrates your firm’s expertise and provides value to the reader.
• Implement a customer loyalty program that encourages repeat business and long-term relationships.
• Celebrate generating new ideas as a practice, and celebrate the hell out of ones that succeed.
• Ask yourself, your clients, and your team, “What else could we be doing?”
• Listen to them when they respond.

Content Builds Interest, Interest Builds Community, Community Builds Revenue

TradingEducation.com plans to be the best site on the web for traders of all levels to come learn about the financial markets and how to trade them most successfully. They are an ad and sponsor driven site focusing a significant amount of resources on bringing together free content, creating a social networking platform, and offering the education traders need that will spawn traffic of its own, through members helping other members.

One smart way to generate that traffic is their recently launched TraderEducation.com Today newsletter. The newsletter allows them to actively promote their market commentary in an easy to distribute manner. Their philosophy is based on educational content which builds credibility with traders. They have invested in strong content that has been developed for the website.

Giving the readers the lead for a number of articles draws them to the site. This generates ad impressions to sell, and most often introduces the reader to additional content and to a worldwide network of traders like themselves, generating more traffic, more loyalty, and more advertisers, who are often also potential content contributors. Advertisers are smart knowing their own contributions can drive exposure for themselves, which compliments their ad program and generates an intense circle of positive impact for the reader, advertiser, contributor, and website community. This also allows for easy viral marketing as people forward the newsletter or site link to their friends and colleagues resulting in more people becoming available to contribute. The contributors are then likely to refer to their own content both on your site and theirs. This all generates improved search rankings and can lead to more sales. An opportunity is then created as people may want paid subscriptions to that contributor or to get even more of their analysis and a greater use of their services.

It’s the Network!

What we are talking about here are just simple business principles designed to help expand not only your company’s client base, but its network of contacts, which can act as an extended sales force. As an entrepreneur, by nature, you may be bustling with ideas, but may be having a hard time executing them because of the day-to-day challenges behind running a business. Just recognize that every day, week, month, and year you can be making countless small, positive, new moves that can collectively steamroll you to great success. It is just a matter of finding time to work on your business, not just in your business — sort of like you thought you would when you started.

As a punishment from the gods for his trickery, Sisyphus was compelled to roll a huge rock up a steep hill, but before he could reach the top of the hill, the rock would always roll back down, forcing him to begin again. Don’t be that guy.

Recognizing what does not work is often the hardest principle to execute, because it requires the owner, manager, supervisor, or the whole damn team at the business to take an honest look at everything and own up to the practices, actions, attitudes, habits, and people that are just not working as they should to help grow the business. This requires leaders not only to be honest with themselves and their team about the areas they may be falling short in (either individually or collectively) but, more importantly, it forces them to take action now that opportunities to improve are out in the open. The payoff is huge when you take a negative habit and turn it into a positive one! You’re not slowing things down anymore—you are speeding them up! It changes momentum; one act at a time, the momentum builds.  The best companies get to watch it happen all the time!

Whether they admit it or not, the vast majority of leaders and companies are just not willing to candidly look in the mirror, leave their ego on the floor and admit what they personally (or the company as a whole) suck at. Honestly, who in their right mind really wants to openly admit their mistakes, weaknesses, bad hires, flawed strategies, poor practices, or candidly own up to the fact that their idea is not working? Smart leaders do!

I have yet to find a single company that does everything right and does nothing to hinder its own growth. Some come pretty damn close, but those are the rare companies that have the discipline, humility, and candor that allows them to catch mistakes quickly, welcome the opportunity to improve, and change course, as needed.

Most businesses, however, are slowed by individual or corporate ego, a defensive mentality, or a general unwillingness to expose any vulnerability. How many times have you interacted with a company/department leader or an employee that just didn’t “get it”? How many times have you seen situations where those involved honestly seemed clueless, indifferent, or, at times, actively defensive about what you could see plain as day was a stupid decision, policy, or action that worked against their own or their company’s success? Do you or I see these because we have some incredible powers of perception? I’d love that to be true but, candidly, it is just because we are thinking with a sales mindset and an objective perspective.

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• Smart and humble leaders.
• Owners who are continuously successful at building and growing their companies.
• Managers who really want to know the truth about their business, as well as their own personal performance.
• Supervisors who recognize that ignorance leads to failure far more often than it does to bliss.
• Leaders that command the respect and get the best performance out of their team.

Does Your Business Stifle Change?

“Please do not tell me anything that could, in any way, improve upon the success of this company.”

How many times have you heard about an employee’s or customer’s suggestion that got ignored by someone who could do something about it? Far worse, but no less common, how many times have you seen or heard about someone actually suffering from their persistence in pushing for intelligent change? In these situations, it is as if the leader at the company or team is jumping up onto a podium, and declaring:

It may sound ridiculous when you look at it like that, but it happens to some degree every day in every company, including my own. Most of us just don’t take the time to recognize it.  Even fewer take the time to whack themselves upside the head to change their thinking and their communication.

