As a marketer, consultant, and business mentor, I must have had dozens and dozens of conversations with start up entrepreneurs over the years.  And I’ve noticed the same marketing mistakes come up over and over again.  And today, I want to share some of these mistakes so that you can avoid them before they become serious.

1) Thinking of everything except how to get customers:

I’ve seen this one a lot, I get really frustrated when it happens!  The entrepreneur will think of the logo, the shop design and layout, the colours, the merchandise supply source, hiring new staff, the website – everything but the most crucial activity; marketing!
Several years ago I briefly flirted with the idea of starting a kids barber shop.  A family friend had a similar idea and we talked about the possibility of a partnership. Most of my thoughts about the potential new business were about how to attract families to the new place, what kind of offers I could make, and how to stand out in the market.  Most of her energy went into the design, the colour scheme, and even the fabric of the chairs!  Had she done it on her own I doubt the concept would have survived, as her business priorities were wrong.

2)    Not knowing who their target customer is:

I see this a lot, someone falls in love with the idea and rushes to implement, before doing any kind of thinking about the potential size of the market, who they are trying to target, and how often they should target them. If you try to appeal to everyone you will end up attracting no one.  So think about who your target customer is. What is their age? Income level? Where do they live? Do they have any hobbies? Do they belong to any clubs? Is there even enough of them to justify your business venture?  Do some homework before you start, and decide who you will target.

3)  Not having anything unique about their business:

It’s happened more than once that I’ve sat in a Coffee shop not knowing if it’s a Costa, Starbucks, Coffee Republic or one of the other chains.  To me this is a dangerous thing, and it scares me when I see a start up entrepreneur not having given enough thought to how he will distinguish himself from the competition.
You must have what marketers call a USP – a unique selling proposition.  A USP can be based on positioning, price, ingredients, colour, size, celebrity endorsement, hours of operation, location, etc.  Just remember that you have to make your business stick out from the rest.  Make it unique and memorable!

4) Not having a relationship with the customer:

A wise marketing guru once said that “you make a sale to get a knew customer, not to make a profit on the first sale.”  What this means is that a good marketer will often spend a lot to get a customer, often sacrificing the profits of the initial sale.  But the real profits come from the continuous purchases the customer makes over an extended period of time.  So the purpose of the initial transaction is to gain a customer and to establish a long-term relationship. Does that make sense?
After the initial purchase you continue to communicate with the customer through email, social media, newsletters, postcards and special offers, strengthening the bond between you, and in the long term leading to more sales and profits.

5)    Having too few sources of customers:

When I teach marketing at seminars I talk about a concept I developed called the Marketing Squid. I tell the audience “a squid has ten tentacles, and it needs them to survive.  Imagine if it had only one or two tentacles, could it survive?” Of course the answer is now, the squid would not be able to move about properly and not catch any prey.
The squid represents your business; if you have only one or two sources of customers (tentacles) your business will not be able to survive in the long term.  You need multiple sources of customers (i.e. multiple marketing activities) to survive and thrive in the long term.  You should consider print, radio and TV advertising, direct mail, marketing joint ventures, and public relations to mention just a few.  Never be dependent on just one or two key sources, as that is too risky!

Hope this was useful.  Talk to you soon.

This blog post is a summary of several conversation I’ve had over the last few weeks, where the topic was the Bahrain regime.  Some people have been predicting the supposedly “inevitable fall of the Al-Khalifa rule”.

This, in my opinion, will never happen (I know one should never say never, and by never here I’m mean a very very long time).  I’ll try to explain the reasons in an as level-headed and calm way as I can.  Here goes:

1) The army will not split.  If you compare Bahrain to Libya (an unfair comparison, but I have a point to make) the Libyan army split, which caused a civil war.  Here we’ll not a have a civil war as the army is 100% loyal.

2) The security forces are loyal – and yes mostly foreigners (“mercenaries” as they are often called).  With 20,000 or so security personnel who are well armed and equipped, an overthrow is very unlikely.

3) Let’s not forget the national guard.  I don’t know how many personnel we have there, but again, they’re loyal and are there to protect the status quo.

4) Saudi Arabia and the GCC will not allow it.  Bahrain is part of a club of monarchies, and they all support and help each other, as we saw last year with the arrival of the GCC troops.

5) Considering their interests, and their fear of Iran, the US and the other Western countries prefer the regime to stay.  But I admit, there are many who believe that the US is conspiring with the protesters to overthrow the regime.

