Congrats to Hugh for getting to number one with his new book, as an ode to him I shall embark on a new post venture:
I just found a perfect place for my paper towels (I buy them in 8 packs and realistically can only keep one on the counter), right behind some pans that only take up half the cabinet. Finally I've found some meaning in my life etc.
Keep at it Hugh, an overnight success after only 8 years and a lifetime of pain, if it were only that easy for the rest of us etc.
Monday, August 17, 2009
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
I've got something you've never even thought of....
Dance Core's Declaration Of Independence
Dance Core's number one concern is greatness. We do not want to be the greatest dance studio in the United States because of anything short of simply being the greatest. Starbucks, McDonald's, Walmart, Ipod's all have in common that even if you do not use them and even if you hate them you know they are the greatest in their field. I do not want everyone to love us but when somebody is going to open a dance studio inside of the United States I want them to either be happy that we are not in their area or size us up as their number one competitor.
We do not create products and we do not create markets, we simply refine products to perfection and take market share control.
We cheat by paying teachers less than the industry standard in hourly wages but give them both tangible and intagible exterior benefits. These benefits include: extremely efficient operations, health benefits, job security, multiple locations to teach at, opportunity for advancement, positive environment, percentage ownership for directors, adult companies to participate in. We also cheat by getting extemely good lease rates because shopping centers need reliable business's that bring in steady, repeat traffic. We cheat because we have the capacity to do our own buildout. We cheat by having a manual that shows exactly how each and every job is accomplished creating a well run studio from day one and whenever there is turnover. We cheat by undermining what other dance studios are built around which is compitions and the better the product the higher the price. We cheat by continually looking for new ways to cheat.
We are not concerned with creating extremely large studios but rather extremely efficient studios that scale to an organic size and then break off and open more branches.
We focus on finding teachers from our student base, directors from our teacher base and owners from our director base.
We grow from getting out into the community and making personal touches. We then execute what we do to perfection creating a buzz and a movement. People then sign up through a systemetized word of mouth marketing campaign. We have an extremely strong online presence both on social media sights as well as having a very strong website. We create strong relationships with local highschool teachers and coaches. We utilize our size to bring guest teachers and special shows to individual markets.
We are Dance Core, we are cheaters, we are organizers, we are marketers, we are always putting on an amazing shows, we are continually moving towards greatness.
That's our first draft of our declaration of independence, now it's your turn.
Dance Core's number one concern is greatness. We do not want to be the greatest dance studio in the United States because of anything short of simply being the greatest. Starbucks, McDonald's, Walmart, Ipod's all have in common that even if you do not use them and even if you hate them you know they are the greatest in their field. I do not want everyone to love us but when somebody is going to open a dance studio inside of the United States I want them to either be happy that we are not in their area or size us up as their number one competitor.
We do not create products and we do not create markets, we simply refine products to perfection and take market share control.
We cheat by paying teachers less than the industry standard in hourly wages but give them both tangible and intagible exterior benefits. These benefits include: extremely efficient operations, health benefits, job security, multiple locations to teach at, opportunity for advancement, positive environment, percentage ownership for directors, adult companies to participate in. We also cheat by getting extemely good lease rates because shopping centers need reliable business's that bring in steady, repeat traffic. We cheat because we have the capacity to do our own buildout. We cheat by having a manual that shows exactly how each and every job is accomplished creating a well run studio from day one and whenever there is turnover. We cheat by undermining what other dance studios are built around which is compitions and the better the product the higher the price. We cheat by continually looking for new ways to cheat.
We are not concerned with creating extremely large studios but rather extremely efficient studios that scale to an organic size and then break off and open more branches.
We focus on finding teachers from our student base, directors from our teacher base and owners from our director base.
We grow from getting out into the community and making personal touches. We then execute what we do to perfection creating a buzz and a movement. People then sign up through a systemetized word of mouth marketing campaign. We have an extremely strong online presence both on social media sights as well as having a very strong website. We create strong relationships with local highschool teachers and coaches. We utilize our size to bring guest teachers and special shows to individual markets.
We are Dance Core, we are cheaters, we are organizers, we are marketers, we are always putting on an amazing shows, we are continually moving towards greatness.
That's our first draft of our declaration of independence, now it's your turn.
Thursday, August 6, 2009
Problems and More Problems
I've heard it said before that because business's cannot actually pleasure themselves they hold meetings instead. It could be said that meetings are a huge waste of time but I think it could also be said that anything that is classically viewed as "business" is a huge waste of time. Today we will look at problem solving and business needs.
