Who Needs Control?

Everyone needs a sense of control, stability, and sanity to your business. I’ve been using a multitude of programs lately in an attempt to wrangle my business functions and to be honest there is so much out there that work okay but nothing that really worked great for me.

What Was I Looking For?

The software had to handle contacts (not my Address Book but my business contacts), businesses, appointments, projects, opportunities (sales), tasks, calendar, and miscellaneous notes. Also, I wanted something that could interface with my email as that is where the majority of where I spend my life when I’m not actually working.

What Did I Find?

After looking through dozens of applications I decided to use one that integrates with my billing software, Billings 3, made by MarketCircle. They have a great application called Daylite, if you haven’t checked it out you should. I had downloaded it before but never really got to using it because it always seemed disjointed from the way I work. Basically, I had to change the way I work to work with it and I always hate doing that with software.

What Did I Do?

I did what everyone does only years later after struggling through use of a great software, I read the user guides. To be honest I rarely do it because most user guides are so very simply telling you where the menu is and to be honest, I’m not that dumb. Well, I guess I was. But regardless of that, I found their Concepts Guide and that was very helpful. Obviously it told me what was what but it went into short detail about how one would use each feature and how implementing the way you work into the software can help you really find the power in the software.

So I Set It Up

I took a trial copy I had downloaded before and installed it clean and began setting it up to run my business. You can import any of your contacts out of your Address Book via vCard. Getting everything set up was pretty simple. Then I installed the Daylite Mail Integration module, this is where things got fun!

What’s So Cool About DMI?

The Daylite Mail Integration module hooks into Apple Mail application so easily it’s amazing! Now I know many of you run from Apple’s Mail application and I get it because you use Gmail or something cool like that. Well, I use Gmail for our business, you know the free one that you can get your domain hooked up to? If you read a little and follow Google’s instructions on how to successfully set up Mail for use of a Gmail account whether for your @gmail.com or @yourdomain.com you’ll find that Mail works wonderfully.

But enough of Gmail for now, back to DMI. You can toggle the DMI module by pressing control+7 and a little window slides out from the left side of Mail. As you click on each one of your contacts the window will change. If that client, employee, vendor, etc. is not in the database it will ask you if you want to add them, just a button, not a pop-up. If they are already in the database, it will show you a check box that you click to add the email to the database as a note. You can also choose to take the attachment with it or strip it out of the email. The DMI is really helpful when you are tracking projects in which your primary communication is through email.

Overall

This software works very well if you setup it up right from the start, they warn you about just using it and trying to change the way you work mid-way through. Mainly because it will break your reporting, to me reporting is very important so I decided to take the little time needed and set it up right. There are some huge benefits of the software that can help every business but one downside that I can’t stand, I know it’s petty, but for the company that makes Billings 3 (which is beautiful), Daylite is just okay looking. I’ve seen worse but they have a standard that they set themselves. One of the best features I look forward to is the iPhone integration which from their blog seems to be right on track.

One More Thing

They have this additional module called Daylite Delivery which in their words

…You can share andschedule PDF reports for automatic delivery to your inbox. And because the reports are delivered via email, you’ll receive them wherever you are. They’ll also look great on your iPhone. There is no need to worry about being in front of the computer, schedule it once on the server and forget it.

I haven’t used this feature but when you are always out and about it would be nice to have the reports in your mailbox every morning. This feature would be very powerful for firms who are not in one geographical location or a firm who is always in and out of the office.

Daylite Shines On Your Business

I really look forward to the next thirty days while I use this software, good things can happen when you have your business under control. Having your business tamed will help you keep your business mind like water allowing you to be productive, effective, and hopefully really, really profitable.

Did I Mention GTD?

If you’re a Getting Things Done nut like almost everyone these days you should know that they have a guide to help you setup Daylite to match GTD practices. This was a big seller for me as I use Things (which is the best program by far that I’ve used for GTD) but it is just not enough, it lacks so much on the “everything else I do” factor. I might begin to slowly transfer over to using Daylite as my GTD trusted system. 

I had a meeting with one of my client’s employees and he seemed to only focus on delivering new features and working out stability as time goes by.

It brought up an interesting point while attempting to deliver your product to your customer. Where do you draw the lines? When you release new features do you release them so your customers have the newest, coolest feature or do you wait until they are fully stable. Obviously, I think most people would go for reliable, cool features but at what cost? How long will that take to release some new feature fully stable? So, then a company must decide what the consumer tolerance is. How long will a consumer deal with a poorly released feature?

