Walk the Talk Mid-Week Motivator

I don't know about you, but I really appreciate daily reminders/motivations/affirmations/whatever, especially since the buck stops at my desk. Consequently, I've subscribed to a few regular M-F newsletters to help get me going in the mornings. Certainly, they don't all hit it every day, but they do jump start that internal cheerleader who reminds me of what's important.

So, this morning when I opened the WalktheTalk.com newsletter, I read this list.


OUR CHARACTER IS SHOWN BY…

The jokes we CHOOSE to share…and not to share.
The derogatory terms we CHOOSE to use…and refuse to use.
The promises we CHOOSE to break…and the ones we keep.
The rumors we CHOOSE to spread…and those we ignore.
The resources we CHOOSE to waste…and those we use wisely.
The lies we CHOOSE to tell…and not to tell.
The responsibilities we CHOOSE to accept…and those we shirk.
The courtesies we CHOOSE to extend…and fail to extend.
The efforts we CHOOSE to put forth…and not put forth.
The quality we CHOOSE to provide…and the corners we cut.
The information we CHOOSE to share…and that which we hoard.
The listening we CHOOSE to do and not do.
The respect we CHOOSE to give…and fail to give.
The helpful hands we CHOOSE to extend…and those we keep in our pockets.

As I read each one, I thought about how it applied to me personally, then how it fits into my professional life, as a company owner, a service provider, and an evangelist of the customer experience.

I don't think the "rules" for great customer service can be expressed any more eloquently than in those used above that define character.

Spending Wisely

Time is the coin of your life.
It is the only coin you have,
and only you can determine
how it will be spent.
Be careful lest you
let other people
spend it for you.

- Carl Sandburg

I start my day with several inspirational emails, Note from the Universe, The Power and Grace-Daily One-Liner, and then a Thought for the Day from my coach, Hugh Ballou, whose email this morning included the above quote.

It is a great reminder and a fitting guide for beginning a new week and, as corny as it sounds, the rest of one's life.

As an entrepreneur who still works solo from a home-based office with a small virtual team, it's critical to use my time efficiently. But, there's so things that can sidetrack us, from our beautiful "San Francisco summer" we have right now to concerns about our business to whatever drama that might be going on in our personal lives.

I just had a conversation last week with a dear cousin who was celebrating a pretty major birthday. And, the conversation went to the reality of how time flies and before we know it, events didn't happen a few years ago, but a few decades ago and how imcomprehensible that can be. How did we get here!? Where did all those days and years go?

My mother always admonished me not to wish my life away. Now I understand what that means.

So, what does this have to do with the customer relationship management experience? For me, it means always taking care to build a strong relationship, know what my customers want and need, and deliver that experience. A happy customer is time-efficient becuase you won't have to deal with complaints that come from poor service. On the flip side, don't get caught up in the time suck that can happen with a customer who is bent on always being unhappy or indecisive. It's okay to fire those customers. Just be honest with yourself that it's not a function of poor a poor customer relationship!

A New School Year

It doesn't matter how many years it's been since I last sat in classroom. The arrival of September, officially heraled by Labor Day is the new year even more surely than January 1st. So, it is right and fitting, apropos, that we launch the first chapter of the new Private Label InterActive bright and early in September.

PrivateLabel Mail is changing names and will henceforth be known as Venntive. Nope, that's not a typo.

Venn is the name of an Eglish logician who introduced Venn diagrams (1834-1923). Venn diagrams are usually those overlapping circles with common shared areas, especially the center where all the circles overlap and share one common area.

Venn also happens to be Norwegian for a companion and equal, someone who knows and likes another person very well, or a person who acts in a friendly and generous way to people, etc. he or she does not know.

Over the years, PrivateLabel Mail has grown a very nice CRM (Customer Relationship Management) module that makes it unique among email marketing solutions as well as CRM solutions. It is truly a turnkey, pre-integrated, suite of tools that enable small companies to have an affordable, SaaS (Web-based) solution with CRM, sales forecasting, A/P and A/R, and enterprise-level email marketing tools.

We feel Venntive better describes what this great piece of software delivers. For those of you who are current clients using PrivateLabel Mail, nothing much changes for you except the name and the logo at the bottom of the broadcasts you send. We ask that you eventually transition over to logging in to your accounts at the new Venntive site, but the PrivateLabel Mail login remains in place.

