What a great devotional. I’m several weeks in (couldn’t wait until the new year to start!) and it really does get each day started right. Each day starts with a bible verse, followed with a story that relates to the Word. Following this is a prayer to wrap up the daily devotional.

Graham is a highly respected individual and I look forward to digging into his thoughts and a piece of the word each day. The only thing holding this from 5 stars is adding more scripture to each day, and the fact that they can be quite generic. If you’re looking for help in a certain area of your life, look for a more specific devotional. Otherwise, this is a great book!

I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.” I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze.com book review bloggers program.

**UPDATE – WIN AN XBOX360!!! See below for details.**

“What can you do with this dollar?” That was the charge, in a nutshell, from Paul a few weeks ago as he wrapped up another great sermon at Genesis Church. It’s not every day you go to church and GET money, but the plates came around and everyone in the congregation received $1. The dollar symbolizes a lot of things, especially during this consumerism-plagued time of the year. Genesis Church gave us each $1 and encouraged us to give one gift of compassion this month.

After having this dollar in my wallet for a week, I decided it was time to start doing something with it. I’m going to see how far/high I can ‘trade up’ my dollar and donate the proceeds (or final item) to an organization or family in need in the greater Indianapolis area. What and who will depend a lot on where this ends up. Maybe it won’t be a house. But what if we get to a used car, or a space heater for a family in need. Winter coats for a family. A college scholarship for a worthy student who’s in a tough patch of life. Who knows where this can and might go. But let’s see what we can do.

1. $1 from Genesis Church – Traded to @jim_brown! Thanks for getting us started!
2. $160 Voucher to Jillian’s Indianapolis - Traded to @douglaskarr from @dknewmedia! Wow!
3. XBOX 360 4GB with Kinect Console – FOR YOU TO WIN!!

Are you ready to win the XBOX 360? If you’ve said to yourself “I have nothing better than that to trade”, here’s your chance to help out.

I’ve partnered with Jump For Joel to offer the XBox 360 with Kinect as a raffle prize.  It’s pretty simple. Here’s how you enter.

1) Click here to donate $10 to J4J

That’s it! For every $10 you donate, we’ll add your name to the raffle ($50 = 5 names in drawing). We’ll announce the winner on Monday, December 20th.

For updates on the raffle and Jump for Joel’s work in Africa, follow them on Twitter (@jumpforjoel).

I just wrapped up my 2010 travel back in mid-October. Using the amazing FlightMemory.com, I was able to take a look at the past two years since BlueFuego started in January 2009. All I can say is… wow.  And one number definitely caught my eye… total miles flown.  303,303. Neat.

(As a quick follow up to my Delta Rollover Miles post, it worked great. I was Platinum by March, Diamond by early summer, and this year I’m rolling over 123,000 miles to 2012 status.  So after 1 flight I’ll be Diamond through February 2013. )

2009
Flight Segments: 125
Flight Miles: 129,453
Earth Circumnavigation: 5.20x
Distance to the Moon: .542x
Hours in flight: 337h, 29m
Days in flight: 14.1 (2 weeks of 2009 in air!)
Longest Flight: LAX-SYD, 7502 mi, 15h 02m (4 times)
Average Flight: 1,036mi, 2h 42m

Total Airports: 45
Total Airlines: 11
Total Routes: 88
Total Countries: 9
Total Continents: 4

2010
Flight Segments: 109
Flight Miles: 145,484
Earth Circumnavigation: 5.84x
Distance to the Moon: .609x
Hours in flight: 363h, 30m
Days in flight: 15.1 (2 weeks of 2009 in air!)
Longest Flight: LAX-SYD, 7502 mi, 15h 02m (6 times)
Average Flight: 1,335mi, 3h 20m

Total Airports: 45
Total Airlines: 13

Total Routes: 80
Total Countries: 12
Total Continents: 4

Lifetime Travel

Flight Segments: 270 [217 domestic (80%), 53 international (20%)]
Flight Miles: 303,303
Earth Circumnavigation: 12.18x
Distance to the Moon: 1.270x
Distance to the Sun: .0033x
Hours in flight: 780h, 49m
Days in flight: 32.5
Months in flight: 1.08

Total Airports: 75
Total Airlines: 20

Total Routes: 165
Total Countries: 15
Total Continents: 5

Most northern airport: AMS, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Most southern airport: MEL, Melbourne, Australia
Most eastern airport: OOL, Gold Coast, Australia
Most western Airport: SEA, Seattle, USA

Where do you want to go next?

