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The heart-warming, heart-breaking, awe-inspiring, world-changing Rachel Beckwith story

Thu, 02 Jun 2016 06:30:00 -0500

In many regards, Rachel Beckwith was a typical kid. But not in all regards. What made Rachel extraordinary was that from as early as anyone could recall, she wanted to give to others. And in the end, she gave more than most ever do.

A Heart-Warming Story

Rachel Marie Beckwith was born on June 12, 2002 in Issaquah, Washington, a town of about 30,000 people that sits 23 miles east of Seattle. Rachel was as full of life as you’d expect a young girl to be—and then some. She liked spending time outside. She loved to dance, jump rope and ride her bike. Rachel had straight brown hair and big dark blue eyes.

Her father’s name was Jacob Beckwith. Her mother’s name was Samantha Paul.

Rachel showed unusual concern for others early in her life. “She always had such a strong sense of empathy for others—especially other children,” explained her mother, Samantha. She was compassionate beyond her years. She often seemed more concerned with what she could do for others than what others could do for her—which isn’t necessarily a trait you find in too many young children.

When she just 5 years old, she learned about an organization called Locks of Love, which takes hair donations from healthy people to produce the highest quality wigs for people with cancer and other diseases that have caused them to lose their hair. Rachel decided to have her hair cut and sent to Locks of Love. Then she grew out her hair and cut it to donate her locks again.

Rachel’s family belonged to the Eastlake Community Church, where Samantha was an active member. Eastlake is a new mold of church, one where community and activism are emphasized. Ryan Meeks, who founded the church in 2003, when he was just 25, wears jeans and a t-shirt while leading the services. He emphasizes acceptance over judgment, saying his church is “a hospital for sinners, not a hotel for saints.” The Eastlake message and approach resonated. By 2010, there were about 4,000 church members, most of them in their 20s and 30s.

Eastlake Community Church also had a habit of raising money for various causes. In 2010, one of the organizations Eastlake Community Church started to raise money for was “charity: water,” which had unlikely and inspirational origins in its own rite.

The story of charity: water

The tale of charity: water is, in many ways, a story of redemption and hope.

Scott Harrison was born in Philadelphia, and when he was young, his family moved to the suburbs in New Jersey. The Harrison family was a conservative, religious family. Scott was active in his church, and he spent much of his upbringing helping tend to his mother, who suffered from intense health problems.

And then at age 18, Harrison’s life became a “bad cliché,” as he puts it. He rebelled. He moved to New York City. He grew his hair long. He joined a band.

When the band dissolved, he became a nightclub promoter. And he turned out to be an awfully good nightclub promoter. His job was, in essence, to throw great parties, and throw great parties he did. “I got people wasted for a living,” says Harrison. “I sold them expensive drinks in expensive bottles at nightclubs.”

World-famous liquor brands would literally pay him thousands of dollars just to have him be seen sipping on their drinks in trendy clubs. He made gobs of money. As he puts it, “You can make a lot of money getting people drunk for a living.”

He had a grand piano in his Manhattan apartment. He drove a BMW. And he lived among the young, the rich and the beautiful. His girlfriend was a model.

From the outside looking in, he was the pied piper of New York City, living the life of Riley that many would envy.

But as you might guess, there was a darker story when you scratched away at the veneer. Harrison had a bad habit of picking up bad habits. Through years of hard partying, Harrison had steadily acquired one vice after the next. Life in clubs led to heavy drinking. Heavy drinking led to other drugs. Drugs led to stretches of his life that he can’t recall.

By his own account, he was up all night on most nights. He was doing massive amounts of narcotics—cocaine being his drug of choice. He had a gambling problem. He drank constantly. He was smoking two packs of cigarettes on most days. He was addicted to pornography. He hung out in strip clubs night after night.

But still, it had all the trappings of glamor. With a gang of his rich and beautiful friends, he took a trip to Punta Del Este in Uruguay in August 2004. The scene was something straight out of the movies. There were horses. There were servants. There was a stunning coastline. There was a private firework extravaganza. There were unlimited bottles of Dom Perignon.

And it was against this backdrop of posh extravagance that Scott Harrison had a realization that would change his life.

Harrison had been on what amounted to a weeklong bender. He woke up one day at 2:00 in the afternoon, hung over and with his head throbbing. He walked out into the intensely bright Uruguayan sun. He considered his lot in life and this was the thought that went through his mind: “I realized I was the worst person I knew. I was spiritually bankrupt. I was emotionally bankrupt. I was certainly morally bankrupt. I realized that I was never going to find what I was looking for where I was looking for it.”

Harrison, 28 at the time, decided it was time for changes. He quit smoking. He quit drugs. He quit drinking. He stopped going to strip clubs.

Those were all major lifestyle changes, but Harrison didn’t stop there. He decided to up-end his life altogether.

He left New York City and volunteered for a yearlong tour with an organization called Mercy Ships as a photojournalist. Mercy Ships takes doctors from around the world, puts them on a massive boat that has been retrofitted as a floating hospital, then stops at ports along the coast of Africa where the Mercy Ships doctors perform thousands of medical operations on those who would never otherwise be able to afford them. Mercy Ships has been doing these missions for more than three decades now, and they have performed more than 500,000 operations. Much of what they cure are ailments that people in the first world never see. Cleft palettes and cleft lips. Tumors growing out of people’s cheeks that are so massive that they overtake people’s faces.

Over the course of a year, Harrison took tens of thousands of photographs of the work being done on Mercy Ships. He saw people in conditions that he never imagined existed. He saw devastation and suffering that seemed unimaginable.

After his first year of service was over, he signed up for a second tour. And it was on that second tour that he started leaving the ship and going out into villages and towns. It was during this time that Harrison started to learn about the root causes of the diseases and malformations that the Mercy Ships doctors were trying to cure.

The single biggest problem that led to so many of the diseases and sicknesses that Mercy Ships worked to cure could be summed up in two words: dirty water.

People in Africa—and poor people around the world for that matter—often drink the same water that they bathe in. Children pull buckets of water from swamps that pigs live in, and then those children use those buckets for drinking water. Women walk for hours to draw water from muddy rivers, then walk hours to get back home—carrying the heavy jerry cans that contain the dirty water—to give to their families.

The volunteer that Harrison was shadowing would go into villages and help locals tap into water that was below ground. And by doing this, villages would be completely transformed. In his brief time with this one volunteer, Harrison saw thousands of lives being improved.

As Harrison started learning more water sanitation problems, he was stunned at the size and the scope of this problem.

In Africa alone, 345 million people don’t have access to clean water. In South Central Asia, close to 200 million people have the same problem. Worldwide, 780 million people suffer from not having access to the most basic nutrient for life itself: clean water.

And clean water problems create all kinds of residual effects on people’s lives that most of us in the first world never have to consider. Women and children spend hours every day in pursuit of water. It impacts their ability to do other chores, to get jobs, to go to school. And without water, the number of days children are too sick to go to school skyrockets.

What’s worse is that impoverished adults and children often drink filthy water that has parasites, worms, even leaches swimming in it. One of the most common sicknesses stemming from lack of clean water is diarrhea—something even children in the posh comfort of the first world come to know at some point. But in places like Africa and India and Bangladesh, diarrhea is so severe—and treatment is so scarce—that diarrhea leads to children dying. In fact, this ailment that most of us think of as an embarrassing but temporary discomfort claims about 1.5 million children every year, according to the World Health Organization. Said another way, about 4,000 children lose their lives from diarrhea every day.

All told, roughly 3.6 million people die every year from lack of water and sanitation, 84% of them children.

Like most of us who grew up in the comfort of the first world, Harrison struggled to wrap his mind around this problem. Just two years earlier, his existence was soaked in a world of $1,000 bottles of champagne, surrounded by people with more money than they knew how to spend. Now he was surrounded by people who couldn’t find potable water for the most basic of needs.

A New Mission

Harrison resolved that providing people clean drinking water would become his life’s mission.

He returned to New York City in 2006, and he founded a non-profit called charity: water. The first step in getting his organization off the ground was raising money, and the one way he knew how to make money was by throwing parties.

He organized his own 31^st birthday party, which was on September 7^th, 2006. He found someone to donate the club. He lured 700 people to the soiree, and he had a $20 cover charge. In total, $17,000 was raised that night. All the money collected from the cover charge immediately went to a refugee camp in Uganda, where the money was used to start building and fixing wells. And photographs of the project were sent back to the 700 guests who attended the party. People were inspired, and they donated more.

Harrison and his team also started working with major brands like Saks Fifth Avenue and Macallan, on fundraising drives. They used social media to spread the word about their efforts, and charity: water became the most followed charity in the world on social networks.

For his 32^nd birthday, rather than throwing another birthday bash, Scott began a massive email campaign and asked everyone he knew for $32 to go towards drilling a well. The way he saw it, he didn’t need a tie or shoes or a gift card, not when so many people don’t have access to clean water. So he reasoned that the best gift people could give him was $32 to go towards drilling a well that would provide others water. He raised $59,000.

It dawned on him that most people—or at least most people in this part of the world—were in the same boat as him. They truly had everything they needed. Material gifts on their birthdays were just gestures, not necessities. So charity: water started the Give Up Your Birthday campaign. The idea caught fire. Scott’s friends started using their birthdays to raise money. Kids started doing it. Celebrities like Tony Hawk, Jack Dorsey, and Will and Jada Smith started donating their birthdays. In short order, charity: water was raising hundreds of thousands of dollars this way. And because they had found corporate underwriters to cover their operational costs, 100% of all donations went to providing clean water to poor people around the world.

The Eastlake Campaign

In 2010, Pastor Ryan Meeks learned about charity: water and was immediately drawn to the cause. On August 6^th of 2010, Eastlake Community Church held a fundraiser called Drinks for Drinks. Not your typical church-sponsored event, there was a live band, a barbeque, beer and wine. The turnout was massive. They ended up raising $320,000 to help charity: water drill wells throughout the Central African Republic.

Scott Harrison was so impressed by what Eastlake Community Church had done, he flew to Seattle and spoke to the congregation at a service in December of that year to thank them.

Rachel Beckwith was sitting in the audience that day, and as Harrison told the stories of what charity: water did for people, she knew instantly that she wanted to be part of it in some way. “When she heard about charity: water, she was so excited,” recalled Samantha Paul.

Rachel’s Campaign

Rachel decided she would give up her 9^th birthday to raise money for the cause. She resolved that she would ask people to donate money to her charity: water campaign rather than get anything for her personally. In typical fashion, Rachel had more of a desire to give than to get.

“She was always so warm and giving and enthusiastic,” remembers Samantha.

