We had a blast during our first "Lunch On Us". It is now time for Round 2. Here is a choice cut from our visit to the Opera Bistro with Tanya Whitaker Garnett of Atlantic Med Equip Supplies and Elaine Shannon of Take Charge! Get Rid of What's Holding You Back:

We are looking forward to sharing another great lunch with two other business folks. Lunch is on us, of course.

Interested in joining us? Leave a comment below and add what you would like to discuss (first-come, first-serve;). The 2nd lunch will be at the Side Door Cafe in Rothesay on Friday August 13th at 12:30.

Side Door Cafe & Patio Menu

Photo Credit: Brandon C Warren

Going to try and get back into sharing more sites/blog post out there that have really had an impact on how I do things daily.  Please feel free to share sites you found that might be helpful.

Seesmic Web - Seesmic Web now eases the management of all your social feeds, recently adding Facebook and LinkedIn accounts, all in one browser tab! I am using this more and more these days.

jmailer - Owned locally by Jacques Desjardins.  jmailer's mission is to help your business reconnect with your customers via Email Marketing.  Check it out.  We are!

Ask Sunday - We have been using the 24/7 Personal Assistant Service and lets just say we are way smarter and faster then we have ever been before. :-)

begr8ful - Well I have been using this site for about a month now and I have to give my bro props.  It makes you think about the little things we should be grateful for in our life.  I get my nice, friendly email reminder to begr8ful every morning.

You like?  Any others?

Rob has entertained around the world including Europe, Japan, Australia and New Zealand appearing on TV, radio, at festivals and as a street performer in places including London’s Covent Garden, the home of street performing.  This was his first visit to Canada.

Combining comedy, escapology and acrobatics, there is a perfect blend of laughter, danger and excitement. Improvisation, quick witted wise cracks and crowd participation create a unique atmosphere that leaves audiences both in amazement and hysterics and this highly polished show has made Rob a favourite among all ages and nationalities.

So why did Rob's performance stick out to me?  The way he did his work!  While being entertained by Rob, there were four things I learned from him that I think will help any entrepreneur.

1. Follow your passion - We have talked about this before numerous times on this blog, but Rob is another perfect example of someone following their passion.  Rob quit law to become a street performer.  Why?  Because he loves it!
2. Build your audience - At the beginning of his show you can tell Rob is slowly building his audience and he does a great job of putting himself in their shoes, while being very approachable and personable.  Like a customer visiting your website or your business, you have about a 5 second window to impress them.  So be relaxed and give them a feeling that something impressive is going to happen.  Just like Rob does.
3. Confidence - People by attract to confidence and it's the first step to building a rapport with your audience.  Set the tone and let your audience know that you can entertain and provide the goods.  
4. Trust - Do something to set the scene.  Educate and let them know what is going to happen and as your crowd builds, this will attract more people and win them over.  Just like Malcolm Gladwell suggested in The Tipping Point, when people see others doing something they feel it is ok to participate.  This will build trust within your audience.
5. Don't take yourself to serious - Have fun with what you do and have fun with the people you deal with.
6. Make them feel apart of something - Rob does this by making his performance unique and when he builds his audience, he hopes to address each individual in his audience intimately.  He does this by making the audience feel great when they join in and cheer on the finale.  Remind your audience that they are a part of something special and include them in your messaging...we, all of us, everyone, etc.
7. It's not what you do, but how you do it. - Pretty self explanatory, but so true.  Others may do what you do, but your specialty is how you deliver it.

Maybe another reason I enjoyed the show, is my brother Adrian got called on the volunteer with Rob and I know how much Adrian loves audiences.

If you are ever at a Buskers event, I recommend you definitely check out Rob Roy Collins.

                 

Click here to download:

7-things-i-learned-from-a-street-performer-ayjuunzbybdHlubnzGyl.zip (6177 KB)

Having trouble keeping your website up to date?  Feel like the content is lacking?  Well you are not the only one.  Being in the web business for the last 10 years and providing a platform that lets organizations manage and maintain their web content with no coding, we are still seeing some groups having trouble coming up with the content to make their site more appealing to their customers.