Take a page from Apple’s playbook recently, they released the iPhone 3G with software and features that weren’t ready for primetime. They hedged those concerns by limiting supply and allowed consumers to waddle in a pool of core features that did not work well. Dropped phone calls and browsing your Contacts worked when it seemed like it felt like it. It was a good thing that you never call people or need to find their information on your PHONE. But what was Apple to do? They had to please consumers and shareholders by releasing new features over stability. However, how long would it take if Apple waited for a complete stable iPhone? A few months after they release of the iPhone 3G and stability was just now promised today!

However, that being said I don’t believe many consumers or shareholders want a company to wait, they want to move product.

How would you suggest companies balance this out?

If you didn’t get a chance to check out the Twebinar hosted by Chris Brogan then I have to say you missed out. It had plenty of corporate people talking about how they use social media and how it has actually affected their business. From service with their clients to how they dispel rumors from their competitors. It was a great event, the next few are coming up shortly. Make sure you register as space is limited. Not sure what a Twebinar is, here you go.

A twebinar is a webinar and Twitter mash-up where conversations take place in real-time before, during and after the webinar, on Twitter.

How Does a Twebinar Work?

It’s easy. Just follow the steps below:

1. Sign-up for a webinar on a topic that interests you.
2. On the day of the webinar, watch the presentation from your computer and receive information visually and verbally from the presenter(s).
3. During the webinar, a parallel conversation takes place as participants comment, ask questions, and/or discuss the webinar series on Twitter. Follow the webinar participants on Twitter and join the conversation.
4. Gather ideas and/or resources from a community of people with interests that are similar to yours.
5. The result? A twebinar.

This is definitely a must attend event! Don’t miss it next time.

So I know I’m behind on all of this but tonight I installed a plugin that allows you to view my site on the iPhone without viewing the site you see on a desktop. Hopefully it will help those of you reading my blog on your iPhone, I heard that it is hard to read my blog on the iPhone so now it should be much easier and definitely faster.

I read your emails how difficult it was to read so hopefully everything works properly. Let me know how it looks and works for everyone.

UPDATE: Plugin provided by Content Robot, Eric did the background logo for me, thanks.

Oh my god!!! Do you we need another video player? I swear, everyday I get up and find myself on Google Reader I keep reading about some blow hard video player company getting funded again and again. Do we really need 50 different video players that are innovative offering the same type of service that you can build yourself? Don’t get me wrong, there are some amazing video players out and one or two that make me salivate but really, when is enough, enough?

I don’t know how many calls I get every week asking me to integrate some new player into our site and how much better it is than what we have and if we go through them then we will make money because of advertising. You know, that was a concept I never thought about, advertising on my content, through my player. I do already and I don’t have to give them 70% of the revenue and then have them scrub the numbers therefore further diminishing my possibilities of profits.

If you’re going to make a player, make a player, don’t make some sorry excuse to sell more advertising. Are you an advertising company or a video player company? You can’t do everything, god knows Yahoo tries to do that.

Look, if you’re going to make yet another, miserable video player, here’s a few tips you should remember:

1. Make it look like every other one available (just change the color)
2. Tell me it goes full screen (no one’s done that)
3. Tell me you’ve engineered a new codec (no one has seen that before)
4. Tell me it’ll play full HD at 800kbps
5. Integrate a playlist (I don’t like to watch videos in order)
6. Put your logo on it (Nothing like you branding my content and site with your player that I pay you for)
7. Put Google AdSense on it and keep 70% or more of the profits (I don’t like to make money)
8. Tell me video on the net is the next big thing (I forgot what industry I was in)

Maintaining a well-branded web presence seems to be the largest enigma of the past few years. If you have video on the internet and have the incessant need to establish a strong brand without selling your soul to Oprah like Dr. Phil did, then you too realize that there must be another option!

Many will deny, often with exceptional conviction, that they need help in creating a brand for their business. The business of online video. No, you don’t need people to truly know what the name of your show is. Surely, you would never want to monetize off your content. Nor, would you, want to sell accompanying merchandise. Those simple ideas of business are for someone more traditional, pretentious, stuffy and downright uptight! Never would “new media” types want to profit, they’re pioneers of the future! Oh, wait! Yeah, they do, they call me every week wanting me to pay, exorbitantly mind you, for their self-absorbed, egomaniacal, and wholly thoughtless show. Many new media amateurs aren’t wanting to be fairly compensated for their hard work of creative arts, they want to extort you, for everything you’re worth.