In May of 2011, Samantha and Rachel set up her campaign on charity: water’s website. Rachel had until her birthday on June 12^th to reach the ambitious goal of $300 she had set for her birthday fundraising drive. After that, the campaign page would be closed down.

On her campaign page, this is what she wrote:

Charity: water estimates that for each $20 donated, they can provide clean drinking water to one individual. The $300 Rachel aimed to raise would lead to clean water for 15 people. Rachel was thrilled with the idea of helping those 15 people have something so fundamental to life.

She was able to get dozens of people to donate money. Her aunts and uncles chipped in. Friends from church made donations. Even some of her 3^rd-grade classmates donated to the cause.

But she struggled to get to her $300 goal. In fact, when her birthday rolled around, she was $80 short, having raised $220.

She was upset and disappointed about not getting to her $300. She told her mother she was sorry.

But she was also undeterred. She declared that she would try harder the next year, when she would launch another campaign for charity: water for her 10^th birthday.

Heartbreak

Around 7:45 in in the morning of July 20^th, 2011, two trucks—one a logging truck and in front of that, a semi-truck—were barreling down westbound lane of I-90 in the Seattle suburb Bellevue. The logging truck was hauling about 60,000 pounds of lumber.

As they approached the interchange of I-405, the semi-truck drifted into the logging truck’s lane grazed the logging truck. The contact forced the semi-trailer to jackknife, slamming into the logging truck. Both trucks lost control.

The timing couldn’t have been worse. As they approached the interchange, the traffic had turned dense and slowed down. The trucks—both traveling around 60 miles an hour—sliced and slammed through one car after then next, turning cars into bowling pins. The logging truck lost its trailer, which careened into traffic. Logs started to slide off the back of the logging truck, and fishtail back and forth on the highway, slamming into oncoming traffic. The logging truck also lost its axle, which went lunging into moving vehicles. Meanwhile, the semi-truck slammed into the back right side of a Lexus, then continued to plow down the road and take out vehicles. In all, 15 vehicles got caught in the crash.

Sean Mee was a driver in one of those cars. Amazingly, once the chaos of the accident subsided, he realized he was alright. In fact, he was unscathed. He got out of his car to start checking on others. Cars were strewn across the highway. Vehicles were stacked against the semi-trailer, some sideways, some upside down.

Amazingly, almost everyone was alright. People were horrified and scared. Their cars were destroyed. But they were okay.

Except for one car—that Lexus that the semi-truck had rammed into. The driver of the car was a young woman who had been driving with her two girls. She wasn’t seriously injured, but she was inconsolable. “I approached the mother. She was hysterical, obviously. She had two kids in the back,” said Mee.

The younger of the two daughters—a 2 year-old named Sienna—was on the driver’s side of the car. She had minor injuries but was conscious and appeared okay. But it was the older daughter who was sitting on the passenger side of the car—the side the semi-truck had slammed into. She slumped there in her seat motionless. The girl was 9 years old. She had straight brown hair and blue eyes. It was Rachel Beckwith.

Police cars, ambulances and fire trucks sped to the scene. They rushed Samantha, Sienna and Rachel to Harborview Medical Center. Doctors ushered Rachel into the emergency room to assess her condition.

After several minutes, the news came out from the emergency room to Samantha.

Rachel’s spinal chord had been completed severed. She had traumatic head injuries. She was still alive, but only because of the life support equipment at Harborview. Rachel had no chance at long-term survival.

Spreading the news of the tragedy

Samantha and Jacob began to let family and friends know of the accident—that Rachel would never be able to survive without life support and her days were few. Being faithful members of Eastlake Community Church, one of the first people they contacted was Pastor Ryan Meeks. As chance would have it, Meeks was on a tour at the time with Scott Harrison and charity: water in the Central African Republic.

Meeks was, of course, blindsided by the news and heartsick. He found himself looking for some way to help while standing on a continent thousands of miles aw

After three of the most grueling and painful days young parents could face, Samantha and Jacob said their last goodbyes to Rachel, and then removed her from life support. She was pronounced dead that day, Saturday, July 23^rd. Searching for some way to honor Rachel, Meeks asked Harrison if charity: water could reopen Rachel’s birthday campaign so that he could donate the $80 to get Rachel to her $300 fundraising goal. Harrison, naturally, obliged.

Awe Inspiring

Even in death, Rachel continued to give herself to others—in the most literal sense. Her liver went to Chicago to a child who needed one. Her kidney went to a man at the University of Washington. Her pancreas went to Wisconsin for diabetes research.

But Rachel’s organ donations were only the beginning of the giving.

After charity: water re-opened Rachel’s birthday page so that Meeks could donate $80, Meeks started urging church members to donate to Rachel’s re-opened campaign. Meeks suggested that even if the thousands of church members couldn’t give large sums of money, they could surely donate $9 in memory of Rachel’s 9^th and last birthday campaign.

Money started pouring in. By the day before they took Rachel off life support, her campaign had climbed to $6,000 raised.

The messages from donors on her fundraising page revealed how moved people were Rachel’s commitment to make the world a better place.

“Giving, smart, kind, lovable, patient, sweet, adorable and one of a kind are just a few things that describe you Rachel. From the first time I met you I became a better person. You have changed lives and will continue too. I have always been so proud of you. I love you so much!”

“We are in awe of you and your giving heart! You are an example of how we should give more of ourselves to others. Thank you for being so inspiring.”

“Thank you to Rachel and Family for reminding so many of us of all of the blessings we overlook and take for granted. My paradigm has shifted because of you. God bless you.”

“Thank you, Rachel !! You will forever remain an inspiration for doing good and loving the most deprived!”

“My family and I were blown away by the heart that Rachel had. As a mother you can only hope that your child will be as kind and as caring as Rachel. She has set a wonderful example for my children. I shared her story with them and today they are donating all the money they had in their piggy banks.”

Eastlake Community Church—comprised a new breed of young, energetic, modern churchgoers—instinctively turned to social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook to get word out Rachel’s story and her campaign. Matt Hasselbeck, a member of Eastlake and the starting quarterback for the Seattle Seahawks, sent out a message about the campaign on Twitter, where he had 70,000 followers.

Local news outlets had started picking up on the story. The stream of donations to Rachel’s fundraising page accelerated. By the time of her funeral on Sunday, July 24^th, her campaign had raised $100,000. By Monday, it was up to $160,000. By Tuesday, it hit $200,000—from 3,600 separate donations.

And it didn’t stop there. Word of Rachel‘s remarkable life continued to spread. The stream of donations became a torrent. By Thursday night, Rachel’s birthday campaign was up to $600,000.

Samantha appeared on national TV news shows with Scott Harrison the following week. For her, still in the early stages of grappling with her daughter’s tragic and sudden death, it was cathartic to see Rachel’s memory inspiring so many people to chip in to improve the lives of people in distant parts of the world.

This, of course, spread the word even further. Not only was Rachel’s campaign receiving donations from people throughout the US, people from all over the world were pitching in. Australians. Brazilians. Dutch. Amazingly, people from Africa were making donations.

On August 9^th, two weeks after Rachel passed away, her birthday campaign—the one from which Rachel had hoped to raise $300 to help 15 people get access to clean drinking water—passed the $1,000,000 mark.

It was the single largest fundraising campaign in the history of charity: water.

Charity: water and Samantha decided to keep the campaign open until the end of September. People followed the page daily. They donated multiple times, often times in small amounts.

At its conclusion, Rachel’s birthday campaign had received 39,997 donations and raised $1,265,823.

It also inspired countless others to launch their own fundraising campaigns.

Changing the world

Charity: water routed 100% of the funds raised through Rachel’s campaign to their partners in Tigray, a region of Ethiopia nestled along the northern edge of the country, bordering Eritrea and the Sudan.

The work of building infrastructures so that people can have clean drinking water does not happen quickly. Wells take a long time to dig. Rainwater catchments take time to distribute and erect. Teaching people how to use sand filters can be a slow process. It’s frustratingly slow, in fact.

But because the projects stemming from Rachel’s campaign took time, there was an opportunity for Rachel’s family to see the fruits of Rachel’s contributions first hand. A year after Rachel’s death, Samantha Paul, Paul’s parents, and Ryan Meeks joined Scott Harrison on a trip to the region to see the work that was underway.

During the trip, they got to see Yellow Thunder, charity: water’s first drilling rig, capable to drilling up to 80 wells a year, which translates into to 40,000 people a year getting clean water.

The emotional highlight of the trip came on July 23^rd, precisely one year after Rachel was taken off life support. That morning, the charity: water contingency made a two-hour trek to the village of Kal Habel. The people of this community, a world away from Bothel, Washington, had planned a memorial service in Rachel’s honor on this day.

The charity: water crew left early in the morning. The first stop they made was at a church. Harrison recounted the events of the day: “They told us they had been up since midnight, praying that God would keep Rachel's soul in peace. A photo of Rachel stood on the ledge, surrounded by candles. We paused, listening to the priests recite their prayers, singing ancient Ethiopian hymns over Samantha and her parents.

“From the church, we walked to a new well nearby that was funded by Rachel's donations. We cut the ribbon and watched water splash into bright yellow jerry cans. This water didn't have dirt or leeches in it, and it didn't carry deadly disease. It wasn't far away from people's homes, and they didn't have to walk for hours to find it. It was right there, in their village, and it was crystal clear. To prove it, Samantha took a long drink.

“The children wrote notes about Rachel, and handed them one by one to Samantha. A famous priest read a poem he wrote especially for the occasion, and then the village gave gifts to Rachel's family. A mother from the village made a speech and said Rachel's story would be a lesson to their children. She said that all the mothers in her village were praying for Samantha. Another community sectioned off a plot of land and called it Rachel's Park.”

Rachel’s initial ambition of raising enough money to provide 15 people with clean water had grown into a world-wide movement that would eventually help tens of thousands of people gain access to clean water—in 149 villages and communities throughout the region of Tigray. She also inspired thousands of people to get involved in a cause.

Closing Thoughts

How important is clean water? Gandhi, the man credited with freeing millions of Indians from British colonists, had an interesting perspective on that question. He once said, “sanitation is more important than independence.”

The work of charity: water continues. The organization has now raised $60,000,000 for water projects around the world. They have helped millions of people around the planet get access to clean water. But there is a long journey ahead. Roughly 30,000 deaths occur every week due to unsafe water and unhygienic conditions.

Charity: water has continued to grow and help people around the world gain access to clean water for the first time in their lives. Harrison has a goal of providing clean water to the world’s population. It’s an audacious goal, some would say impossible, but he’s optimistic that if enough people chip in, clean water for everyone is something we can achieve. And indeed, if enough people chipped in, it’s a problem that could be solved.

Tag, you’re it!