6) I think this is by far the most important reason: Most people in Bahrain do not want regime change.  But I also acknowledge that the number of people who are angry and want to remove the regime are not few by any standard.  Unlike other countries, the Bahrain crisis has split the population and caused a rift, rather than bringing them together.

So for those who are predicting civil war, it’s not going to happen.  Of course we’ve had, and continue to have civil strife.  And don’t get me started on the whole sectarian crisis that we are suffering from at the moment.  I predict more violence from the protestors, and more use of bombs etc., and sadly there will be more counter violence from the Sunni street.  And through all this, I hope the security forces show restraint.

So for those calling for the downfall of the regime, it’s just not going to happen.  Going down that route, no matter how passionate and emotional you are, and no matter how wronged you may have been, is just not practical.

Reform Reform Reform!

Just because the regime won’t fall, this does not mean it should sit back and relax.  On the contrary it must move fast and decisively to end this ongoing crisis, and work on real reforms and start the reconciliation process.

If it doesn’t, our economy will suffer even more than it is already, and the business community will start getting more vocal in their dissatisfaction. The last thing a regime needs is a mix of political, human rights, financial, economic and sectarian crises. It will take us years to get out of this mess – oif we do at all. It would further lower Bahrain’s status in the world politically and economically and we’d turn into a sad, third rate has been of a country.

We need reform NOW!

Thanks for taking the time to read this, and talk to you soon.

So, there I was this morning, sitting in the car with my children, driving them to school.  BBC Arabic radio was just finishing a section on a scathing report issued by a human rights organisation on Bahrain (I think it was Amnesty International).

Anyway, the words Sunni and Shia came up several times, and I thought this was a perfect opportunity to bring up the Sunni/Shia topic with my kids.  With me in the car were Selma, 10 years, and Laith, 8 years.

I started the conversation by asking “do you guys know the difference between Sunnis and Shias?”

My daughter knew a little, but my son was clueless.  Since I teach my kids kickboxing on the weekend, I used a martial arts analogy to explain the difference.  Here’s what I said:

“You know what karate is right? Well, there are different types of karate like Shotokan, Kyokushin, and Wado-Ryu, but they are all called Karate.  Well Islam has different types or branches too, and the main two are Sunni and Shia.  And within these two branches, are several sub-branches.”

I then asked them if they knew what sect we were.  My son did not know, but my daughter answered “Sunni!”

“That’s right” I responded. “And which sect is better?” I followed.

“Neither,” my daughter responded.  I was relieved by this response, it seems my wife and I are doing a good job in making sure they are open minded and respectful.  I reminded them that the Prophet Mohammed (PBUH) said that there is no difference between an Arab and a foreigner except int heir devotion.  I told them that we don’t know who’s right or wrong, and that we have to be respectful of all sects and faiths.

“But what’s the difference baba?” They asked.  Here I kept the answer really basic, and avoided going into the intricacies that happened over 1,400 years ago.

“Well, Sunni’s pray like this” I put by hands in the prayer position, right hand over left, “and Shias like this.” I kept my hands by my side.

“Also,” I added, “Shias pray on a small stone” [I didn't know how else to translate turba]

“What was the Prophet baba, Sunni or Shia?” They asked.  “Well,” I responded, “in those days they were only called Muslims. But both Sunnis and Shias today consider him on their side.”

That seems to have satisfied them for now.  I’m sure there will be more questions as they grow up, and as they mature, I’ll explain more of the details, and go deeper into historical references.

Allow me to take a moment to talk about the way we raise the kids from a religious perspective.  I consider my self quite religious, but I also consider myself liberal and open minded.  I know some really liberal families tell their kids that “we are neither Sunni nor Shia, just Muslims.”  Though I find this admirable, I do not subscribe to that way of raising children.  There’s nothing wrong with raising them a certain way, and teaching them to pray in a certain way – as long as they are respectful of other sects – and religions for that matter.

We’re raising our kids as respectful, open minded Sunnis.  But if I ever catch them saying anything negative about another sect or faith, they’ll get a slap on the face.

Back to the car ride…

As we’re driving and talking, the subject turned to protests.  “Baba, why do the protesters protest on the street, why don’t they go somewhere far or talk on the radio?”

“Well, if they go far no one will seem them. The protestors want as many people to see them as possible, so they go on the streets.  As for the radio, they’re not allowed to go on the radio here, but they use the internet a lot.”