The key themes of this story that can be used as teaching moments are that God has a plan for us, and that we are all equal to him Set in a time of history where Richard Kelly is used to segregation, he has two choices: go to jail or join an all-white seminary. Forgoing jail, his friends turn on him and his new classmates are hesitant to accept him as well. Race is a key theme throughout, but when an unexpected friend comes alongside to help him with his goals, Richard sees the way to success and works hard for his goals.

Overall, it was a pretty slow and boring movie and i’m not sure how clear the main themes came through. I don’t think I’d recommend it to others.

*Thanks to Booksneeze.com for providing a copy of this DVD for me to review.

It’s no secret that I’m a Delta mileage fiend.  I’ll fly an extra segment here and there to accumulate the miles, I’ll fly into Dallas and drive 3 hours to Abilene rather than take American Airlines.   It’s a game to me.

This year, Delta is starting Rollover Miles.  Anything over a tier that you accumulate is “credited” to your status for the following year.  And it’s working out quite well for me.

Here are Delta’s tiers:

• Silver – 25,000 miles
• Gold – 50,000 miles
• Platinum – 75,000 miles
• Diamond – 125,000 miles (*New in 2010!*)

I reallllllllllly wanted to hit Diamond last year, and could have, but I decided to play around a little.  I stopped at 115,000 miles on Delta, leaving me 10K short of Diamond BUT 40,000 ahead of Platinum.

My current Platinum status is good through February 28, 2011.  So I’ve got many free upgrades in my future.  Rather than go to Diamond and then risk having nothing beyond ( I did 5 international trips in 2009, and don’t think I’ll do as many in the coming years), I decided to pull up short and use rollover miles to extend my elite status days.

So here’s the math: 115,158 – 75,000 = 40,158 “rollover miles” credited towards my 2010 accumulation. I’ve flown 1,632 miles this year on 3 segments, putting me at 41,790 qualification miles YTD.

After next week, I’ll have flown 10,000 miles in January.  So I’ll be Gold Status already (50K), which would cover me from March 1, 2011 – Feb 28, 2012.  Then after my international trip in February, I’ll accumulate 25,000 miles and be to Platinum status by the middle of the month, giving me my current Platinum status through Feb 28, 2012.

So to reach Diamond Status (which begins as soon as you hit the tier and carries through Feb 28, 2012), I’ll just need to fly 50K more miles in 2010.  No problem.

So there are 2 scenarios:

1. Fly 10,000 extra miles in 2009, get to 125,000 and have Diamond status until Feb 2011. Start from 0 miles and hopefully fly 75,000 miles to get Platinum through Feb 2012.
2. Stop at 115K, take the rollover miles, use it as a bounce to headstart for 2010. Potentially have Diamond starting by June 2010 and through Feb 2012.  Use Rollover miles over 125K towards 2013.

I chose #2.

I read a great Seth Godin book called The Dip over my holiday break. It’s a very short book, but was full of great information about startups/work/life/business in general. Here are my key takeaways, I hope you find some inspiration in here!

- If you’re not going to put in the effort to be my best possible choice, why bother?

- People settle. They settle for less than they are capable of. Organizations settle too.

- Are you hoping to become a success because you’re the only one being considered?

- A woodpecker can tap twenty times on a thousand trees and get nowhere, but stay busy. Or he can tap twenty-thousand times on one tree and get dinner!

- Before you enter a new market, consider what would happen if you managed to get through the Dip and win in the market you’re already in.