Now you’ve read the heart-warming, heart-breaking, awe-inspiring, world-changing story of Rachel Beckwith (I hope you felt the story lived up to the seemingly hyperbolic title). And once you come across the story, you become part of the story.

So now that you’re part of the story, there are a few things you can do:

1) Nothing (that would be kind of a bummer)

2) Share this story with people. To do that, share this on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, or email it to people you know. (Isn’t it a story worth sharing?)

3) Donate. If you’ve gotten this far, perhaps you were inspired to by this story. Perhaps you can take the amount you’d normally pay for a good book, and donate that much here. (That would be awesome!)

Business Aspirations

Sat, 13 Dec 2014 18:41:00 -0600

Decked out in my holiday hat

I just did something. And that made me realize something. And that made me want to write something.

First some background. As I type away at this moment, it is 12:57 EST on December 13^th, and I am at my mother-in-law’s house on Cape Cod, where we’ll be hosting 13 kids to make gingerbread houses in 33 minutes (oops… 32 minutes). I’m decked out in my holiday hat, and my wife is naturally taking the reigns on the prep work. 20 minutes ago she instructed me to dash over to the grocery store to get some OJ for mimosas (hey, the adults get to have some fun too!).

So I dart over there, and as I entered, there’s a guy giving out samples of some kind of food. Never one to pass up free food, I head right towards him. As I get closer, I see that it’s some kind of salad dressing with some kind of labeling about being made in Chilmark. For the uninitiated, Chilmark is a section of Martha’s Vineyard, on the west end of the island. So the guy doing the samples–I’d put him at 55-60 years old–seems to be a truly friendly guy. He starts telling me how it’s his sister’s recipe, and the stuff is great on salads but it also makes for a great marinade. It’s mindless banter. But the guy’s a nice guy, and I’m in a good mood, so I’m chatting away with him. I ask him if they’re selling the dressing online or just in retail stores. He says something a bit hard to decode, like, “Yeah, here and there.” So because I’m nosey and I’m in a chatty mood, and because I’m building a performance apparel brand online and selling through an eComm site, I press him on it a bit, asking something like, “What platform do you use?” Then the truth comes out: People they know on the Vineyard shoot them emails with orders, and they deliver those orders to people’s homes. That’s their online presence.

Out of nowhere, I launch into what must sound like a marketing pitch.

“Oh, hey, you know I sell shirts online, and it’s a totally different kind of business, but I built my site on the Shopify platform. It’s amazing, there are something like 100,000 stores hosted on the Shopify platform.” I know I sound like a sales man, but it’s like I can’t help it.

“Really?,” he says. I don’t know if he’s genuinely interested, but if he’s just pretending to care, he’s gonna have to pretend a bit longer. I have to keep going.

“Oh man, it’s amazing. It’s dirt cheap--$30 a month or so. The platform is drop-dead easy; you don’t even need to know how to code and you can build a full-fledged eComm site. Oh, and the support is phenomenal. They’re available 24/7.”

OK, that’s enough I think to myself. Plus, gotta get that OJ back in time for the crowd to have mimosas upon arrival. I hand him my card, and as I part, I offer this: “Hey, if you’re interested in trying the eComm thing, feel free to give me a call or shoot me an email, and I’ll chat your ear off about it.”

As I head back to get the OJ, the thought crosses my mind: I just did the kind of sales job for Shopify that they could never do for themselves. What’s in it for me? Nothing. But my experience with them has been so awesome that I want to tell people about it. It makes me feel like I’m doing this guy a favor to tell him about it. That is pretty powerful. If I were the owner of Shopify—or I worked at Shopify—I’d be damn proud of that.

Then I think about the companies I’ve worked at, and I think about the brand I’ve been trying to build as a bit of a "passion project"—You Can’t Fake Sweat. Have the experience and service been so awesome that customers feel inwardly compelled to tell strangers about them? I’m sad to say I haven’t worked at a company like that quite yet. I’m happy to report I think I have had that happen with You Can’t Fake Sweat customers a few times, and it gives me a bit of a rush.

There’s a business book that was published years ago called The Ultimate Question. The author posits that this is the ultimate question to ask customers when evaluating a business: "Would you recommend this business to a friend?" Indeed, the answer to that question is quite telling.

But imagine running a business so well, having a product so good, providing customer service that is so delightful… that customers not only tell friends, but they walk up to strangers in supermarkets and tell them about it.

That’s what Shopify has done. And it would probably be wise for us all to think about how we can do this as we build businesses and build our careers.

3 Business Lessons from My Wife’s Bootcamp Fundraiser

Thu, 21 Nov 2013 14:37:00 -0600

OK, a bit of background—a local friend, Marc Jobin, has been running the Boston Marathon for a number of years, and every year, he uses the race to raise money for Children’s Hospital.

This year, my wife Justine—who is a fitness instructor—offered to put on a bootcamp with some of her instructor friends, with all proceeds going towards Marc’s fundraising efforts.

In a show of support, I did something I’ve never done—actually participate in one of my wife’s bootcamps. This was, of course, mildly terrifying for me on a number of levels. But I faced the fear, and I’m glad I did—not just because it was a hell of a workout, but because I spotted a few great business lessons during the course of this event.

1) Give a little to get a little. Justine made the offer to put on this bootcamp for Marc at no charge. It was a huge win for Marc. He promoted it well and was able to recruit about 60 people to come to the bootcamp. By the way, that translated to $1,400 raised. And after Marc gets the company match he’s going to receive, the total raised from this event will be $2,800. Not shabby. And 60 people got exposed to Justine’s business. Will all of them become clients? Of course not. Will a few of them? Probably. Will they be evangelists for Justine to their friends? I think they will be.

2) Make it a party. The bootcamp was held on a frigid Sunday morning. I suspect a lot of folks were dreading it. But upon arrival, the music was cranking, there was a welcoming table, friends were mingling. One of Marc’s friends had set up an obstacle course of the kids. It actually felt… really fun. And if you get people having fun while doing something they get a benefit from (like working out), you’re on your way to building a clientele.

3) Embrace different personality types. Justine recruited 3 instructor friends to help her run the class. To say they were contrasts in styles is an understatement. Justine is the cheerleader captain type of fitness coach—upbeat but very clear and strong in her instructions. Jill takes a quiet, reassuring, supportive approach to her bootcampers. Marianne plays the part of the perky and chipper instructor. Nicole is hilariously sarcastic and takes a swear-like-a-sailor approach to motivating her bootcampers. All of them are completely different, yet all of them are supremely effective at what they do.

Sundays’ fundraising bootcamp made me a proud husband, and in a surprise twist, it also gave me a few things to think about when it comes to doing business.

My Five Favorite Ads of All Time

Wed, 06 Nov 2013 12:32:00 -0600

Today, for no particular reason, I decided the world desperately needs another list of someone's favorite commercials of all time. So here you go world!

#5 P&G: Thank You Mom

As the saying goes, there's no arguing with motherhood and apple pie. But even setting aside the wholesomeness of extolling the virtues of motherhood, I love the way this commercial taps into all those little, mundane moments that are part of motherhood to create a special and moving piece.

#4 PUMA: Footballer Hooligans Celebrate Valentine's Day

This one is delicious on so many levels. First of all, the irony of these guys singing this particular song in a pub together is awesome. The way the song slowly builds to a crescendo makes it impossible to turn away. And then the completely anti-climactic ending is somehow the perfect way for it wrap up.

#3: Dove: Evolution

An awesome ad that exposes the truth behind so much marketing.

By the way, the spoof of the ad might be better than the ad itself.

#2 Google: Parisian Love

I recall people making fun of this ad when it ran during the Superbowl in 2010. They couldn't have been more wrong. It stood in such contrast to all the other ads that year--plus, has there ever been another ad that told such a great story while highlight the company's product the entire time? I can't think of one.

#1 Nike: Move

Between the haunting music, the exquisite editing and the gorgeous cinematography, this is the ad I just never tire of seeing. My apologies that I can't find a higher resolution version of it.

Darth Vader: A Reservoir of Great Humor

Fri, 01 Nov 2013 22:16:00 -0500

Every now and again, you stumble into an epiphany that makes life a bit lighter, that tickles you when nobody else is there to see, that adds just a tiny bit more joy to your life. I just had one of those moments, when I learned that Darth Vader could be so damn funny.

6 Notable Differences Between Hockey Players and Ultimate Frisbee Players

Mon, 28 Oct 2013 20:56:00 -0500

One of the gutsier (crazier) things I’ve done recently is to take up hockey as a full-grown adult. Inspired by many mornings at the rink watching my son's practices, I decided that it’s never too late to try something that seems to be beckoning you (I like to refer to this as “the path of least regret.”)

The rush of hockey is hard to describe. It’s ridiculously fast. Adrenaline courses through you when you’re on the ice. The speed and intensity has your legs quivering after being out there for 90 seconds. It’s also an incredibly difficult sport—for the very obvious reason that you’re playing while skating. For newbies like me, when everything lines up just right, and you score a goal, the euphoria is awesome. After being ignorant about this sport for most of my life, I’m truly glad I’m out there playing on Monday nights.

In another athletic adventure, I recently re-acquainted myself with a different sport—one I haven’t played in 15 years or so—ultimate frisbee. I’ve never quite understood why this sport hasn’t gotten more mainstream traction. It’s wickedly fun, it’s easy to learn, and you consistently see impressive athletic feats during the course of play. And all you need to play is a field, a disc, and a handful of willing players. I continue to stuboornly believe it will one day emerge as a more popular sport.

As I’ve immersed myself in these two sports, something I’ve found fascinating is the extremely different personality profiles of the people they seem to draw.

So without further ado, the six notable differences between hockey players and ultimate frisbee players:

1) Yelling

Like most sports, you’ll find yelling in both hockey and ultimate. But they are two very different flavors of yelling.

In hockey, if there’s a bad line change or someone isn’t in the right spot on the ice, that person gets yelled at from the bench. When guys don’t like the refs’ calls (which is about 93.4% of the time), they scream at the refs. When I get back to the bench after a shift in which I messed up somehow (that would be most shifts), Darren and Vince (my fellow Hit Dogs) don’t spare my feelings with soft-spoken counsel; they seem to prefer high-decibel instruction.

On the ultimate disc field, the only yelling from players comes during the cheers we do—which, by the way, happen not only at the beginning of the game and the end of the game, but at the end of each timeout and at half time. And each cheer is a brand new one, proffered by someone in the huddle. These cheers have an impromptu poetry slam feel about them. On my team, the Gasconaders (more on that later), a typical cheer coming out of a time-out huddle might go a bit like this: “To be a Gasconder is to be the real deal! To be a Gasconader is to rule the field!” When it comes to the cheers, clever is good, but silly is even better, as far as I can surmise.

