Biznik Blog

Time to eat cake!

The results of the 2011 Member survey are in.

Did you know… 86% of you are currently running your own business. 70% are businesses of 1 or 2. And you’re not a group of newbies. 48% of you have been running your own show for over 5 years. Another 24% for 3 or more.

That means 72% have been on your own since before the recession. It’s clear a deliberate entrepreneurial choice has been made.

You didn’t create a job for yourself out of necessity, you’re choosing to build a business. Our economy is linked to YOUR success. Biznik is here to help you succeed.

More than half of you have taken some college-level business courses, but a full 30% have had no business education, not even an adult education business-related class or workshop. That’s a lot of self-taught professionals, who can learn from each other through Biznik articles and workshops.

Blogging can be boggling.

49% of Bizniks blog more than once a month. More telling, 55% of you would like to do it better.

What to say, how often to say it, what platform to put it on, what to call it… Should you be doing it at all. These are questions you will have to answer about your business blog if you haven’t already.

A remedy: go to Biznik articles. There are dozens published on the topic of blogging for business that may answer one or more of your questions. And if you know something on the subject, share it with others! Build your reputation as an Expert when you publish an article on Biznik.

You said peers are important.

95% of you said that networking with other small businesses is important. (I might’ve guessed that much.) But what surprised me was that 61% of Bizniks generate over HALF of their annual revenue from referrals. After previous customers, you report that the majority of your referrals come from trusted industry peers.

Your trusted peers are on Biznik.

Demonstrate that you’re trustworthy… start by bringing your profile up to date. If your profile doesn’t reflect who your are today, you’re not taking advantage of the potential of the Biznik community.

Social media is like eating greens.

It’s important for the overall health of your biz.

63% of Bizniks have a Business Page on Facebook. Wow. So this week we enabled Facebook Like Boxes which means others can ‘like’ YOUR Facebook Business Page directly from your Biznik profile and the articles you publish.

Facebook continues to adjust how businesses are represented on their site, and what tools business owners can use to reach the people who have ‘liked’ them. ‘Likes’ equate to a larger audience for your business. Biznik is on board with helping you cultivate that audience from inside the community growing here. Add yours!

And while you’re adding your Facebook Like Box, add your Twitter stream, your blog feed and your video to your profile too. The majority of you report that you use these for business.

AND PERHAPS…

…THE MOST SURPRISING RESPONSE.

36% of you have a listing in the Yellow Pages. My copy of the yellow pages has gone from straight from the porch to the recycling bin for the last ten years. If you still see a value in the Yellow Pages. I want to talk to you!

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And for those who are interested… Mark Roberts of Portland, OR, was the recipient of the iPad2.

Coming our way, November 2 & 3, 2011.

Brainchild of Brian Rauschenbach, the Seattle Interactive Conference [SIC] conference is bringing together visionary, disruptive thought leaders ranging in areas from online commerce, social media gaming, interactive advertising, entertainment, and much more. “Think of it as the SxSW of the Pacific NW.” (Cool!)

The folks at SIC have given Biznik a day stage to focus on entrepreneurial topics and the micro business owner. Our goal with the stage is to offer you access to cutting edge concepts in technology and business.

We are extremely excited about the speakers we are lining up, as they represent the core values that inspired the emergence of this conference, as well as the motivating factors for why we all got into business in the first place, to make the world a better and more innovative place.

Stay tuned for more information as it develops.

Register before June 30 and receive $100 off the Early Bird Rate.
(That’s $99 instead of $199 for Bizniks!) code: biznik2011

Register today!

It’s happened to all of us. You connect with someone new — a new business associate. You admire the way they think. You enjoy your conversations. You look forward to your interactions. You’re busy with your business, you know they’re busy with theirs. Someday, you trust, you’ll spend more time with them.

Kim Ricketts operated Kim Ricketts Book Events in downtown Fremont, a block from the Biznik office. I followed her suggestion, once, to come by for a glass at “wine thirty”. We talked about KRBE and Biznik and the Innovators Series we co-produced. Then we talked about books, and authors, and running a business, and managing employees, and how to scale in-person events in this era of technology. I left that meeting inspired by this fellow woman business owner, a decade my senior, who was generous with her insights and wisdom. I looked forward to sitting down with her like that again. That time never came.