- Being better than 98% of the competition used to be fine. In the world of Google, though, it’s useless. It’s useless because all of your competition is one click away, whatever it is that you do. The only position you can count on now is best in the world.

Seven Reasons you might fail to become the best in the world
1) You run out of time (and quit).
2) You run out of money (and quit).
3) You get scared (and quit).
4) You’re not serious about it (and quit).
5) You lose interest or enthusiasm or settle for being mediocre (and quit).
6) You focus on the short term instead of the long (and quit when the short term gets too hard).
7) You pick the wrong thing at which to be the best in the word (because you don’t have the talent).

- Don’t play the game if you realize you can’t be the best in the world.

- The next time you catch yourself being average when you feel like quitting, realize that you have only two good choices: Quit or be exceptional. Average is for losers.

- Isn’t your time and your effort and your career and your reputation too valuable to squander on just being average?

- The typical salesperson gives up after the fifth contact with a prospect. Studies report that 80% of these customers buy on the seventh attempt to close the sale.

- Selling is about a transference of emotion, not a presentation of facts. If it were just a presentation of facts, then a PDF flyer or a website would be sufficient to make the phone ring.

- If you’re not going to get to #1, you might as well quit now.

- One person or organization will behave differently than a market of people will One person has a particular agenda and a single worldview. One person will make up his mind and if you’re going to succeed, you’ll have to change it.

- If you’re trying to influence a market, though, the rules are different. Sure, some of the people in a market have considered you (and even rejected you). But most of the people in the market have never even heard of you. The market doesn’t have just one mind. Different people in the market are seeking different things.

- Influencing one person is like scaling a wall. If you get over the wall in the first few tries, you’re in. If you don’t, often you’ll find the wall gets higher with each attempt. Influencing a market, on the other hand, is more of a hill than a wall. You can make progress, one step at a time, and as you get higher it actually gets EASIER. People in the market talk to each other. They are influenced by each other. So every step of progress you make actually gets amplified.

- You and your organization have the power to change everything. To create remarkable products and services. To over deliver. To be the best in the world. How dare you squander that resource by spreading it too thin. How dare you settle for mediocre just because you’re too busy coping with too many things on your agenda, racing against the clock to get it all done.

- It’s almost impossible to overinvest in becoming the market leader.

Sometimes in life, you just need to take a day for yourself.

While doing some research, I’ve noticed a similar trend.  There are companies who have a strong social web presence, and people talk about them.  But how did they build this presence? How did they get their fans/followers/friends?

Free stuff.

With the economics of free has come a sense of entitlement.  Not only that every company should have a social web presence and be prepared to drop everything at the moment the customer needs assistance, but that the company should also be prepared to compensate this person with free stuff.   Apologies don’t go as far as they used to; upgrades and free things do.

And 99% of the time, it works. The person’s mind is totally changed about the brand and experience, and they become a raving fan.  ” I had the worst experience ever with this hotel room, but they gave me a free night so now they are AWESOME!”  You see it all the time.

How does this affect the way we do business? Our bottom line? Our company culture? Our customers who aren’t using Twitter to complain?

I posted the thought on Twitter this morning that I was trying to think of a business that everyone raves about on the social web that didn’t get there by giving out free stuff or massive discounts. A few quickly rose to the top, Zappos and Southwest. They are known for their customer service more than giving things away for free (we all do the occasional promotions though). But after that…. pretty much silence.  So I posted a follow up thought that essentially said:

Two ways to create Ravings Fans = 1) Provide excellent customer service OR 2) Give away free stuff?

Through the recent month, I’ve heard of many people talk about companies and vendors who are horrible at customer service, but people rave about them because they’re getting free stuff. Free things might come in the form of actual free items, fancy dinners, spotlight in a blog post, actual free items, and more. There are many ways to use free items to make someone feel better about themselves and about your company.

Is that enough to win people over? And more importantly, is it sustainable? Why do you want people to talk about you and your company? Because you gave them freebies, or because you provided excellent customer service, an amazing product, and untouchable results ?