2) Coping with Pain

In hockey, the golden rule is “play through the pain.” Perhaps you remember the Bruins’ Gregory Campbell during the 2013 playoff series with the Penguins. He took a slap shot to the leg, and despite obvious pain, stayed in the ice, playing the best defense he could muster. It wasn’t until after the next day that we found out his fibula had been shattered by that slap shot!

This play-through-the-pain ethos trickles all the way down to the men’s adult C-league at Navin Rink in Marlborough. In the third game I ever played, an opposing player slashed at the stick of one of my teammates as he was breaking away. The defender’s stick rode up the stick of my teammate and hit him in the mouth. My teammate was clearly hurt but played through, sprinting down the ice and scoring. He then covered his mouth with his glove and skated over to the bench. It turns out that he had 4 teeth smashed out by that stick that him in the mouth.

While some ultimate players take the game pretty seriously, they aren’t quite as extreme when it comes to pain. A few games back, I accidently stepped on another player’s foot, who immediate winced—albeit faintly—in pain. The entire game halted immediately. His team—and my team—gathered around to make sure he was okay. And it was only after he repeatedly assured everyone that he was fine and had probably over-reacted when he winced that play resumed.

3) Dealing with Refs and Rules

From listening to my hockey team after games, you’d think we’d never lost a game that wasn’t the referees’ fault. Every game—every period, in fact—brings a new wave of complaints about how absolutely awful the refs are. “What a frickin’ d*&$%e bag” and “I barely touched that p&*sy,” are a smattering of the kind of complaints you’re likely to hear after a call.

Ultimate… well, there are no refs. And despite the absence of neutral observers (or maybe because of it?), there aren’t ever any arguments or complaints. If someone makes a call, there are no questions asked. No moaning, no sneering, no contesting. It turns out this is very much part of the culture of the game. In fact, the game is said to be called “ultimate, because the game required the ultimate honor to play: players call their own fouls (even on themselves) and do not dispute fouls called by the opposition.”[1]

4) The Conversation

Locker room conversation at the hockey rink is, well, fairly limited in scope. Typical conversations over a post-game beer (always Bud Light in cans) include: hockey, drinking, other sports.

Ultimate players tend have a bigger canvas when it comes to conversation. I’ve had conversations about teaching, marketing, software, world travels, early 80s hair bands, and of course, frisbee.

5) Sportsmanship

There’s a great tradition in hockey of lining up at the end of the game and shaking hands with the opposing team. It happens at the end of the Stanley Cup, it happens in the kids “mites” leagues, and it happens at every level in between. But, up until that handshake, it’s anything but gentlemanly. Players fight, trip, hit and generally do anything to get an edge. Anything you can do to gain advantage without getting a penalty is fair game. Guys scream at rivals, they yell at refs, and as mentioned before, they yell at their own teammates. On the barbarism-to-chivalry spectrum, it’s closer to the former than the latter.

During an ultimate game, on the other hand, not only do people clap when one of their teammates score, they often clap when the opposing team scores. After a point is scored, it’s not the slightest bit unusual for players to exchange high-fives—with the opposing team! As mentioned earlier, players respect other players’ foul calls against them, but not only that, it’s common to have someone make a call on himself or herself.

6) Manifestos

Truth be told, to my knowledge, hockey team don’t have “manifestos.” If my team did, I imagine it would be something along the lines of: “Play hard for 60 minutes, do whatever you can to win, and enjoy a Bud after the game.”

My ultimate team, the Gasconaders (click here for a definition), does indeed have a manifesto—one that’s good enough that I’m compelled to shared it: “The Gasconaders, purveyors of extravagant boasting, brag about one thing and one thing only: their ability to brag. What the team understands is that while Ultimate is a particularly ‘cool’ sport, one infused with the love and the spirit of the game, it also is great to play your absolute best, to make a play that you’ll have pleasant dreams of that night, and, yes, to win. And winning, of course, gives you bragging rights. The beauty of being a Gasconader is that we’ve eliminated the obstacles to bragging–for example, the need to win–and simply embraced the bragging as our modus operandi, our joie de vivre, our pedantic way of saying, ‘We’re just awesome, regardless of those so-called scores other people are focused on. Join us, submit to us–or defeat us. We don’t care; we’re still #1.’”

All things considered, I probably wouldn’t pick my ultimate team in a fight, but I think I would for some casual drinks and conversation—one more thing for them to boast about.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultimate_(sport)

Talkin' Bout Practice!

Fri, 23 Aug 2013 20:23:00 -0500

Maybe it’s just me. But when I decide to see someone speak about great writing at a marketing conference session, and as she brings up the topic of practice, she advances her PowerPoint slide to reveal a photograph of Allen Iverson, I know I chose the right session.

Frankly, she could have stopped right there and going to the conference might have been worth it. Reference lost on you? Play the video.

Now let me hit rewind and give just a bit more context. I spent three days this week attending the Inbound conference in Boston. The conference is put together by HubSpot, a company I’ve been mildly infatuated with for about 4 years now, so expectations ran high. And as it turned out, the conference shattered those expectations. Not because of one single thing about the conference, but because of dozens of things—one of them being Beth Dunn’s 20 minute talk entitled, “How to Be a Writing God.” (if nothing else, I knew Beth had confidence)

I had expected to go listen to Beth dispense advice on developing punchy sentences, pinpointing perfect words that evoke the senses, unlocking clever turns of phrase.

She didn’t do any of that. She told it straight. As Beth put it, writing brilliantly—doing anything brilliantly—all comes down to something much simpler and much less glamorous. It comes down to practice.

Beth told the story of a young comic, Brad Isaac, who happened to be in a club at the same time as Jerry Seinfeld. Sensing he had a once-in-a-lifetime chance to ask a legend for advice, Brad did just that. And what great wisdom to Seinfeld dispense? Basically this: Write a joke. Every day. Then never stop. (Here’s a more detailed story from Brad Isaac himself)

Beth told another great story, this one more personal. Beth—like so many of us—decided last summer that she was going to go on her umpteenth health kick. She’s had dozens of short-lived bursts of interests in getting in shape. They generally ended up with her back on the couch. Undeterred, she resolved she was going to start running. And when she was done with her first run, she took a photo of herself— referred to as a “selfie” by the hip set. And then she got out there the next day and ran again—and took another selfie. She started her own little movement—the Beth Dunn #SweatieSelfie movement (which appears to even have evangelists now). She’s been running for about a year now. She’s lost around 80 pounds. She plans to run a 10K soon. And remarkably even to her, she actually loves running now.

Moral of the story: Be it writing, telling jokes and running, there aren’t secrets. There’s just practice. Unless of course you’re Allen Iverson.

10 Reasons Jeff Ramminger Was the Best Boss I’ve Ever Had

Sat, 20 Oct 2012 18:07:38 -0500

Jeff Ramminger, Boss Extraordinaire

Some experiences in your life simply don’t last long enough. For me, working for Jeff Ramminger was one of those experiences.

I’ve had some good managers in my day, and I hope to have many more. I doubt I’ll ever have one better than Jeff.

For a bit of background, Jeff was the SVP of Media Products at TechTarget, and he was my manager for most of my brief stint at that comany. And my time there was truly too short – less than a full year. I was heartbroken about exiting Jeff’s constellation but had one of those rare opportunities in life that truly was too good to refuse.

I’ve spent a lot of time reflecting on what made Jeff such a phenomenal person to work for. I’d like to think that one day, I can be the kind of manager that someone wishes his or her time with was too short when that person decides to abandon me to chase that offer that’s too good to refuse.

And hell, if I’m going to take the time to give it real thought, I might as well write it down. And if I’m going to write it down, I might as well share it for the betterment of the millions of my avid and adoring blog followers who are continually waiting on the edge of their seats for my once-every-eight-to-fifteen-months blog entries!

So here it is… 10 lessons you and I can take from the Jeff Ramminger school of management that will make us great people to work for.

1) Be smart

OK, this is a tough one to start with, because to some degree, it’s what the Good Lord gave you (odd thing for an atheist to write, I suppose). In some cases, people either have the gray matter or they don’t. Jeff had it in spades. He knew about so many things—be it demand generation marketing, SEO, the psychology of sales, the history of World War II, how music gets made or how to use to use a radial arm saw. Jeff was not just a jack-of-all-trades but had also mastered quite a few. That meant that every time I was around him, I tended to learn something interesting. That made me want to be around him, which made me want to be in his good graces, which made me want to work hard for him.

2) “Getting things done is better than being right”

Jeff had a saying for just about every occasion. One of them was that “getting things done is better than being right.” And another thing he used to say to me in his Southern drawl was “You see Thad, I’m like a chameleon. I can be whatever I need to be.” What he meant in both cases was that, while few people were more persuasive, Jeff never felt the need to get up on a soapbox or die on the proverbial sword over this issue or that. He worked with people, he tirelessly forged the right relationships, he sat quietly when he knew talking wouldn’t advance his cause—and rather than ever getting stuck in position where he had turned himself into a martyr over this position or that, he was simply a pragmatist that got things done.

3) Be a great sales guy (a wolf in sheep’s clothing)

OK, I’m outing him here, but another thing Jeff used to always say was that he was “a wolf in sheep’s clothing.” What he meant by that was that since he wasn’t officially a sales guy, clients let their guards down when he paid visits. Yet he did a better job getting people excited about our products than any sales rep we had. He could connect with anyone. He could spin a yarn. He could butter people up yet be thoroughly genuine and authentic. And of course, as the head of the product team, he understood what we were selling better than anyone. Sales reps loved, loved, loved to bring Jeff Ramminger on a sales call. And in case you haven’t figured this part of corporate life out, when your sales people love you, life gets a lot better.

4) Make work relationships personal

From the moment I met Jeff—on a phone call no less—it felt a bit more like a friendship than anything else. He was impossible not to like, and he made me feel as though he had genuinely affection for me as well. Not only that, we talked about so many things—not just work things. We talked about all the things a boss and his worker aren’t supposed to chat about: politics, religion, personal issues. And what made it more remarkable was that he and I didn’t agree on a damn thing! Yet it was always affable and friendly and a good laugh. Again, all of this just made me want to do right by him as an employee.

5) Be passionate but be well-rounded

I’ve met few people as dedicated to his work as Jeff. The man worked constantly. He traveled for work constantly. I never recall him saying “no” to something because it was too much to add to his workload. Yet Jeff was clearly not defined by his work. He had a family he was committed to, he had an infinite string of hobbies, he loved to read, he had dreams of writing a novel about his father. In essence, he was a renaissance man, which made him more interesting to be around, and it inspired me in my personal life and my work life.

