All posts in block out the noise

  • Building Your Ideal Life

    May 1, 2007Posted by Dave Darby

    Last week was YouTube, this week is SlideShare - a service to share presentations.  Below is the presentation format for our ‘10 Proven Techniques for Building Your Ideal Life’ that we are using for LifeMAPP’s mini-workshops.

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  • Nothing Holding Us Back

    Apr 1, 2007Posted by Dave Darby

    Yesterday was all full of emotions.  We did our first ‘Building Your Ideal Life’ seminar.  The response from those in attendance was incredible.  The attendance, however, was an eighth of our goal.  In other words, we lost money on the day.

    So we roll on, we learn, we adapt, we enjoy the compliments and the light in people eyes as they walked out with a new vocabulary, a new way to communicate what they are passionate about and, hopefully, a passion and commitment to take a few steps closer to their Ideal Life.

    We also stop to realize how much we accomplished in 8.5 short weeks since moving to Austin – somehow in there giving birth, spending a week in and out of the hospital with an intestinal infection and pulling the seminar off with 5 kids under our care.

    Now is also a time to evaluate and realize that we spent a great deal of that 8.5 weeks on marketing, networking and business operations, but not enough time in sales and more networking.  But what can you accomplish without the message, the marketing and the business operations – nothing.  They were all a necessary evil.

    But that’s ok.  We have all of the systems in place.  For 6 of those weeks, we hadn’t even nailed down the transaction side of the internet or onsite sales processing – so we couldn’t send people out to transact during that time.  But, hey, how many people were going to wait until the week before anyway?  Probably most.

    The next seminar will be much different.  For one, we’ve spent all of the upfront marketing and operational costs that we will ever need to do this year.  No more expenses on design or equipment or vehicle advertising.  No more scrambling with cash registers or other temporary solutions until our transaction system is in place.  No more directing people to a website when we can sell them tickets face to face.  No more directing people to a website that is ‘mostly functional’ or evolving.

    Now, we just fine tune.  Fine tune our message.  Fine tune the presentation to the changes I made live and on-the-fly.  Fine tune our sales strategy. 

    One big adjustment is understanding the power of what we’ve created.  Trust me, it was nerve-wracking watching those first few transactions unfold online.  Guess what?  No glitches.  People were actually conducting business with us while we were brushing our teeth or eating.  And it worked.  So no more worries there.  Whew!

    We do have questions to answer.  At least now, our entire focus can be on sales and answering these questions:

    Can radio work?  We had 0 sales from the radio, but we did have activity on the ticket giveaways which apparently kept the dj’s phone lines busy.  One lady had her office mates all dialing in and brought one of them with her.  Which music format is our best target audience?  Likely, we just need to broaden our reach across multiple radio stations.  However, the 2 week ads netted 0 sales and cost $2500 including tickets.

    Can flyering work?  We paid a team to distribute 1000 postcards in parking lots and apartments.  We had 0 sales from that for a cost of $120 in labor and $100 in postcards.  Maybe our polished postcards with multiple seminars was too much.  Perhaps we need a simple flyer on bright green paper that states “DON’T MISS – SATURDAY, SATURDAY, SATURDAY!  STOP FEELING MISERABLE.  FREE IPOD!” ;)

    Does vehicle advertising work?  According to the local FastSigns franchise manager, our back window is the coolest they’d ever done.  Note: this was said when we returned a week later for more signs and the window had long been paid for ;)   But, again 0 sales.

    What about networking and word of mouth?  Ah…that’s how I knew the radio, flyering and vehicle sales were all 0.  I knew everyone there who attended our seminar.  I didn’t know them personally, but I knew a handful and knew that they were bringing a person or 2 or even 3.

    So, we need more networking, need the word of mouth.  Wow, just like it was 200 years ago.  We can certainly handle that.  We’ve build a decent little network in 2 months.  But how do we do that in Dallas, Houston, San Diego, et al?  I guess we shall see.

    We also had interest from business partnerships – CVS, a local jeweler who offered a free pair of $600 pearl drop earrings for ‘Building Great Relationships’, and a local women’s shelter, but they could not arrange daycare in time for yesterdays seminars.

    And our radio ad account manager – who was in attendance with a friend – is inviting us to an opportunity with larger corporations like Time Warner to bring life changing seminars and messages to their largely female demographic.  She even mentioned a podcast with Julie to share her message of how we juggle it all so well to give inspiration to their listeners.

    As for the seminar itself – it’s easy in the shuffle of business operations and fiscal responsibility to lose sight of our core purpose – delivering a powerful message. Well, from the response it was – powerful.  All of my nervousness was gone in, oh, about 4 seconds after starting.  That is my element.

    Like a fish in water, speaking to groups of people is my talent and my passion.  And as for all of the planned order and timing of the presentation – I blew that to pieces when the first of four segments went over time – and I thought that, on paper, that segment might not have enough material! ;)   So, I will make some adjustments both to my delivery and to the presentation to find the middle ground of staying on point AND adapting to my audience’s needs, interests and questions.

    And hey, there were only 2 times – towards the end – where I was off point and wondering what the hell was the reason I started down that path.  One of those times, my audience reminded me ;) and the other I caught myself – so, not so bad.  If you know me, 2 sidetracks in 4 hours of talking – that’s a good day!

    So, a lot of great things have happened.  We just need to be patient, learn and adapt.  That’s life as an entrepreneur.  Adapt and make your own success or die trying.  The only thing holding us back is ourselves.

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  • Our First Radio Ads

    Mar 15, 2007Posted by Dave Darby

    Here are our first radio ads! They will air on Austin’s Majic 95.5 Soft Rock next week between 10a-midnight M-F and 10a-7pm Saturday and Sunday. (http://www.majic.com/).

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    No flash installed
    Radio Ads for LifeMAPP

     

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    The following week the DeeJays will be doing ticket giveaways and promoting our seminars.

    This was the hardest advertising choice for us to make as it is so unfamiliar to us. Statistically speaking, we were told to expect to be reaching a total audience of 48,600 – give or take 48,000. ;) So we have that going for us – which is nice!

    So, alas we shall see what radio does or doesn’t do for LifeMAPP.

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