If you have not explored all the tools that are included with your email marketing account, please email to schedule a phone conversation and a demo of all that you could also be doing with your account.

You Never Know Who You Might Run Into...

This past Saturday was windy and cold here in Marin County, so I decided to do a hike instead of a ride after running errands, catching up on some work (ah, the perks of being the CEO in start-up mode! more on that later...).

So, on the way back from Whole Foods in Mill Valley, I turned off onto the short road that leads up to the Tennessee Valley parking lot. Since it was Saturday, the lot was nearly full and there were quite a few people preparing to set out and more coming back. I have to qualify "quite a few people" as fewer than 40 total. Nice, huh?

This hike/walk into a part of the Marin Headlands follows a paved road slightly downhill to where the pavement runs out and the roadway is fine dirt. You get the feeling of being embraced by the surrounding hills that rise up covered in a variety of natural plants in a subtle range of grey-greens, straw yellow, dark greens, and dun. All along both sides of the roadway were a beautiful variety of wildflowers in blues, pinks, oranges, yellows.

Living in New York your iPod is a first line of defense for creating a bubble around yourself to escape the sometimes unwelcome cacaphony of sirens, cellphone conversations, horns, etc. more than as a source of entertainment when you go for an urban hike, bike ride, or just a cross-town busride. When I first moved to Marin, I'd go out the door similarly "armored" for a workout. Now I leave the iPod behind to enjoy the immense silences broken by the sounds of birds or the crash of the surf on the beach.

The approximately 2 miles to the beach is just right to clear your mind and open up to creative solutions. At one point, you reach the crest of a little hill that reveals the ocean, beach, and lagoon behind it framed by this V of hills folded back to expose this incredible vista.

I go to the beach, spend some time watching the surf, casually look for something to bring back to commemorate this walk. Sometimes I find something, sometimes not.

On the way back I notice the seagulls taking baths in the lagoon water, beating their wings against the water to createmakeshift showers. A little further on, there were three or four quail hens with what must have been 30 babies, skittering off the side of the dusty road into the bushes. Just as I was at a turn in the road framed by several large eucalyptus trees, I look down and see this chubby little fella just hunkered down staring back at me. Didn't move a muscle.

So, we looked at each other. Chubby didn't move...and, I went around and left Chubby to do what newts do.

You never know who you might meet or run into during the course of any given business day. Past experience guides us in choosing the proper action when confronted with a new challenge and helps us avoid disasters. That's what we're working on making happen easily for you in your business every day using the Venntive solutions.


More later.

Despite Everything...

"The secret of success is constancy to purpose." - Benjamin Disraeli, the only Jewish prime minister of England who brought India and the Suez Canal under rule.

Stage 1 of the Tour de France, Robbie McEwen produced a perfect sprint in the final 100 meters to come out of nowhere, surprising even the commentators in a chaotic finale and a decisive stage win. Robbie'd crashed with about 20km to go in a pileup and regained contact with the peloton with less than 10km to go. On a very narrow road, he had to push his way through a mass nearly two hundred riders, a nearly impossible feat. But, he stayed true to his purpose, appearing in the last frantic dash to the finish line to eclipse everyone else. What a finish!


Today in Stage 4, there were so many crashes, guys riding in shredded shorts, dripping blood. Alexandre Vinokourov went down hard and the huge hole in his shorts revealed a quickly darkening purple-dark red bruise covering his hip. Again, it was a race to try to get back on the back of the peloton to remain in contention. His team members led him out to bridge a huge gap, each gradually dropping off after a huge pull at the front of the team paceline. Again, he prevailed and not only regained the peloton, but made it nearly to the front to lose a little more than a minute. (Considering the smallest margin ever by which the maillot jaune was won after three weeks and nearly 2,500 miles is 8 seconds, a minute plus can be devastating.)

Despite all the conjectures, accusations, and outright guilt surrounding cycling's elite about doping, this sport at this level is awe-inspiring and a source of so many important life and business lessons. Team building, singularity of purpose, strategy, persistence, grace, fortitude, etiquette.

These are all top of mind for me right now as we prepare to launch a new Website to feature our first turnkey business suite, VENNtive, a pre-integrated CRM (Customer Relationship Management) and ESP (Email Solution Provider) suite for small groups with up to five users.