6) Have a story and saying for every occasion

Again, this is a tough one to include, because I believe that to a large degree, you’ve go the gift of gab or you don’t. Some people have such a knack for telling stories that you feel like you’re being wrapped in blanket by their words. Jeff has that gift. You might start to note that a lot of this advice is inextricable linked. The fact that Jeff was so smart, so personable, so well-rounded… were all underpinnings for his ability to tell great stories. In fact, Jeff told me the same exact stories quite a few times. But unlike your crazy uncle who tells you the same old story and you cringe when you here it coming, I’d enjoy Jeff’s stories the second and third times I heard them. As did others. And when people enjoy your stories, they want to have you around. And when they want you around, they’re likely to give you what you need and want. And that helps in business and in life.

And not only did he have stories, but he had the perfect saying for every occasion:

“There’s a pony in there somewhere.”

“We’re not gonna push you into the lake and just wave at your from the dock.”

“We had to figure out whether we were smoking our own crack or not.”

“If you see the drunk with the bottle of beer, you gotta take the bottle of beer away from him.”

“This isn’t about whose belt is longer.”

“They’re going to lap this up like kittens do milk”

“Now that we we’d call a dog that won’t hunt”

“The world’s always great if you listen to your own echo”

“We gotta put fuckin’ fork in this thing and move on.”

“We need bullets in the gun.”

“It’s like building something for 10 masters.”

I gotta say, I can’t quite figure out exactly why these sayings made Jeff a better boss, but they did.

7) Take your people to dinner

Since Jeff was based Georgia and I was based up in Boston, we’d often times go weeks without seeing each other face to face. But when Jeff was in town, he’d take me out to dinner occasionally. This might sound a bit odd, but this meant a ton to me. I’d just never had a boss who did anything like that before. Of course, it helped that I actually enjoyed his company. And it helped that we usually got good food. But it was more than that. It told me that cared enough about me that he’d spend his time with me off hours, get my input on things, share his thoughts about the business with me. I’ll always think back those dinners fondly—and the fact that we still manage to meet up every once in a while for a meal means a lot for me too.

8) Be the calm in the eye of the storm

Most SVPs I’ve known and worked for are at the eye of a never-ending storm. It just comes with the territory. But Jeff never got frazzled. He was just above it. And it wasn’t that he didn’t get in the weeds on issues—he certainly did—but Jeff just had a knack for balancing the crisis of the day with the big picture. That kind of calm and confidence begets calm and confidence and keeps the ship steady.

9) Take time

Again, it’s hard to make time for people when you’re in the eye of that storm. Jeff always managed to. The man traveled constantly, volunteered himself for speaking engagement and sales calls, managed a department with dozens of people, did all the required dancing with the other muckity mucks at the company. But he always made time for the people on his team when they needed time. As the saying goes, time is the most precious commodity, and when someone like that gives it to you, you remember it.

10) Be honest and keep your people in the loop

As mentioned earlier, Jeff was about the best sales person I’ve ever been around. As I now look back at the process when he was recruiting me, he had a pretty good knack for accentuating certain things. But he never once led me astray or did anything that made me question whether he had my best interests at heart. He told me things in confidence, and expected I’d keep those things to myself. I wouldn’t even think of betraying that kind of confidence. And like all the other things on this list, his willingness to be straight with me—even when he didn’t have to tell me everything he did—made me want to do my best for him.

I hope you enjoyed this list, and I hope you have a boss like Jeff Ramminger one day.

Some Insights on Group Buying Sites

Tue, 18 Jan 2011 02:07:37 -0600

I have some pent-up thoughts on the dynamics at work in the “group buying” space. Having cofounded a company called KangoGift (not a group-buying service, rather a service that allows people to send real gifts instantly by text message), I’ve had a lot of interactions with retailers who have been approached by and have used group-buying sites. I’ve also bumped into investors who have tried to prod KangoGift towards more of a group-buying/discounting model. I’ve given group buying plenty of thought, and it’s time for a brain dump…

Is it really group buying or just new-world coupons?

Groupon, Buywithme, LivingSocial, CoupMe, Eversave, DailyDealster. HomeRun… they’re referred to as group-buying sites, and in a way, it stands to reason. They claim that if they can get enough people to participate in a deal, they can offer a product or service at a great price – usually at 50% off or more.

But here’s the truth – they virtually always get enough customers to activate the deal. For example, where I live – in Framingham, MA -- Groupon needed 50 customers to opt in by end of day for today’s local deal to be be “tipped” – which is 58% off five car washes at a local car wash joint. Groupon probably sends this deal off to well over 10,000 people, perhaps more than 100,000 (with the way they segment their email lists, I have no way of knowing the exact number). Of course they’ll get 50 people to participate. To emphasize my point, the deal tipped before 9 AM.

To call a spade a spade, I don’t think the vast majority of people participate in the deals for the “group” aspect of the deal. They participate to get a great deal. It’s a modern-day coupon for all intents and purposes.

While I don’t think people are truly participating for the satisfaction of participating with a group, I’d certainly concede that social media has helped Groupon and the rest expand in ways not imaginable just a few years back. Deals gets posted and shared by thousands of people on Facebook every day, as well as tweeted/re-tweeted thousands of times. For a simple value prop message (e.g. "50% off your next spa treatment"), social media is a powerful marketing phenomenon, no doubt.

Some of the hidden little secrets

As someone who has talked to plenty of retailers who have tried group-buying sites, there are some interesting pieces to the puzzle that many folks don’t understand. To name a few…

It’s damn expensive for the retailer: The beauty of the group-buying model is that technically a retailer doesn’t pay a group-buying site a penny to participate in a deal. But that doesn’t mean it’s cheap. First of all, the group-buying site will insist that the retailer offer somewhere between 50-90% off. Take the car wash deal I referred to before. It was 58% off the normal price -- $25 for 5 car washes, which is normally $60. Group buying sites will then retain anywhere from 25%-50% of the sale price. With Groupon – due to its enormous marketshare – they’re probably taking 50%. Holding those assumptions, in today’s deal, Groupon gets $12.50 per unit sold, and the car wash gets $12.50. Remember, the car wash is giving away $60 worth of product. This probably is just fine for a car wash. But for a clothing store? A specialty food store? A toy store? That’s a steep price.

The “Breakage” factor: This is somewhat stunning but true. From the retailers I’ve talked to, anywhere from 20-40% of deals bought on group-buying sites are never redeemed. In the gift card business, a gift card that’s never used is referred to as “breakage.” Of course, this breakage offsets the aforementioned expense for the retailer a bit. Part of me thinks consumers will eventually wise up to breakage but another part of me knows they won't.

There can be serious buyer’s remorse: There are undoubtedly some retailers who are thrilled to bits with the customers group buying sites deliver. But I’ve heard a fair share say that they’ll absolutely never do a group-buying deal again. They get overwhelmed with customers in a very condensed period of time, or they feel like the deal cheapens their brand in the long run, or the promise of new customers that convert into repeat customers turns out to be hollow.

The copycat phenomenon

It’s truly amazing to see how many group-buying sites have come out of the woodwork. I’ve been following Groupon since early 2009. There was perhaps one other company doing something similar back then. Fast forward 20 months, and there are so many group-buying sites out there that it’s a bit absurd. It's a bit shameless as well; not only to these clones copy the business model, they copy the look and feel of Groupon's site. There are, in fact, son many group-buying sites now that aggregators are cropping up (more on that in a bit).

I guess this goes to show a few things: The entrepreneurial spirit is alive and well in America – for better and worse. Plenty of people want to build companies and hit pay dirt, and plenty of people have no qualms trying to essentially do a copy and paste.

The big little secret: It’s all about the sales force

While imitators abound, one thing that I think is under-estimated is the sales challenge involved in a group-buying site. While you can read about the how the $100 billion local advertising business is just there for the taking, trust me that it just ain’t that easy. Groupon, which undoubtedly has a tremendous amount of inbound demand from retail businesses, still needs a gargantuan sales force of thousands of people to do what it does. They have thousands of sales folks pounding the pavement from Seattle to St. Petersburg – and that’s not an easy (or cheap) thing to replicate.

I have to wonder what Groupon is thinking about leveraging this sales force in other ways. Employees with connections into thousands of local businesses is an absolutely awesome asset, and it could be used for more than great discount deals. I’m very curious to see how this plays out.

How will aggregators change this game?

I spent close to 10 years working at Monster.com. Among the hundreds of companies to come along to take a bite out of Monster’s lunch were the job aggregators – sites that essentially just scrape as many job boards as they can find and display all the jobs all in one spot. Two of the big ones are Indeed.com and SimplyHired.com, and frankly, they’re brilliant. If I’m searching for jobs, why go to Monster.com, Dice.com, CareerBuilder.com, MyLocalNicheJobBoard.com all separately if I can just go see all the jobs listed in one spot?

Well, group buying is just like job boards… do I want to subscribe to 23 different group buying sites or one aggregator like GroopBuy or Yipit? (some more on this trend here: http://www.dailyfinance.com/story/aggregators-will-change-group-buying/19756903/) The jury is still out.

The self-service model

To me, this is one of the most interesting unanswered questions in this space. Groupon announced last fall that they’d allow companies to create and promote their own deals. And there are new companies like Privy out there trying to enable a self-service model. On the one hand, this makes perfect sense – turn the whole thing into a SaaS model and let everyone service themselves, right? Well yeah, except there’s the reality of it all, namely…

Getting small business owners to do anything is a massive uphill battle. They are busy, they are often disorganized, they’re not necessarily tech-savvy, and they’re putting out fires all day. Barriers abound. Trust me! :)
If I’m a small business owner and I’m not getting new customers in the door by running a huge discount, is it really something I want to do for my existing customers and fans? Why would I advertise a 50% off deal through my website or Twitter feed or CRM campaign to people who are already interested in my brand? I’m not saying there’s never a reason a business owner would want to do this, but as a general rule, discounting is intended to get new folks through the doors.

It’s all fascinating to follow, and it’s going to be very interesting to see how it all plays out.

How my dad lost 135 pounds (and I’m not trying to sell you a damn thing)

Mon, 29 Nov 2010 16:07:33 -0600

Do a bit of poking around online, and you can find out that the weight loss industry is anywhere from a $35 billion to $70 billion dollar a year industry, depending on whom you believe. The late-night infomercials, the Jenny Craig pre-made dinners, the diet supplement stores. Weight loss is an unmistakable national obsession.

Ironically, on the whole, we’re only getting bigger and fatter.

But I’ve got a pretty inspirational story about weight loss. And here’s the beauty of my story: I don’t want you to subscribe to my program, join my gym or buy anything with a money-back guarantee that you’ll lose 20 pounds. Honestly, I don’t really care all that much whether you lose weight. I just think it’s worth telling the story of my father’s weight loss, because I know there are lots of folks out there who aspire to lose a lot of weight.

