The Keller Blog

I had a great opportunity today to attend a “business ignitor” event hosted by Grow Utah Ventures. I have been so busy working in the trenches lately that I began to feel out of touch with the rich entrepreneur community here in Utah. The topic was “How to Approach an Angel Investor.” The perfect topic for the situation in which I currently find myself. It was so refreshing to hear from experienced panelists regarding what they looked for in applicants and to hear questions from other attendees reflect my current questions.

The panelists, Alan Hall, Brad Walters and Brad Angus were all successful entrepreneurs and investors in the Weber Davis Morgan region of Utah. I have had the paradigm that Northern Utah Entreprenuership was fertile grounds, but I was grateful and impressed by what I saw today. Although my current business exploit is a social venture and not directly applicable to much of the material covered in the conference, I did gain a lot of useful knowledge and also made some good contacts.

To anyone in Utah County, Salt Lake or Northern Utah who might be considering attending a Grow Utah Ventures event, I would highly recommend it. Thanks guys!

I have rarely, if ever expressed personal sentiments in this blog. I generally reserve those for my private journal and close family and friends. I will deviate today however, in honor of significant event that hit very close to home this past week. Amid the blur of professional and personal commitments, I have taken a moment to ponder about the lives of those who have dedicated–even consecrated–their complete faculties and resources to the service of others. Mahatma Gandhi, Mother Teresa and William Wilberforce are among those who memorialized their lives by the successes and prosperity of the millions of people who benefited from their self-less labors. This past week another great Leader and Humanitarian will add to the legacy of historical giants: Gordon B. Hinckley passed away here in Utah on January 27th, 2008. Governor John Hunstman declared all flags lowered to half mast. It has been touching to witness the somber and respectful tone demonstrated from the member and non-member community.

While thinking about his contributions to society and the members of the LDS religion, I reflected upon the magnitude of his legacy. I am truly humbled by his dedication and faith. Not only faith in his religion, but also his faith in humanity. Gordon B. Hinckley never recieved financial compensation for his more than 70 years of service. Gordon B. Hinckly acted out of duty, compassion and love for his Creator and fellow human beings. Gordon B. Hinckley will be greatly remembered for his poverty relief, educational reform for people seeking skills-training in developing countries.

For a full account of his funeral and links about his life and biography, feel free to run a search on youtube or checkout The LDS Church’s official statements regarding his passing.

A fun little service to check out while researching his impact is found at Blog Pulse. This service tracks a persons popularity or coverage by the number of blogs that refer to the individual. On January 28, Gordon B. Hinckley reached third in the world. Pretty impressive for a person who never sought personal attention or publicity.

The reflections of this past week have encouraged me to stand a little taller and work a little harder as I work to contribute to society and my personal development. Regardless of religious affiliation, President Gordon B. Hinkley’s wit and dedication deserve great respect. I hope to carry even a fraction of his awesome legacy as I work to develop my personal talents and use them to benefit mankind.

I just want to take a minute to congratulate Worldwide Book Drive and it’s faithful team of book sorters and back-brakers for donating over 100,000 books this year alone! Their contributions will certainly have an impact on generations of children in Utah, Nicaragua, Idaho and Africa for generations to come. And that’s just up to September of this year–who knows what beneficial labors wait around the corner.

In a recent conversation I had with Jaron Brown, the Regional Manager for Worldwide Book Drive, he said something that struck me as a key factor to Worldwide Book Drive’s growing success. He related a recent experience in which a retiring professor donated his entire collection of used books and curriculum before heading back to Norway. He said the retiring professor identified Worldwide Book Drive as the best place to donate books used books, because it was by far the most believable organization. It was very reassuring to hear that from an outside source. The hours of labor it takes to sort through the books and truly try to maximize the value can be a thankless task… (although the last time I helped to sort and put together a load of 5,000 books for Books for Utah Kids, my back was certain to thank me

Donations have been recieved from Nevada, Idaho and Utah. Their biggest source of donations come from school districts and libraries. So if your looking for a reliable place to donate used books or find used books to benefit a great cause be sure to check out the Worldwide Book Drive website, www.worldwidebooks.org

Over the past week I’ve spent a lot of time looking for good blogs that have search engine friendly comments enabled…

I’m proud to say that Kellerblog is a very search engine friendly blog. Complete with disabled no follow tags and an open invitation to comment on anything that you can add value to.

Enjoy!

For a long time online dating has been one of the fastest growing segments on the internet. The relationship of Large Online Dating Companies and profitability has taken a sharp turn. Although market adoption has still been growing at substantial leaps, the number of new companies entering the market has grown at a much faster rate, absorbing most of the growth for themselves. Here’s an article that tells more about it.

The concept makes me smile when I think about the little online dating company that my friend has recently purchased and is working to build it up. The website is LDS Friends… Which as you might imagine specifically targets the LDS Dating niche. It includes a craigs listing type sales page. as well as a number of other member services that lds match seekers could enjoy.

Niche dating websites are popping up all over the web. Although large corporations are trimming their fat, eventually the market will stabilize and new companies will work to the top. While now is not the best time to enter the market, it seems like a great time to be a player while things remain so mobile.

Customer service is really all about expectation management.

I remember a time I was waiting for a return flight from Atlanta Georgia, when the customer service representative announced that the flight to Salt Lake City had been delayed four hours and alternate arrangements might be necessary for many customers. The dismay of the disgruntle passangers could be heard throughout the gate terminal… About 30 minutes later, the customer representative made another announcement that proclaimed they had worked to expedite the problem and the delay would only be an hour longer. The crowd errupted in cheers. I smiled to myself as I thought how many people still missed their connecting flights but by suddenly exceeding expectations the angry mobs were appeased…

Let them know what to expect: risks, worst case scenario, and more. I’m not saying dwell on it, but mention it as a potential part of the package and if things do go wrong everyone will be more prepared to handle it. When things go smoothly, (which they most often do) your customers are even happier with the goods or services.