Amongst my rant though, let me clarify, there are many new media types who produce quality content that are worthy of making large, ridiculously, risible amounts of money, hopefully in Euro rather than the weakening US Dollar.

Having a destination, a place to call home, where it is all about you and your brand is so vitally important. It seems so distant of a business practice; to create strong brands. Many consider their business model to “just be viral” and money will roll through the door eventually. A business model as such, would be so eerily ridiculous if it didn’t work for a select few of talented, creative and just plain lucky individuals. But as this industry wanes on, the possibility for daft, fatuous programming to succeed closes rapidly. Many say the industry is sick, fatally ill from a lack of traction in the market. Traction has been achieved no doubt, strong branding has yet to be so lucky.

Having all media viral or social seems to create a problem while solving another. Everyone knows, or should know by now, that you should have a social strategy/plan for your company and most definitely for you video/brand. The problem begins when you tell people where to go to consume your brand. What address do you give them? YouTube, WordPress, Ning, Shopify, Revver, Flickr, FeedBurner, etc.? Many think their brand is truly only their video, however, branding is so much more than just a “video.” For instance, if you have an off-road video show you produce, don’t you really have an off-road brand? Isn’t there more to your business than just a video? There are blogs, articles, community, syndications, advertisements, photos and e-commerce. There are probably some I missed here as well. How do you execute each of those effortlessly, without failure, while maintaining your social presence? Without failure may be difficult but let’s try all of the above mentioned with embarrassing, disappointing failure mixed in. How do you manage it all?

Sure you could use Content Management Systems (CMS) that are popular and even modify a blog engine but what about those not technically savvy, those who haven’t embraced technology, you know those who don’t know how to send a simple text message. They are continually, thoroughly confused as to why you would want to type a message on such a small keyboard to someone rather than just call them. How do these people thrive in this industry? The are talented, creative, experts in their field who are branching out, exploring, pioneering into this seemingly ‘Gold Rush’ times of online video. Don’t they deserve the same opportunity as the perverted, pimply-faced thirteen year old who films his friends kicking each other in the ‘below the belt’ zone? As the industry matures I believe it will be harder for geeks to become creative content creators as technology begins to consolidate in order to help content creators to have the same power as the geeks but without the lonely nights and flats of Mountain Dew.

Now, some might want to point out to me, many pompously, pontifically haughty, how important social media/interaction is in our world today. My feeble mind, in all of its simplicities, have not overlooked the importance of social media. Hell, everything should be social these days! If you don’t interact with your audience today, you won’t have them tomorrow. But there is a colossal need for some sort of “point of origin,” what did we all call them a few years ago while describing web sties before “Web 2.0” became the oh, so tiresome cliche, ah, I remember now, “destination sites.” There must be a home for your audience, scratch that, audience is so corporate, your die-hard fans, those who live for your new release every waking moment. You remember them, you know, those who make those grueling hours of veritable horrors we call art, worth every moment. What is that called again? That’s right, validation. It’s our fans, those who love us at our best time and at our most embarrassing times. Where is their home? Why should they live on twelve different networks just to embrace your creative prowess? Don’t you owe them something more? Sure they love scouring YouTube for your video, hitting up Ning, posting bulletins on MySpace and even moderating a group on Facebook but how is that a sustainable business?

There is an obvious need for consolidation and management, a need to have your “home” and your social outreach. But where do you go to get this service needed? Very few companies provide this, at least for the smaller, growing companies. I feel with roughly three-quarters of United States broadband users consuming videos online I believe it is important for service to become available. A select few companies should rise who can do for online video what Salesforce.com did for Customer Relationship Management (CRM) by offering a platform as a service, something that can be built upon. This is an area we (Global Independent Media Productions, Inc. or GIMP) have been working on silently for the past two years. Now, I’m not into completely pimping out my company, however, I think you should know that we have been thinking about these issues. I know there are many seemingly, well-built platforms that can be built upon and modified but I’m not talking about complete adaption. I’m speaking more of a Salesforce.com model, they do CRM well, very well, probably the best, if you live in sales then this company is for you but every industry and sub-group of an industry is different. They made a platform for industries and sub-groups to build upon. There should be a platform for the entertainment industry to build upon and not the big studios, they already have them. Whether you like it or not you reside in the entertainment industry, you may be talking about the geekiest of things but you are still providing entertainment.