Kim Ricketts lost the battle to cancer on Monday. I lost a mentor and business partner. The literary community lost one of it’s shining stars — a master networker who intuitively knew how to connect authors with their fans. The Seattle community lost an extraordinary event producer who created unique experiences for her audiences and guests.

Kim was a friend of Biznik, who helped launch our most successful event series. Her idea to match the country’s innovative thought leaders with Seattle’s innovative entrepreneurs was an innovation in itself. It was her idea to invite Warren Etheredge to engage the authors in an on-stage conversation; her idea to include a wine sponsor; to make the events small and intimate; to throw in a copy of the book. She explained to me that authors were bored by being asked to speak to a banquet room packed with 400 audience members. “Let’s give them something special.” What began as something special for the author became even more special for the audience. 80 people crammed into Theo’s Chocolate Factory for Gary Vaynerchuk last month. Sure, we could’ve rented a larger space and made room for 400. But then I doubt I’d still be hearing from attendees how remarkable it was.

Kim’s legacy will live on in the Biznik Innovators Series. I’m grateful for the short time our paths crossed, for all I learned from her. And I’m deeply saddened that I won’t be provided another opportunity to join her for a chat at “wine thirty”. I raise a glass to you, Kim. Thank you for all you are, all you touched, and all you contributed.

Donations in her honor can be made to the following:
826 Seattle
The Seattle Public Library

Lara and I wrangle with different topics around entrepreneurship all day. We get to work with solopreneurs as they look for ways to engage with other business owners. All this mixing with smart business types can be very inspiring.

After attending the Guiding Lights Weekend 2011, I have a new lens with which to be inspired as I work with entrepreneurs: Good Citizenship.

The Guiding Lights Weekend is the brainchild of Eric Liu, a civic thought-leader in Seattle. Eric presented four precepts that would steer the weekend, compelling the 400+ participants to dig deeper, to show up in creative ways to inspire and foster the society that we can be proud of:

All contribution should be progressive.

Society becomes how you behave.

Every one of us is a gardener.

Show up for the young people.

Eric uses the metaphor of a garden, and it is a good one. A garden takes continuous and constant work. Like gardens, civic life flourishes when we plant seeds, and then care for the plants we seeded.

GLW11 has brought together dozens of luminaries to speak on panels, host workshops and deliver speeches; their contributions for the hundreds of attendees is making a powerful impact on how we all go fourth in our businesses, teaching roles, and civic relationships.

What follows is a selection of the really awesome discussions and workshops we attended from the weekend.

Teach Civics
Sandra Day O’Conner had wanted attend the weekend, though unable to, she was generous enough to produce a video welcoming the Guiding Lights attendees and made a special plea for Eric to share with her the results of the weekend. O’Conner has developed icivics.org, a web solution to help teach students learn about civic life.

The former Supreme Court Judge is concerned that millions of native born citizens would be unable to pass the test required to become an American today. Icivics educates students on democracy, encouraging students and teachers to engage in civic responsibility.

Marching Orders
US Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan joined the discussion via satellite, and encouraged adults to step up and work with students independently, noting the school system can’t do it by itself. When we do that, students will meet us more than half way.

During the last part of his marching orders Friday, he asked us all to hold the senators feet to the fire, they need to get better, faster, with less money. We cannot wait. Demand reform, challenge reform. Senator Duncan left us with these thoughts:

Education is the civil rights issue of our generation.

Education is an economic imperative.

Education issue of national security.

There are millions unfilled jobs in America. Duncan’s marching orders for American adults to make strides to engage in students lives can occur in a variety of ways for entrepreneurs: through mentorship programs, interns, summer jobs, and business intensives. He called for this move towards youth as early as possible – starting to engage young Americans in their mid-twenties is great, but it’s too late.

Teaching the Art of Citizenship
Either overtly or subversively parents and teachers are what brought the notion of civic duty to the highly skilled and dedicated panel members on Day 1 of Guiding Lights 2011. Maya Enista, Ted McConnell, Andrea Levere, David Smith, Maya Wiley all approached the panel discussion about how to teach the art of citizenship from their unique lens, and they did not all agree on how to best bring about the shift which must occur in America, to recognize the areas of growth we need to pursue.