I think there are two ways to make your content work for you on the web:

1. Write your content like you talk.  Don't be afraid to show your flaws.  Imperfections are real and people respond to real.  It's ok if it's not perfect.  This is how we operate at Evolving Solutions.  You can probably tell we are not perfect. :-)
2. Hire great writers!  If you are looking to hire anyone, for any position, hire the best writers.  Great writers know how to communicate, because they are clear thinkers.  They make things easy to understand and that is what you want your website to do.

So, if the number 1 option is not for you, here are 3 websites that can help with your web content.

1. Craig Allen Agency -  Craiger (aka Craig) used to work with us here at Evolving Solutions and he has since spun out his own company directly revolved around content writing for the web.  If you are local and think you could use some great web copy, he is your man.
2. Crowdspring - Crowdspring is an awesome online resource where over 11,000 small businesses - and a few big ones - have trusted crowdSPRING with their projects.  When you post your project, you name your own price.  I have not used Crowdspring before, but I am sure it would be an amazing experience.  
3. Elance - Elance, the world's leading online talent marketplace, helps companies hire and manage professionals online to get work done and grow their businesses.  Tim Ferris of the 4 Hour Workweek speaks very highly of Elance.

So there you have it.  Stop sitting on your hands and pick one of the options above.  If you outsource, great, now you can go focus on what you do best and use your website with Big Santo :-) of course to achieve your goals. 

If you keep it real, make sure you have the proper tools in place to make it easy on you, so you can update your content quickly and not waste hours adding a new promotion.  Now you just need to make it a priority.  

Good luck and please share some of your tips and tricks.

Well it's here. 20 years later and I feel like Martin Q. Blank from the movie Grosse Pointe Blank, minus the professional assassin job and he was celebrating his 10th year reunion in the movie. 

Everyone last night looked Tony Robbins good!

Our 20 year reunion kicked off last night at Big Leagues in Cole Harbour and for me its been a success already.  Over 70 people from CHDHS showed up for the pre-pre-party at Big Leagues and it was awesome to catch up.

Looking forward to hooking up with everyone again today and chatting with people that weren't there last night or people I didn't get a chance to talk with last night.

Flashback to 1990

Number 1 Billboard Song - Because I Love You, Stevie B  How many waltz's did you have to this song?

Number 1 Movie - Home Alone

Numbe 1 TV Show - Cheers

Discussing old times is great, but it is the new memories we are making this weekend that I will remember.

Thanks to Paul LeBlanc and George Colwell for putting this together.  If there were others that helped, thank you as well.

What do you remember the most from 1990?  And what will you remember from 2010?

Today was our first "Lunch On Us" and we were lucky to have Tanya Whitaker Garnett of Atlantic Med Equip Supplies and Elaine Shannon of Take Charge!  Get Rid of What's Holding You Back.

I am currently reading Rework by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier of 37signals.  The book is about going against the "so called" norm when building your business.  The examples and writing are a breath of fresh air and it is something we have been trying to do with our business since Day 1.  We truly believe it is important to be yourself and keep things simple.  Some of the topics discussed in the book:

• Meetings are toxic
• Planning is guessing - so true :-)
• Underdo the competition
• ASAP is poison

Today I wanted to get your thoughts on the third point...Underdoing the competition.  We have been thinking about this alot, even more so then in the past.  We always believed in simplicity, but moving forward, any new products we create will be extremely simple and useful (we hope). :-)

In Rework, Jason and David refer to a product that is succeeding by underdoing the competition: the Flip.  I own a Flip and it is truly everything you would need for a camcorder and yet it is do darn simple.   We use it to film our show over at The Hockey Zen.  Here are some of the things the Flip does not do:

• No big screen
• No photo taking ability
• No tapes or discs
• No menus
• No settings
• No video light
• No viewfinder
• No special effects
• No memory card

The list goes on and on.  The reason the Flip is winning fans is because it does a few simple things really well and it is easy and fun to use.

Why is it we think we have to have more features then our competitors?  I know we are going to be stripping down things more and more.  For example, take a look at begr8ful.  All you do is type in what you are grateful for and share it if you want with your social networks.  

What do you think?  Is simple the way to go?