“Why do they right things on people’s houses?” [Referring to the graffiti one can see all over Bahrain]

“I guess they want people to see.  But it’s not nice to write things on peoples’ houses…”

” Yeah then the police has to come and clean it up.”

The conversation lasted almost the entire ride to school.  We concluded the conversation talking about tear gas.  They had heard about it – and they claim to have smelt it – but did not know where it came from.  So I gave them a summary of what it was and how and why it was being used.  I explained in a neutral and calm way.  I told them that the Police in Bahrain and other countries shoot tear gas at protesters to break them up and send them home.  I did not think any more details were necessary at this point.

I hope that in some small way, this conversation helped our beautiful country.  If enough families teach their children respect and acceptance, we can counter the sectarianism and hatred that has engulfed this small yet wonderfully warm island kingdom.

Thanks for reading and talk to you soon.

I cannot tell you how busy I’ve been – REALLY BUSY!  If you don’t see me blogging for a while, know that it’s because I’m overwhelmed, never because I don’t care, or that I don’t have enough to write about – I have far more things to write about than I can ever have time for.

Anyway, since it’s been a while, where do I begin…?

Ah yes, my recent trip…

I had a whirlwind trip recently to the UK, Vienna and Singapore.  I had a couple of meetings in London, and gave a lecture at my former university, the University of Buckingham.

I have to admit it was a very nostalgic trip.  Buckingham is a sleepy village north of London (in Buckinghamshire).  The most exciting thing there is the university itself – and that only has about 1,000 students.

I gave a lecture there to the students of the -relatively new- Business Enterprise programme, which is really the academic way of saying “entrepreneurship”.   I really enjoyed speaking to the students.  It was nice to see people at such a young age having entrepreneurial ambitions.

Talking to the students. Photo courtesy of Dean M. Junayed Miah.

I must have spoken for about 2 hours, which was followed by a long dinner.  The students asked me question after question and I answered as best as I could.  I was in my element.  I really enjoy consulting, coaching and mentoring, and nothing turns me on more than entrepreneurship.

Some of the ideas of the students were really good, while others needed some tweaking here or there.  I’m actually considering investing in one the ideas, we’ll see…

Vienna

Vienna street corner

After London I went to Vienna for 24 hours to pay my respects to some family friends, whose mother passed away. She was a close friend of my mother’s, and as a child I considered her like an aunt.

Her death made me sad, it reminded me of the changing of the seasons that we all have to go through whether we like it or not.  I’m not even 40 and I’ve already lost most of my uncles and aunts, and of course my father.

Funny, when I was a child I could not wait to grow up, and now I wish it had lasted longer.  Of course it’s futile telling your kids to enjoy their childhood and not be impatient about adulthood.  They will eventually wish it lasted longer too… and so it goes on until the end of days.

The Glory That is Singapore

My trip ended in the futuristic city state of Singapore.  Wow!  What a country!  This is a country that knows what it wants, and is getting it!  I loved how clean and organised it was.  Singapore is a great example of what Bahrain could have been.  They have turned themselves into a developed nation in one generation -  while we have protests, burnings, tear-gassing etc.   *SIGH*

The Bay area at night

I attended an investment course in SMU (Singapore Management University, not the other SMU, Southern Methodist University).  From what I gather, this is a very prestigious university.  I had the pleasure of meeting some very interesting people there.  I hope to keep in touch with some of them over the long term.

And I really hope to visit Singapore on a more regular basis.  I’ve visited before, way back in 1997, so it’s changed a lot, but it was impressive then, and is now.  Don’t get me wrong, the country has it’s problems, and I’m told it’s spectacular growth and transformation in just one generation came at a considerable social price, and don’t even get me started on some of their taxes.  Still, a great place.

The view from my hotel (the Fairmont). FANTASTIC hotel by the way.

Mandalay Bay Hotel

Another Young Man is Dead

Bahrain lost another one of it’s youth during a protest, Ahmed Ismael, God rest his young soul. He was shot by a live bullet.  The question is why? And who?  One hears rumours of armed “militia” going to protests, and/or it might be lone gunmen intent in punishing the protestors.  It’s not right, it’s disgusting.  When will the madness stop? God only knows, somehow I still have hope… and God willing, no one’s life (from either side) will have gone in vain.

Rest in peace Ahmed.

Minister of Culture Causes Havoc

I’m sure you’ve heard the story, but I’ll give you an abridged version here, as I understand it.