A bit of history on my father

First some background on my dad. He’s now 71 (started losing the weight when he was 70). When I was a young ‘en, he was a big guy but not overly big. When I was a school kid, he probably weighed around 250 pounds. He could have afforded to drop 50 pounds. But he carried his weight well and did not appear to be a terribly overweight guy.

After my folks divorced and my siblings and I all left for college, my father ended up living in a number of places without significant others or a lot of friends around. Over time (and perhaps without much oversight or input from loved ones nearby), he gradually gained weight.

Throughout these years, my father was an on-again, off-again habitual dieter – like so many millions of people. He knew he should lose weight, and he’d go on diets that he’d stick with for a few months. He’d lose weight – 10, 15, 25 pounds. One time, he lost more than 50 pounds. But invariably, the weight would find its way back. No diet ever really stuck.

Over the years, my dad got big. Very big. At his heaviest, he weighed north of 360 pounds. And there were attendant health problems. He was diagnosed with a heart disease called atrial fibrillation. He was pre-diabetic. He had high blood pressure, and he had pain in his legs and feet. And the most problematic health issue was that his hip began causing him so much pain that he had to have hip replacement surgery in June of 2009. At the time of the surgery, he weighed 355 pounds.

As I write this just after Thanksgiving in 2010, my father weighs 220 pounds. In other words, he has lost 135 pounds since that surgery 17 months ago – 120 pounds since the beginning of this year. The last time he weighed that much was when he was about 44 years old.

He’s still not a triathlete. He can’t walk for great distances or go on jogs, and his hip still bothers him a bit. He’s still less than certain walking down stairs, and he keeps a cane with him. But the difference between my father of today and my father of 11 months ago is absolutely remarkable and inspiring.

The secret is there is no secret

So you’ve got the high-level details now. But perhaps you’re wondering how he did it. Well, I’ve got some bad news and some good news.

Let’s get the bad news out of the way: If you’re looking for an “a-ha” moment, you’re out of luck. There is no magic trick. No silver bullets. In fact, his story about how he lost weight is a bit dull.

Now for the good news: What my father did is within reach of anyone who totally resolves to do it. Not only that, it doesn’t cost a lot of money.

Here are the details of how things unfolded.

In January, when we weighed a bit north of 340 pounds, he had back-to-back meetings with his primary care physician and his orthopedic surgeon. They restated the somewhat obvious – that he had multiple health issues and all of them were made worse by his weight. There was one simple thing the surgeon said that stuck with my dad vividly: “We’re only trying to make the rest of your life as good as it can be.”

My father became ultra-motivated to lose a lot of weight. A nutritionist he saw recommended a low-carb diet that eliminated all high-glycemic foods. More specifically, he was to eliminate all “white foods” -- refined sugar, white flour, rice, potatoes. She asked him to keep his food intake under 165 carbs a day.

My father decided he was going to be a bit more radical than that. He aimed to keep his carb intake under 80 a day.

So what did he eat? For breakfast, he ate lox and berries. One thing I should add is that my father is extraordinarily frugal. So when blueberries were cheap, he’d have blueberries for breakfast – for weeks on end. When strawberries were on sale, it would be strawberries for weeks.

Another constant staple was salads. These salads consisted of lettuce, cucumbers, red peppers and tomatoes. He did not limit his salad intake. He made his own dressing to make sure it included olive oil, a “good” fat.

At dinner, it would be broiled or grilled chicken, turkey or fish (or at least it was at first; things changed a bit later on, which we’ll get to) with a salad or steamed vegetable dish and sometimes fruit for desert.

What did he eliminate from his diet? No cereal, no bread, no pita, no chips, no pasta or noodles -- all high glycemic food. No sugar-laden desserts like cake, pie or cookies.

He also joined a gym and started going to the gym 4-5 times a week at first. The primary exercise for him was swimming laps in the pool – the only form of aerobic exercise his recovering hip could handle.

Quick out of the gates but then a slow-down

The weight loss came rapidly at first. He had lost around 45 pounds by April of 2010. But an interesting pattern started to emerge. He would hit these plateaus where despite the fact that he was adhering to his strict diet, he would level off and stop losing weight for 2 or 3 weeks. But then, after pushing through those stretches, the weight would start to come off again. He’d lost 90 pounds by mid-summer.

Losing more weight became more difficult after he reached 250 lbs. And when he got to 235 lbs., he hit a stretch where he stayed at the same weight for 6 weeks. So he dialed up the rigor of his diet. He essentially cut back to two meals a day, and he cut the chicken, fish and turkey out of his diet, replacing those foods with tempeh, tofu or soy milk plus small servings of lox or pickled herring for protein. He also upped his work-out schedule to every single day, and he started an aqua aerobics class (Interestingly, by his account, the working out only accounted for a small percentage of the weight loss).

Some fatherly advice

There’s no doubt that this has been a Spartan routine for my father. But the results are truly amazing. He has some pretty interesting perspectives on maintaining a regimen of this sort.

The downsides are pretty straight-forward. There was the hungriness and the temptations. But there is also perspective. “The pain in my hip is more difficult than being hungry,” my father says. And the challenge of eating less obviously correlates to less pain in his hip.

Also, his dieting experiences of yesteryear helped him on some levels. “Because I’d been on many diets, I knew I could cut out any food I wanted. In this case, I just had to stop eating a whole bunch of stuff.”

And here’s some somewhat sobering advice he has: “Eat foods that don’t taste that great. That way you’re less tempted to over-eat.”

An interesting technique he employed involved imposing rules and routines on himself: “Eat only at home and stay away from home as much as you can.” (this is probably easier for some than others). And on a related note, my father thinks “it is important to have other activities to take your mind off food, but these activities should not be stressful or cause you to just cram food down your gullet because of limited time or to comfort yourself as a countermeasure to that stress.”

Then there was the common advice to make dinner your last food intake for the day. In other words, no night-time snacks.

Did he ever want to quit?, I asked him. “Not really. I was committed.” The ferocity and frequency of food cravings subsided after a few months. And there were all kinds of other benefits aside from the psychic rewards of shedding pounds. His energy level was higher. He could walk longer distances. He stopped getting winded going up a flight of stairs.

Parting thoughts

Over the past few days (Thanksgiving and the 3 days after), he’s been off the wagon for the first time in 11 months – indulging in the gluttony of this particular holiday. But he’s totally confident he can get right back into the mode he’s been in since January. His goal is to get down to the 175-180 lb. range, at which point he says he’ll add a few indulgences into his diet – like whole grain breads and a bit of peanut butter. But he’s quick to add that he’ll only add in foods if it doesn’t result in weight gain.

This commitment and confidence is wonderful for me to hear personally.

My father literally looks like a different person. It struck me every time I laid eyes on him for the 5 days he was staying with me. Besides looking trim, he seems more animated and more in control of what he’s doing. He doesn’t slouch as much as he used to, and he doesn’t limp the way he used to. He also seems just plain happier.

Is this kind of weight loss a terrifically challenging undertaking? No doubt. Does it seem worthwhile? No doubt.

Future M Start-Up Marketing Boot Camp Recap

Mon, 11 Oct 2010 02:09:43 -0500

I cannot stop thinking about the all-day event I attended on Friday – Future M’s Startup Marketing Bootcamp. When your day-to-day reference point is locking yourself in your basement most mornings and remaining in solitude as you try to help build a startup, spending 7 hours immersed in great discussions and surrounded by smart and vibrant people leaves you feeling like you just got served a feast.

Of course, there were only 120-150 people at the event, which means a lot of people who may have been craving some startup marketing insights didn’t get a taste. I took pretty exhaustive notes, and in an effort to make sure anyone who wanted a bite of the knowledge doesn’t go hungry, I’m going to try summarize what we heard from the inspirational people who presented at the event. The notes that follow mimic the order of the sessions at the event.

Disclaimer: This is by no means a comprehensive review, and I’m just jotting down the things that caught my ear and got me thinking – so it’s gone through my personal filter (for better or worse).

What's Next in Marketing -- Valeria Maltoni, Conversation Agent

Valeria is a bit of a social marketing maven, and her comments echoed comments I heard from another social media visionary, Michael Troiano (@miketrap), on Thursday night. A few themes:

Be playful (reminded me of Mike’s comment that you need to entertain, inform, promote – in that order)
You can’t think of customers as faceless targets anymore
The product is your marketing
Be interested and be interesting

10 Things CEOs Need to Know About Design -- Leslie Bradshaw, Jess3

I have to confess something. When Jess first started talking, I kind of dismissed her because she looked so young. By the end, I was eating out of her hand. She is smart, well-rounded, to-the-point, and she absolutely crushed it with all kinds of helpful tips. I hope I get the chance to work with Jess3 some day. While all of her things CEOs need to know were valuable insights, some of the things that stood out were:

PowerPoint is not a design platform, it is a delivery mechanism! Many of us have learned that our PowerPoint decks should be visuals that help us with our story. The thing most of us (well, me) haven’t figured out is that PPT isn’t what we should be using to design compelling visuals. Design things in Photoshop or Illustrator, and then bring them into PPT.
Leave color out at first. Sketch, wireframe, storyboard. No, this isn’t a message aimed designers. This is a message aimed at founders, CEOs, executives. Regardless of your artistic level, force yourself to sketch things out a bit. It will help you convey your vision in the literal sense, and it will help designers understand that vision when it’s time for them to get started on the real design.
Hire a designer as your cofounder. As Leslie sees it, that’s how important design is. And in this day and age, I’d have to say I think she’s spot on. At my startup, KangoGift.com, we talk all the time about how we wish we had a full-time designer to help us think through the entire user experience. Valeria made the point in the first session that the “product is your marketing,” and to such a large extent, the design is your product (particularly online).

Principals of Great User Interfaces -- Karen Donoghue, Human Logic

OK, confession on this one… I had to bail out after about 10 minutes to take care of a tiny bit of work and pop some more quarters in the parking meter (only downside to the entire day was running out repeatedly to put more damn quarters in the meter, only to find out at the end of the day I had been ticketed around 11 AM.. ugghh! Am I the only person on earth that thought if you kept time on the meter by putting more quarters in every 2 hours you could avoid a ticket!?) So from what little of Karen I did see, here’s what I found interesting. You can think of design in some pretty quantitative, analytical ways. Here were some of Karen’s interesting high-level points:

User experience is an engine to drive business metrics
Design is not about making websites look pretty, it’s about making business work
Building a great product is a supply chain challenge
To do rapid UX development, “kill early and kill often” It’s cold and Darwinian but effective.
Eliminate ALL possible friction points before or during transactions
Gather data/input any way that you can

Mastering the Long Tail – Chris Kenney and Dan Marquees, Gemvara & Micah Rosenbloom, Founder Collective

I immediately liked Dan and Chris. They’re in that casual genius genre of entrepreneurs. They both used to be at VistaPrint (which poached a lot of my coworkers back in my Monster days), and they clearly know their stuff when it comes to online marketing, SEO and SEM. Gemvara (whose founder and CEO spoke a bit later in the day) is actually a company I didn’t know about and glad I do now. They sell jewelry online, and without the constraints of having to carry the physical inventory, they can give people access to an enormous range of products – “mass customization” if you will. In other words, they capitalize on the “long tail” of jewelry.