One thing holds true: Zappos and Southwest rise to the top of many minds.  But who remembers #SquareSpace? Who’s gone back to their site since the free iPhone promotion on Twitter?

Don’t get me wrong. Raving fans are important to a business, even if they are not paying customers.  But as Chris Brogan recently mentioned, “I’m in the business of cashing checks.” Build your business on customer service and trust, not on 50% off coupons and free tacos on Tuesday. Have you ever heard of anyone who has waited to buy a new Macbook because there wasn’t a 25% off coupon? We can’t all be Apple, but it sure is aspirational.

Use occasional promotions to engage people and thank them for being your fan, but once they’re in the door or on the phone with you, let the relationship and service lead the way. That way, when they’re hungry, they’re coming back to your restaurant without the coupon.  Continue to build your personal army of brand soldiers, but don’t forget about the classic 80/20 rule and those 20% of customers who are putting 80% of the food on your table. Give them the customer service they deserve.

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It’s been one year since Gary Vaynerchuk posted ‘You can have both…Jobs.” at garyvaynerchuk.com.  It’s also been exactly one year today since I chose January 31st, 2009 as my last day at my previous employer.

The post is widely known as the ‘Hustle 2.0′ post in the web world, and is often referred to around in BlueFuego meetings. If you haven’t seen the video before, or can’t get enough of it (I’ve seen it at least 20 times), take 2 minutes and watch. Otherwise, skip forward for some of my thoughts, 1 year later.

Hustle 2.0. When I heard this for the first time, it made perfect sense. A week prior, I had lunch with Kyle Lacy, who encouraged me to “just pick a date and go for it.” What was it? I had no clue at that moment. With several offers from other universities and marketing agencies on the table, I had no clue where I wanted to go next. I knew what my ‘hedgehog’ was, and one thing wouldn’t go away: the entrepreneurial fire inside of me. As much as I tried to shake the thought of working for myself, I couldn’t back out of it.

That afternoon, I got an email from Joe, who is now my business partner. He said “you’ve gotta see this video.” But I had. And I knew. The business we’d been loosely talking about for the past 4 months was about to get a lot more attention. So we started, Hustle 2.0. Work a full day, spend time with the family from 6-10pm, and then get to work again. And just like Gary said in the video, we lived on a few hours of sleep for 5 months. In that 5 months we solidified what we wanted to do and went for it. And when I walked away from that job on January 30th (a day early.. ) to do what I wanted and loved, and then when we started cashing checks, I knew that all of the hard work was worth it.

BIG THANKS to Gary V and for his hustle and inspiring others to hustle as well. It’s hard to believe that within the past year Joe and I took an idea and turned it into BlueFuego, and are now truly utilizing our skills and passion for clients around the globe. This video dropped at the exact moment I needed it. I hope that wherever you are in your entrepreneurial hustle this video can inspire you to take the next step.

And by all means, don’t forget to get out there and buy CRUSH IT!! The book is going to be like this video x’s 50 for you. Go over to http://www.crushitbook.com, check out the sample chapter, and buy multiple copies today!!

Thanks for stopping by Bradjward.me!  I can’t believe I started another blog, but I wanted a place on the web to write more about business and entrepreneurship, and my other blogs aren’t geared for that niche. If you’re not following me on Twitter, click over to @bradjward and say hi. To see where else I’m blogging, go here.

Quick bio: I’m 25. I live in Indianapolis.  I left my job in January to do what I love, and now I’m the Chief Explosion Officer at BlueFuego, Inc. We help colleges and universities use the web to meet marketing and recruitment goals.  Business is going great. I have an amazing wife and a very cool Beagle.  I’m on pace to fly 125,000 miles this year.  When I’m not working, I enjoy vacationing with my family, reading, spending time with friends, and thinking about what’s next. I live in the future, rarely in the past. I speak at about 20 events around the globe each year on a wide variety of topics in higher ed and web marketing.  And most of all, I love meeting new people.  If you’re ever in the area or at the same conference, I fully expect to meet you.

Thanks for reading! Subscribe here and comment often.

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