Portrait of Anais Nin taken in NYC in 70s by Elsa Dorfman (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Shopping in a busy department store when my kids were young, a woman was reaming out her little girl. At first it made me cringe. Then it made me mad and carrying a large wooden purse I walked over and stuck my nose in her business.

My fam told me to stay out of it. The kids were like, “Mom!? You’re not going to do this?” The hub said it would only make things worse. But I felt it was important.

“Why don’t you mind your own damn business?” the woman hissed.

“Your daughter is so small,” I said sliding between her and the child.

“I’m going to knock you back where you came from.” She sneered self-righteously.

And I thought make a move and loaded and cocked the wooden purse.

Just then a security guard come over, asked if there was a problem and escorted me out of the store.

(Wrong party, dude!)

I’ve come to believe there are many forms of courage. You can be courageous in one thing and not in another.

Melissa, my past assistant eats dinner at a table for one in restaurants. Her mother thinks that is courageous.

Mel asked me what I think courage is and this is what I wrote her:

Courage is a character to be worked on (like a muscle) – a practice to  strengthen it and leverage it into action.

It has many forms: emotional, personal, professional, intellectual, physical, political and artistic. You can have courage in one form and not another.

It can be born within you.

Courage can ignite your body of work and give you the courage to follow your purpose.

Courage can be found in the most unlikely circumstances (damn it!) when the situation demands it, we just rise.

Courage can be stupidity, bravery and wisdom all at once. “If I knew it was so hard I wouldn’t have done it.” Mark Twain

Courage can rebuild a heart or a country.

Courage can lay claim to a seat for one at a table in a restaurant because it is a validation of choice..it is a right to be claimed and with that right, life expands to its new boundary.

Courage is worth battling for because it’s worth having.

Every time I enter into a new chapter of my life I get braver than the chapter before.

It’s not that I’m less afraid, it’s that I’m afraid of less.

As Anais Nin said, “Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.”

And as Maya Angelou is quoted -

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Tejas Nair Photography Sneakers (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I had a book published before I knew how to write.  I submitted a concept, chapter outline and sample chapter to a local Chicago publisher who liked the idea and drew up a contract.

The Terms said I would produce a completed work in a reasonable time frame in exchange for money.  The selling points of the book: the concept was original, the voice whimsical and the topic timely.

What I didn’t factor when I jumped into the project:  I didn’t know how to write, spell or use grammar properly.  Some ideas were quirky and unsophisticated.  In the scope of one’s lifetime achievements and body of work, this would be considered a boner.

But back then I thought it was Amazing! An Opportunity! A step in right direction!?

The point is, I wrote a book that was published in one easy lesson..I shut up, sat down and did it.

Maybe you have a book stuck in your head..your heart, in a drawer or on a cocktail napkin -

Here are top reasons why you are not writing your book and what you can do about it.

1) It’s already written in your head (the hard part) and the actual doing of  it is just a formality.  ”The value of an idea lies in the using of it.” Thomas Edison

2) It will suck.  You know this secretly so it lingers in Never Never Land until you change your mind.  Which you might. Which you should because – so what if it sucks? If it does you’ll improve it.

3) It will be brilliant if you can just find the time and bandwidth. OK and this one is to the geniuses… Will you please share with the rest of the class?  And to the non-geniuses – DITTO.

4) It will be important – which it probably will be  - so would you mind honoring your expertise, depth or perspective enough to deem it relevant enough to YOU to do it?

5) It will be unimportant.  The irony here is that it already is important.

6) It’s written and got stuck in the weeds of subsequent drafts – so why not hand it over to someone with perspective and get it done?!

7) It doesn’t advance your career – it feels like a side road.  Read Steven Pressfield and The War of Art – it’s a brilliant book on breaking through blocks and his own internal argument for veering from screenwriting to write this very book.

Here’s my advice on how to write a book in one easy lesson. Suspect you can do it (isn’t that a nice low jump?) and set aside time each day to write – a page, a paragraph, a sentence – each day, on the schedule…a step that advances the work.

Don’t talk amongst yourself. You already know how that turns out. Just have the courage to sit down.  If you need some coaching around sitting down, practice sitting down and then getting up and then sitting down and getting up.

My doctor told me a story about a little boy who was discovered in gym class to be an amazingly fast runner. He trained hard and was dedicated. But each time there was a track meet he’d forget his shoes.

Courage is not a concept, it’s a muscle that strengthens with use.

Just bring your shoes to the work and when the gun goes off, do your best.

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In anticipation of the productivity session taking place at our next Big Ooga meeting, I’d like to share an organizing idea from one of our experts, Schae Lewis, Professional Organizer and Co-Founder of Mission 2 Organize. Schae has some sage words on harmonizing your home office.