Here are some takeaways in no particular order:

57% of Amazon’s sales are the result of keyword searches outside the “popular terms” (unfortunately, we never quite heard what the definition of “popular terms” is in this case, but the general point is clear – those niche items add up to more than the mass market items in some markets).
Dan also mentioned a concept I’d never heard of before, which is “tails within tails.” So in other words, in the world of jewelry, perhaps “amethyst” is part of the long tail. But within the realm of amethyst, amethyst pendants with gold casings is part of the tail within that category. Gemvara seems to be conquering these many tails, and they also seem to be en route to disrupting the jewelry category in the process. As a guy who shelled out many thousands for an engagement ring after an exhaustive online search for just the right thing, I can attest first-hand there’s a market there.
From and SEO perspective, Chris Kenney emphasized the importance of a flat site architecture that is as spider friendly as possible. Also, you need to have rules-based content creating and meta data baked in. This allows you to have structured yet relevant, unique content over time.

Micah Rosenbloom then spoke, and he’s one of those folks that within 60 seconds of him opening his mouth, you’re painfully aware that he’s so much smarter than you are (that was a bit of a recurring theme throughout the day, come to think of it). Micah’s with Founder Collective and was the co-founder of Brontes with Eric Paley (who’s also at Founder Collective). For the record, I’ve seen Eric speak and he’s another one of those guys we Bostonians we refer to as “wicked smaaat,” and it’s no wonder that Brontes is a phenomenal success story and Founders Collective is a hot VC firm these days.

Before I get into my takeaways from Micah, an awesome story about him: Micah recounted how after college, chasing a dream to work in the world of celebrity talent management out in Hollywood, he ran out to the West Coast to land some kind of gig in the dog-eat-dog world of talent agencies. The job he landed? – assistant to the real-life person that is the inspiration for the Ari Gold character from Entourage. In other words, he was the real-world Lloyd! While Entourage is something special for me on Sunday nights, it’s gotta be a whole different kind of special for Micah.

So I think how Micah’s story ties into the “Long Tail” phenomenon is that the product Brontes built could be considered a niche market. Hopefully I’m not butchering this too badly, but Brontes helped create a better way to do 3-D images of people’s teeth. Here’s the thing: There are 50 million dental impressions done by dentists every year -- for everything from retainers to dental prosthetics. Among the many interesting observations Micah had is that while you might hope to nail one vertical, then move on to others (I gather that this was Brontes’ game plan; after dentistry, they planned to move on to other types of 3-D imaging), you better be damn sure to a big enough vertical to start with, because you might end up being there for quite a bit longer than you think.

Other things that Micah emphasized:

Get PR and get buzz. That creates the pull marketing for you. Brontes was featured in all kinds of media outlets, which helped them get clients on board.
Brontes was also aggressive about getting their existing customers to market on their behalf. When someone said misleading things about them on message boards, they’d call up existing customers and ask them to comment on the message board to set the record straight.
Even in this online world where many of us live, you still need to have offline tactics. For example, he mentioned that he’d recently read that Groupon has 1,000 sales/business development people these days (if anyone knows more about Groupon’s sales force, I’d hope you’ll share it with me).

Approaching the Social Media Opportunity, One Perspective -- Joe Chernov, global director of communications and social media, Eloqua

Joe gave a great talk about social media, but putting social media aside for a second, there a few small things that made me think the world of this guy. First of all, he gets up to the front of the room and says he worked really hard on PowerPoint presentation, but he’s going to call an audible and scrap it and speak off the cuff. To my way of thinking, it’s impossible to not respect someone who puts in a bunch of work on something, and then makes a split decision to abandon it all because he thinks the change will benefit the audience. And the other thing about Joe that was just really striking to me is that he was the embodiment of modesty. It was clear that he’s accomplished amazing things in his career, but he almost downplayed his own achievements -- and then to top it off, he bent over backwards to compliment his business rivals (HubSpot in this case). Absolute class act.

Some of the things that Joe said that stood out:

When it comes to social media marketing (and many other things), Joe likens himself to Cicero’s approach to philosophy – he simply took the best of what others had to offer (if you’re like me, you’ll just pretend you knew this about Cicero already). But the point is pretty basic – when you see someone doing social media in a smart way, you pay attention and incorporate it into your strategy if appropriate. And in Joe’s case, you also leverage other people’s great work and you make it your own. The internet makes it easier than ever to do this. As Picaso said, “good artists borrow, great artists steal.”
While modest, Joe is clearly quite clever. He talked a bit about setting “ego traps.” Mentioning how great someone or some company is in a white paper, for example, turns out to be a pretty effective way to get them to promote it for you.
Joe also talked about the technique he’s using lately to stagger the buzz associated with a certain piece of content he’s published. He’ll release something on YouTube, then tweet about it, then a week later he’ll promote it on LinkedIn groups. In this world in which content streams move so quickly, you need to be strategic about staggering your promotion of content to get the most out of it.
Joe also talked about how important it is to get influencers in your company on board with your approach early in the process. Giving people ownership is the best way to get people lobbying for your ideas and strategies.

Designed to Spread, Creative Content Strategies – Jon Kay/Sonja Jacob/David Hauser, Grasshopper Group

Jon, Sonja and David were like the wild kids at the party – a crew that everyone remembers. And in fact, I suppose that means they proved out their point – which is that to be remembered, you have to do stand-out things. You also have to tell stories that people want to pass along. Of course, doing stand-out things that people want to pass along can take a lot of different forms, and here were a few examples:

Jon raved about a New Zealand Air commercial called “Nothing to Hide,” in which real employees (including the CEO) went about serving customers wearing nothing but body paint. The commercial was done in a completely classy way, yet it’s a bit arresting. As you might imagine, it became something of a viral sensation.

Sonja presented a great video she created called Thank a Teacher. It taps into core emotions of thankfulness and gratitude. As you can see on YouTube, 200,000 people have viewed this piece, meaning folks who saw it wanted to pass it along.

David Hauser, Grasshopper’s co-founder, recounted how they took South-by-Southwest by storm, with Jon dressed as a matador and someone else dressed as a bull -- turning heads everywhere they went, gathering attention for Chargify (whose mascot is a bull) at one of the world’s great technology conferences. These tactics reminded me a bit of my times at Monster when Jeff Taylor was still there. Jeff would do all kinds of stunts (water-skiing while being pulled by a blimp is the one that stands out) to garner attention for Monster, and while they made me cringe at times, some of those tactics paid off in huge ways.

Refining the Platform: How to Test and Optimize Your Product and Marketing Channels, David Cancel, Performable

David Cancel is another one of those understated-but-clearly-brilliant guy, and he gave a no-fluff, no-B.S. presentation. Some of the stand-out things he touched on:

Generation 1 of marketing was “outbound”, Generation 2 is “inbound”, Generation 3 is “lifecycle” (Here’s a pretty interesting blog post about lifecycle marketing)
In David’s opinion, you need to create a data-driven marketing framework to optimize your company for learning.
He stressed the importance of having a dashboard. Don’t automate it! Use Google Docs. Keep it simple, keep it cheap. It’s going to be painful: Your teams will spend hours working on it every week, and you’ll find out where you suck the most. And you’ll be better off for it.
Multi-variate testing is useless for start-ups, according to Dave. There’s just not enough data for it to be statistically meaningful. Stick with simple A/B testing, with the best kind of test being a “show/no-show” test (i.e., how do things perform when the widget is there, how do things perform when the widget isn’t there). The point of testing is to prove things quickly! And you should never stop testing; it needs to be baked into the culture as a continuous process.

Another interesting thing came from this session. Presumably, David is a quant guy – at least all the companies he’s worked for would tend to indicate that. But he made it clear that there is simply no substitute to getting out there and talking with people face to face, so that you can see when “their eyes light up.” In his words, you have to use both qualitative and quantitative data to test assumptions.

Making it Happen in a Shoestring: Crowdsourcing Your Marketing Activities -- Ross Kimbarovsky, crowdSPRING

Ross jumped from being a lawyer to starting crowdSPRING, which crowdsources web design, logo design and writing services. I cannot help but respect someone who believes in a nascent idea in such a powerful way that he walks from stability and swings for the fences with an idea like crowdSPRING. And he also won me over with his view that “planning is over-rated. Just fucking do it” As he said, you’ll learn more in a day of doing it than a month of planning it.

So some specific things that Ross mentioned that stood out as great ideas/concepts:

If you’re just trying to do fundamental market research, use Mechanical Turk to conduct incredibly cheap surveys with a broad audience. It’s not perfect, but if nothing else, it’s going to help you refine your questions.
If you’re trying to identify specific audiences to do market research and surveys, social media (twitter and blogs) can be amazingly helpful.
When doing crowdsourcing, there are a few keys

Be crystal clear on what you’re looking for. The more direction you’re able to give, the better results will be.
Focus on the right details. Ask questions to figure out what the right details are. Gaining some knowledge in any given field is a good step before crowdsourcing (or outsourcing at all).
Avoid “committeecide”

-----

The day culminated with six awesome entrepreneurs getting up at the front of the room and talking about the lessons they’ve learned starting companies. It was as awesome session with great people:

Laura Fitton, oneforty
Seth Priebatsch, SCVNGR
Ross Kimbarovsky, crowdSPRING
Seth Lieberman, Pangea Media
Jennifer Hyman, Rent the Runway
Nabeel Hyatt, Conduit Labs
Matt Lauzon, Gemvara

But I’m closing in on 3,000 words here, so I’m not going to summarize the last session. Suffice it to say, I admire all of them.

It was a tremendous and inspirational day, and I feel lucky to have been part of it.

Silly Bandz and The Making of a Fad

Thu, 17 Jun 2010 00:47:27 -0500

f you don’t have kids – or more specifically, you don’t have kids between the ages of 5 and 11 – you’re probably completely unaware of Silly Bandz. But take it from me, Silly Bandz are a big deal. And rest assured, someone’s making millions from them.

Silly Bandz are… well… kind of silly. Not in a funny way, but more in an inconsequential way. They are essentially colored rubber bands that are molded into shapes (shapes of animals, automobiles, planes, etc) and are just big enough to fit around a kid’s wrist. And as I write this, I’m quite certain that millions of kids have them around their wrists at this precise moment.