Some Islamists MP’s were not happy with the Spring of Culture activity Shaikha May organises every year.  And according to rumour, they were particularly upset that she allegedly asked the mosques to lower the volume of the Athan (call the prayer) in Muharraq.

She was brought into questioning in parliament where she was grilled.  In an angry response she accused the MP’s of bringing “child mercenaries” to her events to protest.

With Shaikha May al-Khalifa, minister of Culture, at an EO event.

This caused an uproar and she was kicked out, and on her way out she said something like “there is not a single man among you”, which caused an even bigger furore.  Now the MP’s are calling for her head.

Personally, I think that this whole thing blew out of proportion, and I hope we see some apologies exchanged, and people acting civil again.

I do want to add that I admire Shaikha May and I think she’s an outstanding minister, who has done a tremendous service to cultural awareness in Bahrain.  I give her my fullest support.

The DreamBody Centre Bahrain Mall

Well as can be expected, we’ve been delayed in the Bahrain Mall centre.  Originally, the contractor was supposed to hand over on the 1st of April, but it turns out that was a dream.  The problem is we had sent out sales letters in advance telling people that we’d be open.  To say I’m frustrated would be an understatement.

The new – and hopefully fixed – date is 15th of April.  By the way, we’re doing some amazing special offers for the opening week, if you’re interested, make sure you’re on my email list.  Click here to join my list.

Well my friend, that’s all I have for today.  I’m off to India all of next week, hopefully I’ll blog again soon.

Take care and God bless.

Further, I’m traveling for a couple of weeks to London, Vienna and Singapore, and I doubt I’ll have much time to blog during my travels.  So the next time I’ll have something to write will be end of March, or beginning of April. Having said that, if I find that I have time on my hands during my trip I’ll write an article or two.  But will definitely be tweeting, so make sure you’re following me on Twitter.

I want to assure my followers and the readers of this blog that I’m committed as ever to writing – and to contribute to the cause of reconciliation in our beloved Bahrain.

All that remains is to say thank you for your interest, and your patience.

Talk to you soon and God bless.

Marketing should never be haphazard.  All your marketing efforts should be as defined and as targeted as possible.  Each advert you put out has to have a purpose.  Some adverts have a call to action that require the prospect to visit the place of business, while others want him to call.  Some adverts’ purpose is to increase awareness with no specific call to action.  Still, other adverts have the purpose of generating leads.  This is the type of advert I want to talk about today.

But first, some general definitions; Let’s start with the word “prospect”.  A prospect is a potential customer for your business.  Someone you want to do business with. A “lead” on the other hand, is someone who has expressed interest in your company; by contacting you in some form or other.  This could have been by phone, email, mail or social media.  Leads are the best prospects to follow up on as they already contacted you, which means they are interested – at least on some level.

So, how de we generate leads for our business? By using lead generation advertising.  You can see one here for the DreamBody Centre, which appears in the Yellow Pages in Bahrain.

The DBC Yellow Pages lead generation advert

The concept is simple, in your advert you try to entice the prospect into contacting you by offering a free but valuable – and highly desired – “gift”.  It could be a free report, an audio CD, a webinar, or even an app.  In order to get the free gift, the prospect has to call, email, or login to a website, thus turning himself into a lead.

Let’s breakdown my advert so I can show you how it works.  The advert is not selling anything; it’s just encouraging the reader to get the free body fat report from the website. The advert has no other purpose.  And the report cannot be downloaded without giving an email address first, which we will use to follow up with.

Notice that the advert is targeted towards people who are overweight; this is done with an attention-grabbing headline (“How to Starve Your Fat Cells”) and a photo of a scale and measuring tape.  Notice that the headline is dramatic and in bold type.  This increases the chances of someone paying attention to it, and hopefully then reading the rest of the copy (words).

The headline is followed by a sub-headline talking about the free report, and it has several, powerful key words like “FREE” (who doesn’t like something free?), “reveals” (gives the impression that something valuable has been kept from you), “secrets” (us humans love secrets, and are brought up to covet them) and of course “burning fat” and “losing weight” which are magic words for any overweight person.
The first sentence of the advert focuses on the reader’s pain (“Are you frustrated with your weight?”)  Here’s a big secret, if you want to make your advertising and general marketing effective and powerful, you must connect to people’s emotions! And you should start with reminding them of the negative ones they are going through at the moment.  The advert talks about frustration, annoyance, depression and shame.  The copy goes on to talk about how the reader probably didn’t get results in the past from trying different diets, and then finally offers a solution; the free weight loss report!