Tip #2: Organize Your Desk, Organize Your Mind

We’ve all heard the expression, “A cluttered desk is the sign of a cluttered mind”. Seems true enough. A tidy, organized desktop makes way for positive work flow and creative ideas. A jumbled desktop gives rise to confusion and that overwhelming feeling of not being able to find what you need, when you need it.

Yet, exactly where does one start to declutter a desk? Lets begin with the beacon of disorganization, the skyscraper-sized stack of papers that’s probably teetering on the edge of the desk right now. No matter how hard we try to control it, paperwork seems to hurl itself at our workspace from all directions and then multiply in the night like rabbits. According to Schae Lewis, there is a way to corral that clutter with style.

First step in paperwork organization is creating a colorful file system that’s easy to use and understand. To do this, you will need colored file folders and colored hanging folders with tabs.

Next, tackle the mountain of paperwork on your desk and start separating it into like-minded piles. For example, a pile for gas bills, a pile for cell phone bills, etc. Congratulations! You’ve just created a bunch of piles that all belong in a category called ‘BILLS’. Now, pick a color for that category. Let’s say RED. Put each pile into a RED file folder and label the contents of that RED file – i.e. GAS BILL folder, CELL PHONE BILL folder, etc.

Finally, gather all those RED folders up and put them in a big, RED hanging file that is labeled with the category BILLS. To your delight, whenever you look at your file system, you’ll know that anything colored RED is a BILL and all BILLS belong inside a file within the RED category.

Follow this system and keep going until your paperwork pile is gone. Keep in mind, each file you create brings you further away from chaos and closer to calm.

To hear more Top Habits of Highly Productive Entrepreneurs, join us at the next Big Ooga meeting on Nov. 13th.

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As we amp up to Highly Productive Day at the next Big Ooga meeting, I’ve asked our experts to supply me with some important productivity and organizing tips we can put into immediate use.

To get our organizational energy flowing, let’s start off with a time management tip from Lynn Meyer O’Dowd, CPO®.

Tip #1: Choose what is important and spend your time on important work.

When it comes to employing time management strategies, highly productive people make choices. When they say “yes” to one action, they say “no” to another. When they choose to spend their time on important things, they understand they are choosing not to spend time on unimportant things. This action propels productive people forward so they are always reaching their goals.

Think about where you spend your time. Not just the large, sweeping chunks of it, but the moment-to-moment pieces as well. Your body of work is a composite of where you decide to spend your time. Your body itself, and the quality of your life, is also a composite of choices.

Personally, I like spending time in a zone called refreshing, meandering and imagining. These are some of my decided actions because I consider them important to creating. When I’m in the zone of not being able to focus on my important work, yet still not able to give myself permission to meander, I’m caught in the nothingness of choice. It’s the old, “I can’t do this and won’t let myself do that” trap of time management run amuck.

When making decisions, avoid the pitfall of making a “non-choice”. Either we go HERE or we go THERE. Standing still, excessively waiting for things to percolate, is making no choice at all – which is actually a choice. By not deciding this or that, inadvertently an option has been selected to just hang out in the same place where you are.

Today, consider every action you take and ask yourself, “Is this important to my bigger picture? Does it contribute to, or move me toward, my goals? Or is this action frittering away my time, energy, money, relationships or priorities? Am I moving forward or detracting from what I really want?”

If you can’t do what’s important, do what’s going to enable you to do what’s important. Make a conscious distinction. Your world will be a more productive and successful place.

To hear more Top Habits of Highly Productive Entrepreneurs, join us at the next Big Ooga meeting on Nov. 13th. For more information and registration, go to http://tinyurl.com/crahy3f

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It’s true. I’ve been conspiring with Lennie Rose. To build up to the event on October 2nd, we’re posting top 10 lists on each others blogs, one tip per day. You’ll find my tips below and you can see Lennie’s content strategy tips on the Orbit blog.

So check back daily and you’ll see this list grow. Feel free to leave a comment and say hello, and hopefully, I’ll see a few of you at the Catalyst Ranch at the next Big Ooga!

1. Know who you’re talking to…

Web marketing is all about empathy. The more you can put yourself in the shoes of your audience, the more successful you’ll be. What questions do they have? What gets them excited? Worried? Where do they hang out? Who do they read? Who do they listen to?

This is the mindset of the content strategist: What questions does my audience need to have answered before they buy? Where are they asking these questions? How can I get there and provide the answers first?

2. Share with people who care…

Here’s a quick way to get your content in front of people who are interested: Visit FilterTweeps.com and find people who have the topic in the bio. If the post is called “How Wedding Planners Can Use Pinterest,” search for people who have “wedding” and “pinterest” in their Twitter bios (hint: there are 37). Pick a few with big followings and mention them when you Tweet the link!