The Ladder Out of Poverty
Van Jones began the Keynote address on Saturday morning by acknowledging that he was asked to not stick to hi schtick, and to talk about something that he dos not usually talk about. So he decided to talk about the American Dream. A topic that he noted seems to be in conflict with itself, and with a large number of Americans.

The American Dream is under threat from the inside. There is a quest and a calling that we have a nation to work hard and aspire to get there – the middle class is falling off the table. It is under threat. Neither the right nor the left can defend it alone. We need the best of the markets and the best ofgovernment, we need the best of community, and best of our individual selves to come forward.

Jones keenly echoed the theme of responsibility in his speech. He spoke about the importance of the entrepreneur. Now, more than ever, social entrepreneurs are working to use their business degrees to solve civil problems, problems such as poverty. Though Van was quick to share a quote from his father, Willy Jones, “Every child has to climb the ladder out of poverty themselves. Society has a responsibility to make sure there is a ladder for that child to climb.”

 

 

The New Story of We
Following an amazingly inspiring story from Dan Savage about how and why he created the It Gets Better Project – a full panel of social change agents took the stage to talk about their story and how we use story to improve our citizenship. On the panel was Nassim Assefi, Deepak Bhargava, Kathy Johnson, Timm Lovitt, Dan Savage, Dawn Trudeau, Vivek Varma, John Vassall, M.D. The panel was moderated by Eric Liu, here are a selection of tweets from the panel discussion. For the full scope, check out #GLW11:

 

Tell It How It Is
Guiding Lights Weekend closed with an eminent speaker on global warming, Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org. 350 is what scientists say is the safe upper limit for carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. After showing the audience amazing photos of people around the world impacted by global climate change, he astounded the room with the obtuse direction that the US Chamber of Commerce is trying to drive the nation, as it secures the big business polluters, and politicians. If The US Chamber does not speak for you or your business, speak up here!

Wrapping Up
It was hugely inspiring to be with the on-stage and off-stage participants of GLW11. The Biznik Team is excited to have the opportunity to work with Jena Cane, who, with Eric Liu, and the rest of their team will present The Guiding Lights 2012 to offer wisdom, perspective, and new possibilities of civic engagement to the Biznik community.

Guiding Lights Weekend 2011 – Images by Alan Alabastro

Last night @GaryVee rocked the house for the Biznik Innovators event at Theo Chocolate in Seattle. Kristy Swanson did such an awesome job summarizing the take-away in her blog, I’m reposting it here.

“I think that in this world of unlimited information, fast-paced communication, email, texting, Facebooking, YouTubing, and other media and content flying at us with breakneck speed, something’s got to give—and that something is that we’ve got to get back to being personal with each other.” Well said, Kristy.

From KristySwan.com: Helping gutsy women do cool things

Relationships Rule, Even in Social Media. Here’s Why.

Well, my mind is just a-spinning!

See, I went last night to a Biznik event to hear Gary Vaynerchuck speak about his new book The Thank You Economy. Without me trying to reinvent the wheel, here’s the review on Amazon.com if you want to read a summary of what the book is about.

Gary Vee is an energetic, passionate guy who has a lot to say about social media and how it’s going to change business as we know it. But suffice it to say that underneath all the talk about the impact of social media, Twitter, Facebook, the death of traditional advertising, and the difference between push marketing versus pull marketing, the nugget that I took away from all of it is this:

It’s the relationship, stupid.

Yep—when you get right down to it, none of the other stuff makes a bit of difference unless you are willing to put the time in with that other person to have a quality, connected relationship. The relationship you have with someone else is at the heart of just about anything you do, whether it’s your customers, your boss, your coworkers, your sweetie, your friends…if you don’t take care of those relationships, the rest of it heads south.

Now, Gary’s book is focused on marketing. On using social media to hyper-personalize marketing, to find out what your customers really want and need, and then address those needs.

But I think it’s broader than that. I think that in this world of unlimited information, fast-paced communication, email, texting, Facebooking, YouTubing, and other media and content flying at us with breakneck speed, something’s got to give—and that something is that we’ve got to get back to being personal with each other.

