Disruptive to anyone with as many irons as I have to keep hot, but we’ve pulled it off reasonably well, with Hunter in school at at the excellent Waldorf School here in Pittsburgh and Heather re-establishing her jewelry studio and online shop just in time for the holidays.

Even though I’ve been doing some painting, most of my work time has been spent online for Heather and some of my other clients developing more avenues for connecting with people online, a prime directive of the San Diego Finishing School mission.

In the general state of craziness of the last few months, its been very reassuring for me as an artist and a business person to see some of my developed opinions on business, the economy and the state of culture in general reflected (and sometimes far more clearly articulated) by other bloggers and commentators.

I’ve bookmarked a few of them to share as I redefine the San Diego Finishing School project in new contexts, this one is from BrandForward a smartly written blog by Michelle Tripp, article just published November 1.

I couldn’t agree with this more.

“Consumers today are more educated, more savvy, have access to more options, AND THEY HAVE HIGHER EXPECTATIONS.

If a company isn’t consistent, honest, connective, and emotionally relevant to the consumer, they’ll move on to do business with another company. Consumers are drawn to what’s real and genuine. If a company isn’t living its core value, if it doesn’t offer an experience that “feels right,” consumers smell a fraud or don’t make a connection. They may not detect the reason on a tangible level, but their subtle discomfort causes them to look for other options. That’s why uncovering a company’s core value and leveraging and living it consistently will draw consumers into the brand community. They subconsciously crave being a part of experiences (and brands) that are aligned, balanced, and represent something higher.

And most importantly, when you begin to subtly and consistently integrate the core value into your marketing and operations, the energy of the company begins to shine. Your customers have a renewed sense of why they do business with you, and new customers feel an energetic pull toward you.

Customers are always drawn into the light.”

I’ve been developing the definitive “cheat sheet” for super-fast set-up of an optimized WordPress blog for a small business and a self-starting strategy for creative and/or personality driven businesses to build their engaged online audience and grow the sphere of influence of their business in general.

Its an intensive two-day process, but at the end you have a tool you can use to get your business first page search returns, a first rate mailing list, and first mover authority in your niche. Read the Online Business Commando Training Class Description here and stay tuned for more!

Listen online now.

Online Business Commando Training

Location: San Diego Finishing School, 1843 5th Avenue, San Diego, CA 92101
Link out: Full class description & registration page

Summary: Walk in with whatever you’ve got for your business so far.
Walk out with a working site and a business plan that will get you a targeted audience and paying clients for your products or service. This is the ultimate shortcut to getting your business up on or back on its feet in these rough times. Includes follow up consulting to make sure it works for you- call me directly for details at 619-654-6208.

Dates: August 14, 2009
09:30AM-5PM
and August 15, 2009
09:30AM-5PM

Can you tell I’m a big fan of Wordpress?

Anyway, here’s part of what I wrote on the other blog, and a picture of my new Commando troops I took with my iPhone and e-mailed directly to my Flickr, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn accounts in seconds (literally) to make a point about leveraging technology for time as small business person.

“In the afternoon on Monday of my “Online Business Commando Training”, 3 woman entrepreneurs and their assistants sat down to their own laptops as I guided them through:

• setting up proper web hosting
• installing and optimizing a Wordpress blog
• crafting a post
• publishing it across multiple social media platforms

While I confess to cramming in too much information for most people into one day, I can now be sure to say that everyone had an “intensive” time and is working away on creating a powerful online channel for their existing offline businesses– all 7 of their businesses (between just three students).” (read the rest here)

July 20, 2009 Commandos

July 20, 2009 Online Business Commando Training

Because I have the honor of appearing on San Diego art sage Philly Joe Swendoza’s ART ROCKS! Internet Radio show this Wednesday night, I decided to combine the Wednesday night class into Thursday night’s class to free up the time.

Then I realized it was even better deal for people just starting to be serious about marketing their art or creative small business online, because I’m fitting twice as much information into a more convenient single class AND more convenient single price.

Its like getting 50% off the information in half the time— if you’re ready to be serious, that is. I’ll be presenting a lot of information in that evening that can fuel the growth of your business using online tools and social media channels, if thoroughly absorbed and applied by you.

Check out the revised Evolution Business I & II class description.

I’m especially excited a new class on Monday July 20 called Online Business Commando Training. I’m teaching this in a secret North County location in San Diego and only have 2 spots left– so if you’re looking for the ultimate shortcut to getting your art or creative business online with the most powerful business generating strategies available to brick and mortar business today, this is your chance!

This class started as a custom spec and I didn’t anticipate having extra people, but my excellent host has assured me she can make comfortable room for two more people to suit my maximum of five people/projects to a session. The reason for this is to make sure everybody’s getting what I’m talking about in the class and getting the results they want weeks and months down the road.

Check out the class description and feedback from my marketing classes for artists at the San Diego Finishing School.

Can you tell I’m going to beg off on not having updated the schedule of classes here or created the registration pages you need for my marketing for small business classes in July?

(the faux painting classes, too, actually.)

Well I’m really going to apologize for putting the teaching schedule and “maintenance” of the San Diego Finishing School second after my painting and business gigs– it is all about getting the gig, right? and any opportunity to just paint is going to come first for me, and I hope for you, too.

So I’m sorry I’m being a selfish artist but, among other things, I have a show opening this Friday in Little Italy, a show of my sky paintings which I sort of backed into, but its working out great for a variety of reasons, one of which is some marketing practice of my own, which you might be interested in.

Check out this video I made of a fun step in the process of these particular paintings (fun for me, anyway).

Anyway, I really am working on the class stuff, and I’ll actually be out of town on the 15th, so that sequence of classes for artists as small business people is going to move for sure, but more on that later this week.

Gary, who I’m quoting below, is both artist and craftsperson who has been working to get his jewelry specifically focussed online for business purposes, has more than one “light-bulb-on” moment during our session last Thursday night, and sent me this email in response to my inquiry about this experience an dreaction to class.

John,

Your class was a very thorough introduction for the uninitiated to an abundance of new tools within reach of most artists today and brings forward what to many may seem complex elements.

Thanks for showing that it can be simple and seamless and more importantly, effective, made very apparent in the success of your wife’s jewelry business where you’ve applied your ideas– she’s a great example for us.

-Gary Welsh

I look forward to working with Gary further and sharing here some of his progress in achieving new business success as a direct result of his own efforts online.