How To Survive In Business

Couple of quick items I thought you’d find interesting.

First Interesting Item: The Wall Street Journal ran a great story the other day on the follies of MBA-powered mismanagement.

Well, I thought it was a great story, anyway. No one else seemed to pay much attention… probably because it doesn’t fit into the average person’s belief system that a Master’s in Business Administration is good for anything.

Seems that Harvard lost $350-million bucks in a hedge fund… run by guys with Harvard MBAs.

Let that idea roll around in your head for a moment.

If you have a stake in believing that MBAs rule, then it’s just an annoying news item. Move along. Nothing to see here.

However, if — like me — you enjoy these tidbits of proof that MBA actually stands for Massive Bullshit Acquisition, then the irony is truly delicious.

I’ve always maintained it is harder to teach people with too much education how to run small biz and entrepreneur shops, because the nonsense is piled so deep and thick in their skulls. An MBA is often a red flag that trouble lies ahead… like getting in a car with someone behind the wheel who learned how to drive solely from books.

A lot of the people who come to me for private consultation have MBAs. They can wax prolific on all sorts of business theory… but when it comes down to actually making sales, they’re like a babe in the woods. Helpless, clueless, and desperately trying to bluff their way through whatever disaster they’ve created.

Okay, there’s probably some worth in getting advanced degrees in biz. If you’re looking to nail down a soul-devouring gig in middle management at some faceless corporation, for example, it’s definitely the way to go.

And it will, at the very least, force you to read some books. I guess that’s a good thing, too.

But a vast number of the most frightingly successful entrepreneurs and small biz owners I know have zero college under their belt. Many dropped out of high school.

And yet you would consider them intellectually “inferior” at your peril. They’re usually smarter than the most “officially” educated guy in the room, and possess infinitely more real-world “pedal to the metal” savvy. The world of small biz doesn’t do so well using theory and grand concepts like “branding”. Entrepreneurs generally do better by breaking rules, and employing old-time classic salesmanship to deliver targeted product via killer pitches to hot markets.

All my mentors were self-educated. That generally means they were obsessive about reading. If rumor of any good book in any MBA program leaked out, they were on it. And because they filtered all incoming data through the real-world crucible of making sales happen, I would bet on their comprehension level being higher than any student’s.

But they never relied solely on books. Often, they would stop reading the latest bidniz best-seller half-way through, having quickly picked up the essential knowledge they could use. Books are tools.

It’s how the info works in the laboratory of everyday selling that counts.

I’m a broken record on this, because it’s important: Whatever happens to the economy (and things are, admittedly, getting scary)… whatever happens in your market (including the sudden threat of increased competition)… and whatever happens in your life in general… the one key survival skill will always and forever be raw, classic salesmanship.

Learn how to sell. Learn how to identify your best prospects, how to find them, how to nurture their innate desire for what you offer… and, most importantly, learn how to needle their emotional sweet spot to get them to act. To buy, to try your stuff out, and to allow you into their complex, fuzzy-focused lives as a “go to guy” provider of goods, services and content.

And remember — if the dudes teaching the MBA courses really knew their stuff, do you think they’d be grinding it out in academia?

The School of Hard Knocks remains the best university out there.

Second Interesting Item: Last night, I had dinner with a friend who also happens to be the top real estate broker in Northern Nevada.

Nevada, you may or may not know, went from being one of the top ten hottest real estate markets in the country… to being one of the top five worst. And we did it in a matter of shell-shocked months.

Most real estate-related businesses around here are in full panic mode, laying people off, closing up shop, fighting off bankruptcy, wringing their hands and hiding under the covers.

Ask your average agent how things are going, and he’s liable to burst into tears (and ask to borrow twenty bucks for lunch).

My friend, however, is doing just fine. He’s not matching his record-setting pace from the recent boom years, but he’s not far off, either.

And how, you ask, is he able to survive and thrive while others struggle and fail?

The answer is very simple, it turns out.

He ignores all the strategies other agents and brokers rely on.

And, instead, he uses old-time classic salesmanship to help his clients sell when no one else is selling, and buy when no one seems to be buying. Any good salesman would immediately recognize his skill-set as bonding, smart message-to-market targeting, and (most notably) working within the rules of the real world.

No theory. No tricks. No special magic at all.

Most agents simply do not know how to sell. They violate the most basic principles… like forgetting that it’s not all about them, but rather all about the prospect.

You never “sell” a house to anyone. You create the opportunity for a prospect to sell himself. And you do this by completely understanding his needs and desires, and genuinely matching him up with the right house. However you need to define it.

Most agents get all caught up in self-defeating conversations about “no one’s buying”, “the market’s in the tank”, “we’re in a recession” and all sorts of other nonsense. The glass is half empty, and leaking.

A great salesman assesses the situation, adjusts, and stays frosty.

And they get real. People are still buying and selling, even in the most dire market conditions. Sure, they’re harder to find, but they’re there. The housing industry is a fluid, moving parade of action. And there is always a way around a problem. Always. The reality of the solution may not thrill you, but there are endless choices and alternative paths.