The advert then starts to explain all the things the prospect will learn from reading the report.  And it reminds him that the report is free, with “no gimmicks and no tricks.” Notice the style of writing is simple, conversational.  A good copy writer should speak directly to his customer, and always in singular form, not plural.  Also, you can use tag questions like “right?” Or “make sense?” because we actually use them in day-to-day conversations.  Also, they are a powerful technique to get people to to agree with you.  Know what I mean? :p  The call to action is to visit the website and get the free report “now.”  Remember to always tell the reader what they should do next!

My advert has two flaws, one which I was aware of, and one which I noticed only later, after we submitted it.  The first flaw is the website, ideally, a pure lead generation advert should not have any hint of branding, which I did well – except for the website.  The website is a bit of a give away.  I could have created a special URL for the prospect to visit… something like StarveYourFatCells.com or something similar.  But I was rushed and the deadline was close, so I could not be bothered to go to such length.

The second mistake was not actually mentioning the title of the FREE report, which is Body Fat Secrets Exposed.  I’ll make sure to fix that in the next edition.  But remember, don’t add your logo and don’t brand your lead generation ad.

Anyway, you can do something similar.  You could write a 3 or 4-page report about your area of expertise, and then offer it for free download.  You could also record an audio or even a video slide show and offer than as a free bonus on your website, in return for the prospects contact details.  Then write a similar advert to the one here (do not copy it word for word, it is copyrighted!), promoting your free bonus, thus generating leads for your business.

Try it!

Hope you found that useful.  Will follow up with another marketing article soon.

PS For more on how to write adverts, read the following blog posts

1) The importance of direct response advertising (how to commit small marketing suicide)

2) How to write advertising headlines that can make you rich.

3) How to pointlessly burn your advertising money.

4) The phenomenal power of copy writing. How to write proper advertising copy.

5) Millionaire secrets to creating killer advertising photos.

6) The missing puzzle piece to any advertisement

I received my first “social media” award last night!  A big thank you to the Information Affairs Authority (IAA) and it’s president Shaikh Fawaz bin Mohammed Al-Khalifa for organising such an event.

The event started with a speech from Sh. Fawaz, I then had the honour of giving a speech as well, in which I spoke about my experience in social media.  I spoke about the great benefits social media has brought to me, as well as it’s dark side.  I spoke briefly about how much hatred I received from people because of my views.

Giving my speech. Courtesy of @EbtisamKBahar

My speech was followed by a short video of Bahrainis talking about their use of social media, which was very entertaining.  This was followed by the actual awards ceremony.

30 awards were given out for several categories.  I received an award in the “blogger” category, and so did The Make Up Manual.  My wife Alia received an award for “health guru” – well done!

I really liked the fact that our Foreign Minister Sh. Khalid bin Ahmed Al-Khalifa received an award – two actually. One for his ministry, and the other as the “most engaging personality” on Twitter. When he received his award he gave an impromptu speech, saying that social media should be used responsibly.

Ali, Ehsan and Bader at the Awards ceremony.

He also said that a lot of Bahraini youths have started using Twitter in the last year, and he feared that seeing so much hate might become the norm for them, which is a scary thought.  He also said that social media should be used responsibly, and he mentioned me saying that what I said resonated with him, as he’s received some vicious online attacks in the last year.  To be honest, I don’t know how he survived it!

My awards and certificate, and a new Galaxy phone!

Anyway, an interesting and proactive move by the IAA.  If you consider how removed they were from social media last year, this is a huge step forward.  And it’s nice of them to honour active Bahraini social media users.  The awards covered a wide spectrum of society – but of course it did not include any active anti-gov folks.  And nor should it, these are IAA awards after all.

Either way, I’m happy and honoured to have been selected among some great Tweeps, and I’m honoured to have given the main speech.

On his way out Sh. Khalid gave me a big hug, saying “we [Bahrain] will prevail!”

I agree Your Excellency, God bless Bahrain.

]]> http://www.suhailalgosaibi.com/2012/02/08/the-bahrain-social-media-awards-2012/feed/ 6 http://www.suhailalgosaibi.com/2012/01/23/four-possible-scenarios-for-february-14th-2012/ http://www.suhailalgosaibi.com/2012/01/23/four-possible-scenarios-for-february-14th-2012/#comments Mon, 23 Jan 2012 18:19:07 +0000 Suhail http://www.suhailalgosaibi.com/?p=4393

Things are heating up.  Tensions are rising, and the violent protests are increasing, which are resulting – if some of the web videos out there are to be believed – in ever more severe crackdowns.  I don’t want to sound too judgemental, but the impression one gets is that the impunity mentioned in the BICI report is still going on.