It’s the relationship, stupid.

Relationships are, and always have been, at the heart of every situation and interaction we will ever have And as a corollary, how we nurture and interact in those relationships (i.e. communicate, via words, actions, body language or technology) is key to having successful results, whether it’s in our work, our relationships, with our customers, and so forth.

I think about this stuff a lot as I work to build my coaching business. It’s not hard to get swamped in all the hype that is out there about social media, marketing, branding, advertising, how to get clients, how to keep clients, how to engage your clients, how to grow your customer list, blah blah blah. And I’m guilty of getting sucked under it along with the rest of the small business owners.

Not that it isn’t relevant stuff. After all, I DO want to build a business. I do want more clients. I do want to offer something useful and meaningful to my potential customers, even when they’re not specifically hiring me as their coach. And (shameless plug here): I do hope you’ll connect with me via Twitter, Facebook, or via my mailing list, because as it turns out, more fans (clients) equals a healthier business. Who knew?

But the point isn’t more, more, more, just for the sake of having a big following. I’d rather have 100 raving fans who I can actually interact with in a meaningful way than a large number of people that I can’t possibly connect with. I don’t need tons and tons of people on board—I just need the right ones, who I can help in a very real, productive way. I mean, Gary Vee has nearly 900,000 Twitter followers, for god’s sake. (Yes, you read that correctly.) I guarantee you that he employs a small army of Twitterists who manage that stuff for him. And for me, that’s just not the kind of personal relationship I want to have with my peeps.

I’m more interested in conversation. When you read a blog post of mine, I’m interested in your feedback. I respond to every comment because the conversation is the good part to me. I love hearing your thoughts, especially when your point of view is different than mine.

And yes, I am a Facebook fan. Facebook is an awesome tool for building and maintaining relationships, both business and personal. I love some of the conversations I’ve had with people there, and it’s even better when those relationships extend into the non-virtual world. A prime example is at the event last night, I met someone in person who previously I had only known through connecting on Facebook, and it was really cool. We had a great conversation that all started because of social media.

Then there’s the Twitter thing. Do you follow me on Twitter? Here’s my request: don’t just follow—let’s talk! I love that Lynn over at the Power Chicks has what she calls Twitter Tuesdays: leave your handle, and a brief description of what you tweet about. Yet I find myself wanting to say: I use Twitter to talk with other women who are doing cool things in the world! No specific topic…let’s just share what’s up!

But again—the media, the technology, the vehicle that you use to connect—that’s not the point. Getting lots of followers, having a bazillion friends on Facebook–not nearly as important as the quality of those connections.

The point is (yes, you got it) the relationship.

All the technology in the world don’t mean a thing, unless you are willing to invest the time in having solid relationships. With real people. In ways that matter. Are you with me here?

Now over to you: what’s your take on social media? How do you use it in your life and work?

Join the conversation by leaving a comment on Kristy’s blog.

It takes a lot of guts to put together and host a networking event.

First, you have to dream one up, then find a location, get the manager’s email and phone number – having conveyed how many people will attend and if they are buying drinks or eating food – and figure out if you need AV equipment. How many chairs are available, and is the manager willing to donate the space.

After you get that all set up, you can create the event for publication, promote it, execute it, clean up, thank the venue, thank the attendees, and then relay any and all pertinent information that was discussed in any conversations for the event, which sometimes can get pretty deep. When all of that has been done, you have completed a successful event.

Three members hosted the most events and as a result have a proven track record of trust and accountability within the Biznik audience: Deborah Drake, Kate Phillips, and Bob Dunn.

You can host an event in 2011
It’s easy to host an event, (it’s even easier when you grab a friend and you host one together!) Popular first-time events have included social meet’n’greets at a local pub, walk-n-talk casual networking without an agenda, or a gathering of folks at a coffee shop who have all read the same great marketing book like Seth Godin’s Linchpin.

If you are interested in hosting an event, think about the type of event that you would like to go to, and then reach out to one of these Biznik members who knows what it takes to host an event and ask their advice. You can also ask me for tips: Matt Lawrence, the Biznik Community Manager.