If you don’t have kids – or more specifically, you don’t have kids between the ages of 5 and 11 – you’re probably completely unaware of Silly Bandz. But take it from me, Silly Bandz are a big deal. And rest assured, someone’s making millions from them.

Silly Bandz only came into my personal consciousness last month when my nephews in Texas sent my 6 year-old son a 12 pack of them. Somehow, through masterful trades with fellow school kids on the bus, my son has turned 12 Silly Bandz into 18 (“I traded one really cool one for two medium ones”). Apparently, the same negotiating tactics my older son uses at dessert time are transferable to Silly Bandz bartering.

Sillly Bandz are an undeniable craze – of the variety that is difficult to explain rationally. They are colored, molded rubber bands. Nothing more. No intrinsic value. No function. No purpose. Yet every kid has them (at least the cool ones!). In fact, they’ve become so wide-spread and such a distraction that many elementary schools have taken to banning them.

So how do these crazes gain traction? How do they hit a tipping point? Is it an elaborate plan or an accident?

From what I can dig up, the rise of Silly Bandz seems to be more accident than master plan. While conventional wisdom would have you thinking that fads and crazes are hatched in places like LA and New York, this particular craze caught fire in Birmingham, Alabama, which is where Silly Bandz first started gaining traction. From there, they spread up the East Coast. Today, they are sold in at least 8,000 stores around the country, as well as online.

Another interesting point on Silly Bandz which might point more to master plan and less to accident: go to their web site, and this is what they’ll tell say should do with these products:

Wear them
Trade them
Collect them

And this is exactly what kids do.

They wear them – scores of them, sometimes hundreds of them – up their little arms. Having more of them is like some kind of tribal expression of superiority. Clearly the kid with 109 Silly Bandz is 4.73 times cooler than the kid with 23 Silly Bandz.

They trade them, which makes them like money. While they have no real value, they have enormous perceived value.

And kids collect them. And what’s more, some shapes are much harder to come by than others. In other words, they create scarcity. Marketing nirvana! So my kid can go on the bus, and he can trade one of his rare snake-shaped Silly Bandz for three of the easy-to-be-had car-shaped Silly Bandz. And then, in what must give Silly Bandz executives warm tingles, the kid my kid traded with begs his mom to go buy 12 more Silly Bandz. Freakin’ Genius!

Interestingly enough, the importer of Silly Bandz happens to be the importer of the LiveStrong bracelets – which turned into a somewhat analogous craze among adults four or five years back. Creating two fads – one for little kids and one for Yuppies – out of glorified rubber bands is kind of impressive when you stop and consider it.

Any more insight on how fads and crazes get started and hit a tipping point? Better yet, any predictions on what the next fad will be? I’d love to know about it before my kids!

Update: Turn out my kid no longer has has 18 Silly Bandz. He now has 100-plus! Thank God school is out; maybe this craze will plateau, because it's getting out of hand!

The Big Short

Fri, 21 May 2010 12:26:14 -0500

I finally finished up The Big Short. If you haven’t heard about the book, it’s an inside look at a handful of the characters who saw the market crash coming before the rest of us. The author, Michael Lewis, has a phenomenal knack for taking dry topics – like trading exceedingly complex derivatives – and making it absolutely riveting. Lewis has never let me down with a book.

I remember thinking something along these lines back in the stock market fall of 2008: “The market is crashing, millions of jobs will be lost, and there are a handful of scumbags out there profiting from this disaster.”

While I’m still fairly certain there were some dirt bags who made millions out of the market collapse, The Big Short help me realize something kind of profound: On some levels, the “shorts” (those who shorted the market) were the heroes – or at least as close as you get to heroes in the world of finance. In reality, the scumbags were the ones who created the ridiculous run in the subprime mortgage market in all those years leading up to the crash. Those respected, well-dressed, articulate, educated financial moguls built a house of cards; the shorts just saw the lack of structural integrity before the rest of us.

Here are some of the take-away lessons from the whole fiasco – at least the ones I see through my lens.

People’s status can mask what they’re really involved in. Those who breathe the rarified air are sometimes merely a degree or two of separation from – and inextricably tied to -- the sycophants and lowlifes of the world who take advantage of the poor and downtrodden. Wall Street mortgage bond dealers were the perfect example of this. For years, they outsourced their dirty work to subprime lenders. Wall Street essentially invented and continued to feed the market for creating loans to people who could never possibly afford them (case in point: the migrant worker who was given a loan for a $700,000 home, which he didn’t need to make a single payment on for the first two years). The Wall Street magicians provided the incentives to fly-by-night lenders to lend to whoever would sign their lives away, then sliced and diced the loans into something virtually nobody – certainly not their own CEOs – understood. These Wall Street folks, of course, made millions while creating the underpinnings of a financial crisis, then got bailed out by the government when things collapsed.

Peer pressure persists far beyond high school. As we look back situation that was created throughout the first 7 years of the 2000s, it was patently absurd. $400,000 loans made to people making $15,000 a year. People getting mortgages with no proof of income. Strippers and janitors buying a half-dozen investment houses. Ostensibly, the financial market is full of smart people. One would expect that at least some smattering of these sophisticated financial types would have seen the inevitability of a financial collapse and rung the bell. But there was enough pressure within those circles to let the good times roll that these smart folks somehow managed to either miss the wrecking ball hurling towards them or saw it and bit their tongues.

The path of conviction can be a lonely and dark. The book tells the tales of the small handful of people who really understood the charade – and who tried to benefit from shorting mortgage bond market. For years, these men spoke truth to power while the insanity of the mortgage market continued to be hidden through obfuscation by unspeakably complex collateralized debt obligations. It was as though they were screaming at the top of their lungs, yet nobody could hear. It was a very dark experience for this handful of men. One of them started to feel as though he was losing his mind. Ultimately, this small cadre were proven right, but it certainly took its toll on them.

The Big Short is a tremendous read for anyone who wants a glimpse into how we got ourselves into such a very bad place in the financial markets, and how much it could have been prevented had more people had moral strength. As complex as the problem became, it was rooted in the same basic human weaknesses that create so many problems – greed, fear and the human tendency to follow rather than question.

A chance encounter with greatness ignored

Wed, 12 May 2010 14:38:00 -0500

This is one of those stories that’s not new – just new to me. I came across it last night a bit randomly and couldn’t stop thinking about it. It was a bit of an innocent social experiment organized by a Washington Post reporter that leaves you feeling a bit of pity for us humans (is it me, or do all “social experiments” seem to point out how pathetic we are?).

Joshua Bell is one of the world’s finest violists. He’s a young, charismatic guy, and he commands hundreds of dollars per seat when he tours the world’s great concert halls. He plays to sell-out crowds from Boston to Berlin to Beijing. One magazine declared that his ability to play music "does nothing less than tell human beings why they bother to live." Apparently, his violin isn’t too shabby either; it’s valued at $3.5 million. I’m no expert, and honestly had never heard of the guy ‘til I came across this story, but you gotta think Joshua Bell is pretty good with the fiddle.

So what happens when Josh Bell plays some of Bach’s greatest masterpieces for free in a completely public place? Throngs of people queue up for hours for a chance to listen to him, you guess.

Not quite.

What actually happens is that as Bell plays for 45 minutes, more than a thousand of people stroll by, barely noticing he’s there. After concluding some of the most intricate scores ever written, not a single persons claps or really acknowledges him at all. Think this is hyperbole? It’s not, and in fact, you can watch for yourself.

To be fair, Bell was playing in a Washington, DC, subway station at rush hour. Bell, of course, isn’t a household name or face, and apart from his obvious (or perhaps not-so-obvious) abilities, most of wouldn’t ever realize that this man playing these songs as a world-renowned musician.

But it’s a bit of an indictment on humanity, nonetheless, isn’t it? Here is this man, considered by experts to be a true gift to music. He totes his Stradavari to this Metro stop and plays for free – quite literally providing a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for anyone lucky enough to be walking by. And those “lucky” people just walk by, 99% of them too consumed with making the next train to so much as turn their head to look, listen and appreciate something rare and beautiful.

Bathing in ambient information

Mon, 03 May 2010 20:05:27 -0500

A few observations:

When awake, I rarely go more than 2 hours without being connected to email, Twitter or the Internet at large – either on my laptop or through my phone.
On most mights, the last thing I do before falling asleep is put my iPad down, and when I awake, that same iPad is the first thing I reach for.
The other day, my 6-year son just finished his 400^th puzzle in the game Unblocked on his iTouch.

These types of observations have been on my mind quite a bit of late. Not long ago, I heard someone with a better flare for phrases than me talk about how we are constantly being bathed in “ambient information.“ For example, a Pew Research Center study found that the average girl between the ages of 12 and 17 sends and receives 80 text messages each day, and one in three teens sends or receives over 100 text messages daily.

I also look at my own behaviors, and the extent to which I am bathed in ambient information.

For example, I find myself drifting through my Twitter stream from time to time – not because I need to know what’s going on in anyone’s life, but it feeds me links to information about what’s happening in the world around me – sometimes news, sometimes technology, sometimes politics, sometimes just humor and entertainment. Ambient information is exactly what it is, and it is soothing and it’s addictive. I crave it when I’m away from it for long.

While I guess it was subconsciously evident to me how addictive the Internet and a digital existence can be, I recently came across two stories – one through Twitter and one on a podcast (speaking of ambient inflow of information) – that really hammered home how real this addiction can be.

The first story was about a study recently conducted at the University of Maryland – one in which a class of 200 students were asked to go without any digital consumption for 24 hours. About a third of the students couldn’t get through the assignment. Some reported feeling nervous, jittery or sad. Here’s one description of the experience a student gave: “Texting and IM-ing my friends gives me a constant feeling of comfort. When I did not have those two luxuries, I felt quite alone and secluded from my life. Although I go to a school with thousands of students, the fact that I was not able to communicate with anyone via technology was almost unbearable.”

The second story was a Frontline documentary called “Digital Nation,” which I’d eagerly recommend watching. It describes all kinds of unintended consequences of this digital age – from South Korean kids literally dying from exhaustion after playing video games for 48+ straight hours in Seoul’s famed Internet cafes, to kids at prestigious universities like MIT completely unable to concentrate on any particular topic for more than a few minutes at a time.

I love the Internet, and I love the digital age. I’m a cofounder of a great little company that taps into the whole digital age phenomenon.

But I also have to say that the ramifications of such abundant information flow are a bit scary. There are parts of our brain that we’ll cease to use. My son might be actually learning something by getting through 400 Unblocked puzzles, but will he be able to remember his home phone number (then again, will he have to?)

It’s an interesting story – one that I’ll follow the years ahead on my Twitter feed.

Visual appended on 6/6/2010