The world may or may not be headed for some kind of economic Armeggedon. We may weather the coming crises just fine, or we may all be living in caves in a few years.

But however the reality plays out, one stark fact remains: Those who survive and thrive will be the ones with the most real-world experience, and the best salesmanship skills.

It has ever been thus.

Stay frosty…
Via-http://marketingrebel.com/

JumpKnowledge, a brand new online notation tool. JumpKnowledge gives its users the ability to note and comment directly on web pages

JumpKnowledge is a lightweight and simple tool which is dead easy to use. It’s great for jotting down your thoughts in context without any disruption of the original text. It’s also a good way to share notes with fellow students or coworkers. You can even use it in jest, to mock bloggers by inserting witty asides in their witless posts.
JumpKnowledge, a brand new online notation tool. JumpKnowledge gives its users the ability to note and comment directly on web pages (unlike Google Notebook) whenever a thought occurs to them. Annotated pages can be saved, linked and sent to friends. All your notes displace the underlying text so that none of the original content is lost or obscured; your text is highlighted and can be read in context. JKN supports international character sets and includes soft links for cross referencing your annotations. There are add-ons for both IE and Firefox; you can also just copy and paste the web address into the text box on the homepage.
More at:http://info.jkn.com/

Shopify, one of a number of services for creating niche online stores

Shopify, one of a number of services for creating niche online stores, has launched the Shopify Marketplace, a venue to search all items on Shopify stores, browse by tag, vendor and product type and use the slick interface to view the featured stores of the day. The site was announced to users today.

Shopify claims to have more than 20,000 stores running on the platform, with pricing between free and $299/month. Rivals include Zlio and Amazon aStores.

Speaking of marketplaces, you’ve got 24 hours left to list in the Web 2.0 Marketplace, which I’m happy to say is getting hammered with traffic.
more at;http://www.shopify.com/

Social Media Plateform

CrowdFactory.com, which offers a platform that includes user profiles, blogs, comments, groups, discussions and photo albums -- all completely customizable. The service is offered on a hosted basis, and can be deployed quickly and easily. CrowdFactory boasts that their services cost less than developing software in-house. CrowdFactory makes it easy for anyone to set up a social network, for anything. Maybe you can use it for a campaign, your work team, your reading club, or a nation-wide group of like-minded thinkers.
They say"Traditional media are losing their reach. Tivo, spam-blockers, information overload, and the inability to deliver relevant information to consumers and track the effectiveness of campaigns have created a void for new forms of marketing to fill. The emerging social media - the synergy of online identity, communication, consumer-generated content, and traditional media combine to create compelling experiences for consumers. Social media have surpassed simple trend into phenomenon.

To help companies leverage the new medium, we have developed a social media platform and toolset to power white-label social network communities. Our offering includes social network communities with user profiles, blogs, comments, groups, discussions and photo albums, all completely customizable to create the optimal customer experience. The service is offered on a hosted basis, and can be deployed quickly and easily at a fraction of the cost of developing software in-house.

Our vision is to deliver social media in a way that makes it easy and effective for marketers and developers to create and power the best consumer experience possible."
More at:http://www.crowdfactory.com/

AskLaila.com works as a search engine where you can find any kind of information about your city

AskLaila.com works as a search engine where you can find any kind of information about your city. For instance, if you are in need of a specific kind of service, such as the telephone number, location and hours of service of a plumber, you will have it. Or even if you are running late for an important meeting and need the exact direction of the location where its taking place, you will also be provided of this information. But this doesn’t end here, whether you feel you must suggest a kind of place, your favorite one for example, or a helpful service, you have to register with the site, which is free, and by this provide the site with all the essential information you feel should be included. You can also contribute to AskLaila.com by writing reviews, rating the reviews of other users, or even your questions are considered as important. At the home page you will find five categories including Wine and Dine where you will find the best places to eat, drink and merry, Events, Lifestyle where you will find all you need to live, Local Services and Shopping. After this, what else do you need to make your life easier?
more at:http://www.asklaila.com/

Youtube On Your Cellphone

Mofoyo is the only way to share and watch videos and view images on
your phone. The Mofoyo service is 100% free and works on most video
enabled phones including Sprint, AT&T/Cingular, Verizon, T-Mobile or
other carriers including the iPhone, Blackberry's and Windows mobile
enabled phones. You may then share the video and / or image via
standard text message to the phones of your friends, colleagues and
family.
Mofoyo is an innovative site that allows you to share videos and photos with friends as well as meet new people from your video-enabled cell phone and your computer. One must simply enter the site and
create a user account, then you are ready to go and upload, watch and
share videos and photos as well as meet new people. Mofoyo works with
all major cell phone carriers and is free, although it is recommended
to upgrade your cell phone to an unlimited data package. Videos and
photos are shared through text messages and you can create a profile
which allows you to meet other users all over the world. The Mofoyo
site also keeps you updated with lists of all the most popular videos
and photos, along with members profiles.
More at:http://mofoyo.com/