bwagy, the blog of Ben Young

This video is the result of a few smart (great guys) I know coming together and executing, enjoy.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5VGjNyMbM-E

How would you react?

in the digital age of libraries, what will they become?

Hubs, real physical hubs, just as with Twitter The Well, one of the original online communities, people strived to meet in real life (despite online connections).

Libraries will become places where we meet, gather, engage with each other and connect around content.

Or at least, till the next generation takes these libraries inside facebook.

Someone will research, interview, toil away for thousands of hours, employ a team of research assistants to help them collate the information.

The recommendations sum up this mass of intellect.

And then anyone can go the summation of this knowledge off the shelf as a book for ONLY $30.

Does executing your side project make business sense?

Or does it only exist because you’ll put unreasonable hours into it?

Answering those questions helps put your effort into perspective.  It doesn’t necessarily have to make business sense yet but realising it doesn’t will change how you approach it.

Einstein said: “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”.

The annoying thing is that when you are seeking information often the same results come up over and over.  It would be nice if we could ‘edit’ the results and say stop showing me this page.  Just like Facebook where you can remove content from your activity feed – do the same for search results.

Please Google, Bing, that would make a world of difference (to me and everyone else out there researching).

We (my wife and I) were shopping over the weekend visiting (I’ll be honest) mainly ladies stores.

What I noticed is that most stores the attendant would come up and say hi, the most interesting was one who was on the phone wandered up said hi, shuffled two pieces of clothes and walked away to resume her conversation.

I thought that’s weird.  Then I remembered my friends (in retail) telling me that mystery shoppers come test you and score you accordingly.  One of those is ‘acknowledging’ every customer.

So what’s the shortcut to that? Saying hi by whatever means, even if it’s not helpful.  It’s a shallow performance measure and really the response to it reflects the culture of the store.

Not a good sign! A better measure in my mind would be to have a meaningful interaction with each and every customer.  And people are scored by customer satisfaction leaving the store.  Not being on the receiving end of forced communication.

You can sell yourself, you’ll never have a problem.

Being able to sell yourself changes and de-risks any new opportunity you pursue.

It means you can chase an idea and still earn a living.

If you can solve this problem, it erradicates many others that you’ll never have to experience.

Let me get my regular meal but also let me try something new without risk.

It’s the opportunity cost, at the cost of getting my regular tasty meal I could risk it (to get something better) BUT lose out on a guaranteed (or at least I feel guaranteed) meal.

It’s the same process that anyone goes through when swapping suppliers.

So how do you overcome it? Offer a taster menu, your regular meal with a taste of a new one.

A little bite, a snippet, enough to get a gist of it.

Check out the most viewed videos on YouTube.

Do you think you could do better?

Probably. Actually most likely.

It surprises me (it really does) that more people don’t take advantage of this. Especially super high value content. Extra tid bits for tv shows, behind the scenes for upcoming movies, studio sessions for bands, product demos. Give it a go now.

(after I wrote this the Jesters popped up, an Australian tv show sharing full episodes online, for free – now I want more!)

When overwhelmed looked at what creates the waterfall, what one problem when solved will solve all the others.

As a startup this is usually just sales, if you have sales, everything else tends to fall into place.

I was reminded of this as we met with an augmented reality company, who said users tended to just focus on the software and lose focus on their surroundings.  Which actually meant they performed much better, as they focused on one thing, and everything else fell into place.

It’s like playing a racing game, you can focus on trying to beat your competitors, watch the clock, avoid obstacles, use boost and upgrades to win OR you can focus on great driving and just that.  It’s great driving which wins the race and everything else falls to the wayside.

Focus on the one issue which drives success of everything else. Finding this issue or problem, which in solving, solves all your others.

If there’s enough people doing it, you will find what you’re looking for. It’s a self-fulfilling prophecy as people will want that attention and try to monetise it.

It’s the same with interest in any area, you can probably find people/books/ideas to re-inforce it…

That’s why knowing and keeping an internal scorecard is so important, what is of value to you, what do you or your organisation stand for, identifying where you do/don’t stand and sticking to them.

Just because there are enough people doing it, making money (or look to be successful), doesn’t mean it’s for you.

From Alan Webber’s 52 Rules of Thumb:

“Change happens when the cost of the status quo is greater than the risk of change C(SQ)>R(C)

It’s that second part that sounds out to me, really looking at and investigating – what is the true cost of the status quo.  What happens if you don’t move forward?  Can you really live with that? Will your organisation survive if you don’t?

What do you do?

1) Pick yourself back up

2) Review/reflect on what went wrong

3) The most crucial part: make changes

4) Try something new

A Christmas email which actually genuinely bought a smile to it’s receivers.  From Kiva:

Twas the Night before Christmas……and all across the map,
Not an entrepreneur was resting,
Not even a quick nap.

They have work to be done,
Opportunities never sleep.
With visions of better lives,
Their commitment runs deep.

This holiday season,
Kiva simply wishes to say:
Of you, our lenders and borrowers,
We are proud every day.

Kiva wishes you Happy Holidays, and a safe and healthy New Year.

—

A christmas email any entrepreneur is likely to forward on (which should always be the aim right).

Not your friends…

But their friends.

The related products.. the products that make your existing purchase better.

It’s amazing the effect that it creates, you buy one, then you buy another. Soon you have the whole family. Kind of like Barbie, and Ken, or iPhone and Macbooks or ….