Management

If you’re an entrepreneur or small business owner in Austin, don’t miss this year’s RISE conference the week of March 7. Created originally in 2007 by Roy and Bertrand Sosa as a week-long, free “un-conference” for- and by- entrepreneurs in Austin, Texas, RISE has now grown into an ongoing annual program that leverages its proprietary web interface to provide one-of-a-kind resources and experiences to entrepreneurs worldwide for free.

There are dozens of sessions to choose from in locations all over town ranging from bootstrapping your business to sales training to the kick-off event with Robert L. Johnson founder of the RLJ Companies and Founder of Black Entertainment Television (BET).

Of course, I hope you’ll join me for one of three sessions I’m hosting on Monday March 7 at the Better Business Bureau Conference Room on La Posada Drive:

8-9:30 am:  Seven Steps to Marketing Success

10-11:30 am: The Social Media Pyramid: Unraveling the Mystery of Social Media Marketing

12-1:30 pm:  Winning the Local Search game PLUS Teaching Your Business to Market Itself with Referrals

See you there!

I couldn’t resist taking advantage of today’s date to write a Top Ten List of Reasons I Don’t Need Marketing. October, 10, 2010 or 10/10/10 apparently has metaphysical, mathematical and psychological implications.  I found this random and mildly amusing web page about the significance of the day, which won’t happen again for 100 years.

Take 10 metaphysical minutes to ponder this list. Do any of these reasons sound familiar to you?

10. Marketing is over rated. We have a sales force and all they need to do is SELL, SELL, SELL!

9. I’m busy running my business, I just don’t have time to work on marketing

8. Marketing?  We ain’t got no marketing,  We don’t need no marketing.  We don’t have to show you any stinkin’ marketing!

7. It costs too much.

6. There is no ROI.

5.  I’ve tried advertising before, and we didn’t generate one new customer.

4. I’ve got a website.

3. My sister-in-law designed a great logo.

2. Our quality and products sell themselves.

1. We’re already doing marketing! We know our narrow target market, understand who our ideal clients are, can say what makes us different, have developed content that educates, have a great marketing kit, created a brand identity, have a great web site and know how to use social media — we’re doing mailers, newsletters, special offers, networking, advertisements, public relations, have awesome repeat business and we’re getting all the referrals we can handle — NOT!

I'm a time management wannabe. Overall, I do pretty well at managing tasks, deadlines and projects for my clients, but I'm always looking for a system or better way of thinking to be more productive overall, especially at running my business. From Franklin Covey to Getting Things Done, I often get on a productivity bandwagon — determined to develop healthy habits to gain more control of my work and family life.  But alas, I fall off the bandwagon after a few months because, well, the systems just seem too hard.

I met recently with productivity training expert Maura Thomas of RegainYourTime.com.  She challenged my thinking.  It's not time management that I crave, it's attention management.  As Maura explains on her website:

It’s now widely accepted among researchers and scientists that constant multi-tasking even makes us worse at multi-tasking!  The more we do it, the worse we get…at everything.  The problem is that we have become so accustomed to instant gratification of our curiosity and our mental whims, that we have undermined our own ability to focus.

Many of the marketing and social media programs I teach and coach my clients to use require managing multiple projects and objectives – on top of their "day job."  I'll be exploring ways to help them not just manage their time, but also their attention.  Take a look at this video from Maura and visit her web site to learn more.