Online retail, brick and mortal service retail or door t0 door sales, the key to long term customer satisifaction remains: let them know what to expect. Manage that and customer service improves, employees are happier and management is happier.

Everyone knows that misspellings are an important part of search engine optimization. As a fun experiment I thought I would go ahead and make a name post. I ran a search for John Keller on Google, (really who hasn’t googled themselves at least once?) I discovered that I was certainly not the first John Keller on the web. In fact John Keller is also a professor, an ex-pat student, a news anchor an internet security consultant and more. As an internet marketer and entrepreneur, I figured it would a fun project to see if I can move that up. That is dedicate a post to myself, John Keller. Or Jon Keller. Although I did get a lot of people calling me Jonathon Keller or Jonathan Keller, I’m afraid as a blogger, manager and marketer, I’m still just John. John Keller.

Either for fun, or if starting a website for your own home-based business, here’s a few helpful tips to start your own business website and hopefully avoid some problems.

When a person first wants to start their own website. There are few costs they need to take into consideration, (these are not all in the order they might appear in your individual quest).

Domain Registration
Hosting
Graphic’s Editor
Page Editor (unless you program from code, which can get a little long after a while)
Pictures (Unless you plan on taking all of your own)
Merchant Account

Today I just want to briefly mention Graphics editor. I once purchased a full photoshop suite from an O.E.M. reseller. About 8 months later, my hard-drive crashed and I when I contacted them to get another key to unlock the software, they were no where to be found. I came to find out later that the company I purchased from got caught in a big scam and is now editing his graphics in prison.

Honestly, if you have the money and want to invest it in some good software, I would suggest you get Photoshop (at least) the other programs that come in the suite are nice as well.

If you have don’t have the money or otherwise don’t want to spend hundreds of dollars on software you may not use, I would suggest you get The GIMP. This program takes a little bit to download and install but is really a helpful little tool.

It’s a little less than super-user-friendly, but i’d imagine that you could install it less than 15 minutes… Visit Gimp.org and check it out… For people who have windows and want to skip right to installing it… Here’s the quick links.

http://gimp-win.sourceforge.net/stable.html once you get here, Install the appropriate add on, (I prefer to run XP but select the add on appropriate for you), then download and install the “GIMP FOR WINDOWS” button.

Install it, then enjoy! You’re that much closer to making the website of your dreams!

I’ve been out for a while enjoying the stresses and joys of a growing family.

It looks like there’s also some growth going on in Rupert Murdochs corporate family. It looks like Rupert has all but sealed the deal to purchase Dan Jones. There’s a great MSNBC article here.

As a small business owner and entrepreneur, one of the first questions I ask myself when I see a move this is, “Why?” Why does Mr. Murdoch really need to own the business news giant? Although the Bancroft family has long said they wouldn’t give in to Rupert’s questionable motives, a stock price 65% above posted price was helpful to change their minds. Rupert Murdoch is currently the 32nd richest man in America… but his motives could go far beyond his eg0-sized Manhattan apartment.

Rupert’s company, News Corp, has recently made significant headway in China. Home the largest and fastest growing middle class in the world, this communist-capitalist society has a very long (and censored)journalism history. Murdoch’s alleged business biases are no concern for this awakening country. As News Corp. prepares to enter this reliable financial information vacuum, a name that carries the longevity and responsibility of the Walls Street Journal would provide the perfect platform for swift and deep market penetration.

This could certainly become a lot of centralized influence in our growing society. The jury is still out on whether or not Rupert will keep things unbiased. History is a great indicator of future performance and absolute power can corrupt absolutely. But who knows, maybe this media mogul will prove us wrong once again… We’ll have to see.

The iPhone may seem like an immortal device, (check out this utube iphone spoof) but even it has its weaknesses. The New York Times has just released an article that states the iPhone has a security hole that allows remote control or hazing/fisching with fake websites. We knew it was bound to happen. It kinda reminds me of the line in Jurassic Park where Malcolm, (played by Sam Neill) says, “Nature will find a way”. But really when it comes to hacking, “People will find a way.”

The iPhone is the perfect item to hack as well. Limited supplies and relatively high-costs, (for a smartphone) mark its users as targets: Not only as die-hard Mac fans (for Steve Jobs’ next big product), but also as people with money who do a number of transactions over the internet. Intercepting or placing spyware could be very valuable to information theives. In addition to getting credit card information or typing histories, think of how great it would be to also pick up names, numbers, pictures, email addresses and more–all conveniently stored in the same location.

Identity theft has a long history. (Check out this wikipedia article.) The increased danger of hacked identity is more than a Hollywood storyline, (although The Net was a fun movie and one of Sandra Bullock’s better performances). The truth is that the advent of new technology is raising risks not only in the depths of thefts, but also in the breadth and number of people who can be affected.

For now, Apple has released information on a plug-in that can help patch the problem. Check out exploitingiphone.com for more information. But really, big brothers, (like the NSA) or little brothers (like local scam artists) can be tough to shake.

Here’s a website that offers great information on how to protect yourself from scams and hacking. Anyone who does business or shares information should be familiar with information theft and its prevention. Check out the ID Theft Center website and the FTC Identity Theft website for more information.

Really though, we can’t live our lives in fear. The main thing is: be careful what unsecured wi-fi networks you join. And if we’re going to do business and live anyhow, why not do it with an iPhone?