3. Be Brief

Edit it down! Don’t use ten words if you can say it in six. Your reader is busy. Honor their time by being concise. Use short sentences. Short paragraphs. Even sentence fragments.

4. Internal links

Never miss a chance to link from one piece of content to another. Link from the blog post to the whitepaper, and from the whitepaper to the contact form. This is good for converting visitors into leads.

Also, whenever you write something, go back and look at older posts and find opportunities to link to the new post. The link itself should include descriptive text. For example, ”How to make a sitemap” is a better link than ”click here.” This indicates relevance and is good for SEO.

5. Get together…

According to the 2012 B2B Content Marketing Survey, live events are considered the most effective content marketing tactic. Remember, speaking is content too! So find a venue and invite your audience to network and learn from the experts (that’s you). When you meet people in person, you can build a relationship stronger than all those social media connections put together.

6. Take risks…

Try something new. Experiment with different tone, topics, tactics or frequency. What’s the worst than can happen?

…and every now and then, take a stand. Come out strong for (or against) something. It’s good show your readers what’s important to you. You can be sure than when you write an opinion that’s important to you, it will be in an authentic voice.

7. Set it and forget it…

Find every opportunity to put something on auto-pilot. Schedule holiday tweets a year in advance. Use Paper.li to auto-curate a weekly or daily paper. Set up a series auto-response emails when people subscribe to your newsletter or fill out your contact form.

8. Give people a reason to sign-up

If you’re newsletter sign-up box doesn’t tell people exactly what to expect and how often they’ll get it, can you really expect people to subscribe? Your email sign-up form should appear right next to the content, be visually prominent and set good expectations.

9. Post with pictures…

If your post goes live without a picture in it, it won’t stand out when you share it on Facebook, Google+ or LinkedIn. If at all possible, create a diagram or chart. Use a stock photo if necessary. A great picture is interesting all on it’s own. Not sure where to find a photo? Try using the camera in your pocket!

10. Collaborate!

Find someone you like and come up with a writing project together. Take on a bigger content project and split it up the tasks. Combine your client lists and try a survey. Combine your contacts and hold an event. Or, post Top-10 lists on each others blogs and share with each others networks. Sounds like fun, doesn’t it?

Join us tonight at Big Ooga!

We’ll be turning attendees into kick ass content marketers, showing how to turn key messages into client magnets. Learn the skinny on how content strategy works with search marketing and social media.

Andy will be asking for a few volunteers to create an on-the-spot strategy for your company. If you’d like to be chosen, come prepared to answer this: “What questions does my target audience ask about my product or service?

The post Top 10 Content Strategy Tips From Andy Crestodina appeared first on Big Ooga.

I want to tell you a story about my client, John. His single goal is to get more clients. The only reason he’s marketing, the single reason he has a website and the one reason he’s on social media is to distill it down to ONE thing. To get more business and serve more companies.

My challenge was to help John find the most direct route.

So I called J.D. Gershbein, one of the world’s leading LinkedIn experts to discover what LinkedIn could do for John.

After our private phone consultation I learned that LinkedIn is THE place to be if you’re a professional. If you know what you’re doing on LinkedIn you can find your exact right new client and close the business, meet valuable people and bring the virtual experience into real life.

If you know what you’re doing with your profile and how to work the site, you can attract the right new business to you.

The session was so illuminating and the directions were so clear that I said to J.D., “This is way better than any seminar or class, far superior to any canned product. This walk-through agenda with Q. & A. made it possible to gain your expertise.  We should share this. We should offer this to people in this way so they can learn how-to use LinkedIn too.”

Think about it – how many times do you have the opportunity to speak to a leader in their field and have them personally train you? (and live to afford it?)

So we are offering a new and exclusive LinkedIn Mastery 101 phone-in class that’s every bit as good as the $1000 training J.D. delivers to major corporations, C-suite execs and their teams but without the sticker shock.

The difference is, this is a LIVE phone-in session that you can do from the comfort of your desk. You’ll have the ability to ask as we go, to learn at your own pace..to really get the information.

The Date is Wednesday, August 22 either morning 10am-12 noon or 7pm-9pm evening.

If you would like to be part of this exclusive session and really learn a next level of mastery on LinkedIn, ACT FAST.

 
We are limiting classes to 5 participants per session so we can give you our full attention.

 
The Date is August 22, 10-12am or 7-9pm

 
There are only a few spots left.

 
To sign-up click here:  http://tinyurl.com/8c2shew

Please feel free to call with any questions! 773-549-4815

Ooga On!