So, now you ask yourself, “Ok Justin, I get it, now what?”

Well, I didn’t get that far but here are some helpful hints to help your destination/social balance.

1. Setup a release schedule (Week 1 @ Destination, Week 2 @ YouTube, Week 3 @ everywhere)
2. Don’t wait for advertisers to come, format your show for free and premium models. (Your fans will gladly pay you for your talent, pimp the free content everywhere)
3. Sell accompanying merchandise (AskANinja does this well, sells DVDs)
4. Partner with a Network (I know, it sounds like I’m recanting my previous statements, continue to have a home but partnering with a network often enables you platform, structure and most importantly more fans.)
5. Talk to your fans constantly (If you don’t respond to every piece of communication, they will eventually move on, that is the downside to social media and the internet, more opportunity presents more choices for media.)
6. Stop changing your destination site or telling everyone to move over to the new social media site that just came live or is now passing out invites. (People get comfortable in one or two spots and as you move your focus to other places you will inevitably lose traction which you worked so hard to gain.)
7. Love what you do (Sounds simple but you need to love what you do in order to addictively keep up with every aspect of your business.)

You know those times when life is pleasant, easy-going, listless, bountiful, absolutely and resoundingly happy? Well, this week has been far from that pipe dream of hopeful cheer. What could be so bad you ask? Why are you a little down this week? Why do you look like you’ve aged to a grim reaping age of 28? (I’m 25)

Well let me list it for you:

1. DS3 died (First time ever it went down)
2. Lost footage
3. Memory went bad in iMac
4. Server hard drive stopped working
5. Video camera broke (Didn’t break the lens but the CCD board is gone, which means we need a new camera)
6. Hard drive recorder broke (May have lost more footage)
7. No good movies came out this week (I guess that one has nothing to do with me)

So with my ever so shining martyr-like personality (not really) itching to tell the world that if you were thinking about asking me to head to Vegas with you to help you play 5-Card Draw in the High Stakes room; I would have to respectfully, ever most eloquently decline with pride in tact as my luck has seem to have ran out and over-drawn my “Good Karma” account.

However, before you buy a plane ticket to come be my saving grace I would recommend you stop and think of those actions. I would not advise coming with any electronics, trinkets, nicknack’s, grandmothers, watches or pace makers. It could be lethal for you, well, maybe not lethal but definitely hazardous to your technological well being, which in my industry is really your life.

So it is now that I sit and reflect upon my actions, my hopes, my dreams, defeats and I ponder. Will I make it through? Of course, I’m stubborn, driven, an over-achiever and just plain committed to overcoming adversity with utter-most dignity.

So I raise my glass (there’s nothing in my hand) and embrace this menial setback with prudence, humility and ambition. The good thing about Karma is that when it swings bad one day, it can and most likely will swing great the next.

(Disclosure: I’m not sure if I believe in Karma but it fit the theme of the post rather well)

I woke up this morning, got some coffee and readied myself for the day. I drove to breakfast, ate, then headed to the office. I set up my laptop and hit Google Reader, I then saw Jim Cramer’s company TheStreet.com released a new site named MainStreet.com aimed to be the TMZ of the personal finance market. Basically, TMZ meets TheStreet.com for normal people who are at different stages in their financial life.

I first looked at the site and was amazed how nice and clean the site looked. The site was simple to navigate and easily understandable, except for video. Finding video on the site was a lonely link at the bottom but once there it was useful. I enjoy how the site breaks up its sections: Beginnings, Endings, Windfalls and Challenges.

MainStreet.com describes their mission as:

To present news stories in which life and money intersect. Every article – whether it’s a cautionary celebrity tale, a rags to riches story, politics, fashion or just plain fun – will have a secondary focus on improving your personal finances. Updated throughout the day, MainStreet delivers national and international news that impacts your life decisions, your pocketbooks, and your future.

At first glance it really looked like a nicer, more appealing TMZ.com but upon reading a few articles the purpose begins to shine through. It takes normal life and attempts to make a parable of the story, somehow, relating to your life, the normal person, not the trader. This site is a complete shift from Cramer’s TheStreet.com Wall Street addicted users, which articles are about “the market” not real-life.

I believe this is a great step in the right direction for Cramer and TheStreet.com but is it enough to make people stop going to other sites? I don’t know?

What do you think?