Fastest Way Between Two Points is a Straight Line

One great example of how business owners fall into this trap is a firm I worked with a few years ago. They were a trading market education firm that focused on bringing in clients who wanted to learn how to trade the stock index market in a live, interactive trading room. The trading room gave new traders all the education and personal mentoring they needed to understand the system and succeed. The sales team had a great pitch, mixing in success stories, indicating the ongoing potential of the service, and offering a live demonstration. Unfortunately, this strategy did not turn into sales. This firm had a solid product that should have sold itself, but it wasn’t nearly living up to its potential.

The problem was in how they presented the online demo and how they followed up on their initial pitch. Their sole focus for the demo was to exhibit the program, not to sell the program, while they had the prospect’s interest and attention. Rather than personally calling prospects to close the sale, they would follow-up via email. The reps would sweat out a one-word difference in how the email was written, for hours, because they thought it could make the difference in securing a sale. Does that sound smart for a company trying to sell a $5,000 piece of software?

When the owner took a step back, he intelligently realized that he should be focusing more intently on getting the prospects on board with the product during the live demo.

The demonstration is the time when the master of the product can fully show the prospect what they will be paying $5,000 for, and why that is a reasonable investment toward potential long-term success as a trader. Few able-minded people will willingly part with five grand over email. They want to see the product in action, to see how that product can justify their money in the long-term, and the seller needs to act on that when potential customer’s interest and enthusiasm for moving forward is at its peak. Now, the company is doing fewer demos with more qualified prospects and getting more sales.

• I have more important fires to worry about.
• I don’t have time today to address it.
• It involves change and I don’t want to open up that can of worms.
• Every business has some problems, and my business is working well enough.
• I am the smartest person in my company. If the idea was dumb, I would have recognized it.

Why Does This Happen in the Business World Every Day?

Common sense would seem to favor us being aware of those big problems that can often be solved with small changes; however, very few are working to dig for those issues. Far fewer actually do something about the problem when we realize there is one. Why?

In one way or another, we each would describe it in some form of “Shit Gets in the Way”. We are making the choices and we are the only ones that can start turning stupid into successful.

Is your business working the best that it could be? Why are you not striving for excellence and, instead, settling for mediocrity? Many times, the things that can be improved are not just holding your company from reaching its highest potential.  They can literally be damaging your company, your reputation, your results, and eating away at the opportunity that is in front of you every moment that you allow them to exist.

Overwhelmed or Thinking You Can’t Do it All?

Here is a hint: Start by looking at all your “assumptions”.

Are you starting to feel down and out? Are you suddenly realizing the extent of everything that might be holding you or your company back? Are you thinking that fixing all that ails you is a daunting task, or a never-ending stream of bad news that looks a little overwhelming to tackle?

Fear not.  After all, “Rome wasn’t built in a day”. Reaching your company’s maximum potential is a life-long marathon, not a sprint to the finish line by next week.  You just have to make a move, right now, to build both your momentum and commitment through each day and each success.   Remember, changing an action from a negative one to a positive one gives you double the payback—payback that allows momentum to build quickly.

Leading By Example

Recognizing a limitation or an area where improvement is needed, along with actually doing something about it, will not only lead to better results, but it teaches those around you. Lead by example—demonstrate to your team what real leadership looks and acts like. Leading by example builds their confidence in the company and its leadership. Strive for leadership that is not only humble, candid, and proactive, but that which supports its team when they make mistakes, (as long as they recognize them as fast as possible and act with a passion and purpose about improving in those areas).

By being proactive in improvement, you are demonstrating that the company is:

• Clearly committed to open, honest communication.
• Truly driven to be the best at what they do.
• Willing to listen to every person and idea that could potentially help them achieve that.

Everyone Holds a Key

Do what William Wallace did against the British in the late 13th century — lead by example.

Whether it be an employee of mine, a customer, a partner I am working with on a project, or anyone else that can share some insight on my performance, each holds the key for tomorrow to be better than today.  What may put a dent in my own short-term assessment of how well I am performing for a client, or how strong and effective I am as a leader to those working with me, is absolutely required reading that needs to be digested, understood, and acted upon if I truly believe in this whole notion of growth. The key is to create a culture in which the employees feel the same desire to grow as you do and follow your humble lead in embracing change when it clearly leads to better results.

We are a business development firm in northwest Indiana, in Valparaiso to be exact. We have satisfied clients located all over the country. You can check out our website if you’d like.

We believe there are a litany of simple business techniques available at low-to-zero cost for business owners, and this blog will bring some of these techniques to light.

So what are your company’s goals? What do you do to help your business grow?

Anything?

We will periodically update our blog with some of our articles that can be found in our newsletters, website, or any other media we wish to utilize.

Questions? Comments? Let’s hear ‘em!