The opposition is growing ever more restless, and Sheik Isa Qassim seems to be losing it. In his last sermon he said something to the effect of “if these shameless mercenaries come in to your villages again, and are abusive to your families – crush them!  CRUSH THEM! CRUSH THEM!”

This is not good.

Some youths rioting that I witnessed over the weekend in Sar. They blocked off the road, and I did not stay long enough for riot police to appear

Personally, I think it’s only a matter of time until Al-Wefaq stop calling for a constitutional monarchy, and start calling for open revolt.  Their patience is running out, and the impression one gets is that they are inches away from insulting the king – though they don’t refrain from severely criticising him.

And as the anti-government temper is rising, so is the pro-government’s.  People are calling to punish “the terrorists”, and severely criticising the government for their perceived lack of action.  Few are in the mood for reconciliation.  It’s as if the BICI report never happened.

That’s not to say that the government isn’t doing a lot of work behind the scenes, it is.  It is working hard on implementing every single Basyouni recommendation, but the overall spirit of reconciliation seems to be missing.  I’ve heard several people predicting civil war – heaven forbid.

You can bet your bottom dollar that the underground Feb 14th guys are planning something big for February 14th 2012.  So what’s likely to happen? Here are some possible scenarios:

1) All hell breaks lose, and we have another tragic repeat of 2011, where there is lawlessness and chaos in the streets.  I’d say this has a 20% likelihood of happening.

2) The protestors try something big, but the security forces beat them to the punch and quench the attempted rebellion.  I give this scenario a 50% likelihood.

3) Another normal day, and business as usual – 20% likelihood.

4) The government announces something really big which will calm everyone down and start real reconciliation (we’ve been hearing rumours of this since summer last year) – 10% likelihood.

Though I pray for Number Four, I have my doubts.

I hope I’m wrong.

Talk soon.

My head is spinning!  This whole reconciliation business is not easy!

I’m told that prof. Bassiouni said that working in Libya was a walk in the park compared to Bahrain, and I believe him.  Emotions are still high, and the wounds very raw.  And the government’s snail-paced reform process is not helping.

To give you a quick update, I’ve been doing some rounds visiting some key players in Bahrain, and just conversing – mostly just listening.  I’m not really trying to convince anyone of anything just yet, I just want to make sure I hear all sides of the story.  And just like everything else about the Bahrain crisis, there are two (or several) different sides of the story.  It seems that very few are willing to see things from the other side’s perspective.

Here’s a quick summary of how I see things, and please excuse the generalities:

Shias feel that they are marginalised by the government and demand their rights.  Many in the government view these demands as unjustified and sectarian based. Sunnis are angry at Shias for the violent rioting that took place, and are convinced that since the rioters did not take the Sunnis feelings into consideration, and made them feel afraid and unsafe, that the riots/protests/uprisings were sectarian based.  Rejecting HRH’s Crown Prince initiative and escalating the riots and taking them out of the pearl roundabout was the only proof they needed that this was a sectarian revolution.

The protesting Shias are dismissive of the Sunni anger, saying we have no problems with Sunnis, and they say “besides, aren’t we the ones who have been persecuted, fired from our jobs, jailed tortured and killed?” This perceived lack of repsect infuriates Sunnis even more, convincing them even more that Shias want to create an Iran backed Wilayat Al-Faqeeh state.  Some are even saying that the government was not harsh enough on them.

On certain days, it feels like literally everyone in Bahrain is dissatisfied.  Meanwhile, the government is reforming slower than it takes a lizard to evolve into a chicken.  There seems to be very little leadership at the moment.

And to add sizzle to the whole mix, Iran and prominent Shia clerics in Iraq are continuing to comment on Bahrain, as if it’s their business.  One Shia friend once commented to me “the Iranian revolution is the worse thing that could happens to Shias in the Gulf.”  I agree.

The question is my friend, how deep down the rabbit hole do you want to go?  I’m in pretty deep, and going deeper…

Someone asked me recently “do you see any light at the end of the tunnel?” My reply was “I see light because I force myself to see it.”

I remain optimistic, but it’s not easy…