1) Problem Solving
Seth talks today about how business's would rather talk about the solutions than the problems. This concept is extremely damming because on so many levels we realize the benefits today of talking about the solutions and yet we do not have a solution, we simply have a problem.
Let's say you are Serg and I am Larry sitting in our garage talking about how to monetize a web search engine into a billion dollar profit for us. We talk about what cool stuff we can buy with that billion. We talk about how people are going to love us because if people give you a billion dollars they must love you. We work and work and work on this problem, how can we monetize. We put our giant brains together and yet we are still sitting in a garage without a billion dollars. Flip this and take the problem they were solving, fixing and perfecting search engine algorithms, and then realize that the solve came when the problem was solved.
One of my favorite things I've learned in starting a few small ventures is that forcasting is a business term for guessing mixed with hope. I'm guessing about what will happen in something that does not exist and now entails my entire life (thus the inevitable sprinkling of hope). The number one reason it is guessing however, is simply that we do not know what will happen and we have no track record. Taking this to problem solving, if you have solved this problem before than there is no meeting happening about it. If you have not encountered this problem yet then by talking about solutions you are guessing and probably hoping. Don't guess and hope makes a better woman's name than business strategy.
2) Problems Themselves
Taking the new perspective we now have on problem solving we scan over an article Guy wrote about marketing to teens and at the end he throws in this absolute nugget of insight:
"The lesson is that it doesn’t matter what a company “needs;” it only matter what customers are willing to do."
This should cause us to stop everything we are doing and realize that how we decide what problems are may be a problem in and of itself. Let us say that we are all sitting around the big oak table at twitter and talking about the solve to our no monitazation issue. We talk about how cool it will be when we turn each user into a dollar of profit per month, we will all instantly become millionaires, talk talk talk. The issue is that we are not even truly defining what the problem is and therefore, guessing at solutions, but we are also not discussing what the customers are willing to do. Customers are not willing to pay for twitter and thus we are discussing a solution to an undefined problem that has its roots in something completely seperate.
So how about your business, job, church, non-profit, sports team? What are your problems? What are your customers willing to do? Do those lineup? If not, that is your real problem.
1) Problem Solving
Seth talks today about how business's would rather talk about the solutions than the problems. This concept is extremely damming because on so many levels we realize the benefits today of talking about the solutions and yet we do not have a solution, we simply have a problem.
Let's say you are Serg and I am Larry sitting in our garage talking about how to monetize a web search engine into a billion dollar profit for us. We talk about what cool stuff we can buy with that billion. We talk about how people are going to love us because if people give you a billion dollars they must love you. We work and work and work on this problem, how can we monetize. We put our giant brains together and yet we are still sitting in a garage without a billion dollars. Flip this and take the problem they were solving, fixing and perfecting search engine algorithms, and then realize that the solve came when the problem was solved.
One of my favorite things I've learned in starting a few small ventures is that forcasting is a business term for guessing mixed with hope. I'm guessing about what will happen in something that does not exist and now entails my entire life (thus the inevitable sprinkling of hope). The number one reason it is guessing however, is simply that we do not know what will happen and we have no track record. Taking this to problem solving, if you have solved this problem before than there is no meeting happening about it. If you have not encountered this problem yet then by talking about solutions you are guessing and probably hoping. Don't guess and hope makes a better woman's name than business strategy.
2) Problems Themselves
Taking the new perspective we now have on problem solving we scan over an article Guy wrote about marketing to teens and at the end he throws in this absolute nugget of insight:
"The lesson is that it doesn’t matter what a company “needs;” it only matter what customers are willing to do."
This should cause us to stop everything we are doing and realize that how we decide what problems are may be a problem in and of itself. Let us say that we are all sitting around the big oak table at twitter and talking about the solve to our no monitazation issue. We talk about how cool it will be when we turn each user into a dollar of profit per month, we will all instantly become millionaires, talk talk talk. The issue is that we are not even truly defining what the problem is and therefore, guessing at solutions, but we are also not discussing what the customers are willing to do. Customers are not willing to pay for twitter and thus we are discussing a solution to an undefined problem that has its roots in something completely seperate.
So how about your business, job, church, non-profit, sports team? What are your problems? What are your customers willing to do? Do those lineup? If not, that is your real problem.
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