 
LR

The post If You Want More Clients Read John’s Story appeared first on Big Ooga.

The Y-12 National Security Complex in Tenn. shut down their activities for a day and went on a “security stand down” for the first time since 9/11.

Now if three old people can hack into a Nuke plant and pull off mission impossible, is there any better way to illustrate how a driving purpose can give you the super powers necessary to accomplish outstanding things?

The secret sauce to their success, according to today’s WSJ (Wall Street Journal) was good planning.

To recap the three main elements for a successful mission:

A Driving Purpose

An Excellent Plan

The Courage to Execute In The Face of Enormous Odds

Doesn’t that sound a lot like being an entrepreneur? I thought so too.

Post script: The three are in jail and the world is safe, but I just found the story so inspiring..except for the obvious kinks.

The post 83 Year-Old Nun & Two Old People Hack a Nuclear Complex appeared first on Big Ooga.

Changing your tagline is a relatively easy way to refresh your brand and if you haven’t revisited your own in a while, it’s worth evaluating.

Ask yourself…

Does my tagline pack a punch or is it a boring description of what I do? (Leveraging global dynamics)

Does my tagline say anything emotional or does it use nebulous words like: comprehensive?

Does my tagline have attitude? (American by birth Rebel by choice)

Does my tagline set me apart because it’s unforgettable? (Just do it!)

Does my tagline speak to how my customers feel, who they are or what they care about? (The Real Thing – Oh I get it! I’m the real thing and so is my coke. We’re all cool together.)

Is there something catchy about my tagline that causes people to rethink my brand? ( The future of awesome)

A great resource for understanding taglines and what they should do for you is at the Tagline Guru. http://www.taglineguru.com/nuts_and_bolts.html

It’s also fun to review some of the great taglines. http://www.tripwiremagazine.com/2011/01/50-examples-of-catchy-and-creative-slogans.html 

This little change can give you a whole new insight into your own company.  It can guide you into a new brand positioning that is more customer centric, more genuine, less stuffy and more sticky.  By invigorating your tagline you can re-frame your focus and that’s a lot less work-intensive that a complete overhaul.

If you’re not feeling like a tagline genius, we’re happy to do it for you.

http://www.bigooga.com/creativeservices/

Lennie@BigOoga.com or call 773-549-4815

The post A New Tagline is Refreshing – Creating Taglines That Stick appeared first on Big Ooga.

Hurting someone is permanent.

Yes, we’re in business to do the very best job we can and yes, success hinges on those accomplishments. But accomplishments are cumulative and in this instance there is an opportunity for a re-do.

But there is no chance for a re-do once you diss somebody’s spirit.  That little thoughtless act may be a wound that lasts a lifetime. And are you really THAT person who would inflict it?

I have a couple suggestions for honing your people skills when the work delivered is faulty and the project is in motion.

1. Think before you send your email. That doesn’t mean you drop your standards but it does mean you prioritize the people doing the work so they are inspired to do it better.

2. Check in during the waiting period. You can guide the work as it evolves. Some people like this approach, others don’t. Ask them so you know the difference.

3. Pick up the phone. Sometimes clear direction is not clear in an email.

4. Be the collaborator. That changes everything even if you are the boss.

5. When in doubt, take the high road. Not the high horse.

Have you responded in a way that you regret? And if so, how would you have done it differently with your do-over?

The post Immediate Response – Lasting Affect – This Entrepreneur’s Life appeared first on Big Ooga.

“No one will listen,” he said.

“Publish them anyway.” I said.

“Why? When no one will care?”

Then I told him the story of Truth in Accounting-  that I had met a woman years ago who told me she was going to uncover the truth in state and federal budgets, one state and one line item at a time until she knew the whole, unvarnished truth.

At the time I thought this woman was mad. After all this wasn’t the movie DAVE and then I thought “no one will listen.. to her in particular” even if she does – no chance in hell, manage to get it right.

She didn’t seem to notice the look on my face, nor did she notice the look on anyone else’s face who she told of this.  She had just decided with absolute clarity to do this thing, line by line, state by state, item by item. It was not her dream.  It was merely what she had to do and went about doing it.

And she did get it right, astronomically, stratospherically right.

Now people from all across the country from individuals to major publications are listening and taking note.  Truth in Accounting has become the Institute for Truth in Accounting and it is a beacon of insight for all to learn and know.

There is a piece of an adage that says, sing like no one is listening, dance like no one is watching, love like you’ve never been hurt, and to this I’d like to add, do your thing like no one is judging – because in the end no one can judge what hasn’t been done..and what hasn’t been done might just be what you are supposed to be doing.

http://www.truthinaccounting.org/

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