L.A. Walk-About

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I spent the weekend in L.A. working to develop relationships with USC, UCLA and a number of non-academic book related publishers and programs. Although I’ve been to L.A. a number of times, this is the first time that I had the chance to spend time with the L.A. local scene.

I have a close friend who took me to see a number of the best movie-star hot spots. It was my first time acting as a paparazzi, and although we didn’t really see many stars, it was still a fun experience.

While eating a burger at a popular L.A. pub, I had a chance to talk with some of the local residents. The gentleman I spoke with told me about his experience living in a city that was so big with so many options and cultures that he felt he lost himself for the first 5 years of living there. “Ironically,” he said, “after going through all of the motions and learning and developing, I found myself right back where I was before. The same person, only more developed, stronger–wiser.”

Although I’ve never spent enough time in the City of Angels to have my own L.A. Walk-About, there’s something to what he said that seems to apply to a lot of different parts of life. In business, in relationships–especially in entrepreneurship. We work hard to grow and ultimately sell the business. We end up in a similar position to where we started, but our experiences and understanding is so much more developed than when we first started.

The Road Home… A Service Project Worth Remembering

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Tuesday, May 27. Salt Lake City, Utah. Business casual and shiny cars drive cautiously to the shelter. The sign says, “Honk for Donations.” In succession the cars drive through the ominous gate.

I’ve grown up in Salt Lake. But this area of town is unfamiliar. The building and stretch of faces on Rio Grande road almost ask to be forgotten.

We step out of our cars and into the Road Home Homeless Shelter Docking area. It is a small area with a single wide ramp leading to the back of shelter. No pictures are allowed inside. No tours. We look awkward in our business casual dress shoes.

In only a few minutes we unloaded our supplies and we were done.

No fan fare. No smothering thank yous. The books, towels and blankets were delivered.

We walked around the shelter to take some final mental pictures before leaving. The people lined up outside the door looked suspiciously at the passing dockers and collard shirts.

A few moments of introspection. We get back in our cars and drive off to eat and “talk business.”

Not the normal day of work, but certainly a worthwhile one.

The fact is, we were delivering materials as part of a challenge for young entrepreneurs to give back to the community.

Getting the materials was easy. Who’s going to say “no” to sharing their extra substance with the homeless? Some of us went door to door. Some of us asked our friends and neighbors.

We were all able to contribute.

Few people will say no. But how many remember?

How often have I remembered?

The Road Home is Non-Profit based in Salt Lake City, dedicated to providing materials and support for the homeless. Visit their website to learn more about you can help utah’s homeless.

It’s All About The Triple Bottom Line

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I have spent the last three years of my life working in the growing segment of businesses known as triple-bottom-line companies or social ventures. According to the Skoll Foundation (http://www.skollfoundation.org –a foundation based on the principles that strategic investments can lead to lasting social change) a social entrepreneur is: society’s change agent, a pioneer of innovations that benefit humanity.

Although this is a relatively new movement, all around us we see the growing momentum of companies identifying and implementing aspects of social responsibility into their models. This is as much a financial decision as anything else! Dollars spent on social programs can often make more marketing or operational sense than traditional advertising or waste management methods. In these circumstances everybody wins. As society continues to demand more responsibility it continues to pay for companies to develop and demonstrate a competent social strategy.

There is a wealth of knowledge on the subject, best summarized and directed, (In my personal opinion) on Wikipedia.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_entrepreneurship and the internal and external links provide a very good summary. Applying these principles in a business certainly does not have to be a gigantic overhaul, or a substantial change in the business model. Sometimes it’s as simple as a personal change in perspective. Implementing these principles into a business model however, can create lasting strategic partnerships and goodwill that provide a legacy and public image much bigger and better than money alone can provide.

Business Ignitor for Grow Utah Ventures– A great event.

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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!

What Can You Take? Reflections of the life of Gordon B. Hinckley

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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.

Utah Book Donation and Worldwide Book Drive

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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

Do Follow Links from Kellerblog

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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!

Online Dating Rapid Penetration Dilluting the Market

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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.

Expectation Management.

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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 passengers 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 erupted 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 to door sales, the key to long term customer satisfaction remains: let them know what to expect. Manage that and customer service improves, employees are happier and management is happier.

John Keller Jon Keller Keller Blog

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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.