"Small opportunities are often the beginning of great enterprises." – Demosthenes
Motivational Pix – Churchill
"Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm." – Winston Churchill
Magic Numbers
Today's post is brought to you by the magic numbers 3 and 1.
The number three is given importance in a number of places. In Christianity's Holy Trinity, for instance. The Three Jewels of Buddhism. 3 is a lucky number in China, and in Vietnam it is considered unlucky to take a picture with exactly three people in it. Three on a match? Don't do it! But. . . third time's a charm.
We have 3 strikes in baseball, a 3-point shot in basketball, the three-success hat trick in hockey. And when a team wins a championship three times in a row, it's a threepeat.
Considering The Last Thing
We have a client who runs a tiny, local restaurant review site. As you may know, we advise our clients that advertising – paying to put yourself in front of others – should be the last thing they consider when putting together their marketing plans. Not because "it's a rip-off" or some other negative reason, but because there are a ton – hell, two tons of things you can do for free or at minimal cost that will put you in front of your audience before finding a medium and paying them for some space.
But in examining or client's options, we had to agree that is was time to begin to advertise. We wanted to put their web site in front of people in their area who were looking for "restaurant reviews" right now, but we didn't want it to cost an arm and a leg. This is a tiny site, and is still not breaking even. So we went with Google AdWords, and set a daily budget that would barely get you a cup of hot stuff at your favorite coffee house.
Motivational Pix – Mandella
"It always seems impossible until it's done." – Nelson Mandella
Motivational Pix – UPDATE
We've now completed 23 inspirational quotes "mini posters" which will be posted every Monday (except Labor Day, September 1st) at 10 AM Eastern time. We hope you find them both visually interesting and mentally stimulating. Please feel free to share them, even print them out as pictures and tack them on your wall for inspiration.
We're working on even more of them, and may release the whole pack in one ZIP file at some point. We encourage you to post any comments you may have. Thanks for keeping up with them, and with Agile'.
Motivational Pix
We currently have the next 9 weeks of motivational quote pix in the bag. We'll be putting more of them together soon. We've got enough to last at least through the summer.
Watch for the newest pic with quote to be posted at 10 AM Eastern every Monday. We hope you find them motivational and inspirational, and that they help you on your road to success!
Motivational Pix – MacArthur 02
"There is no security on this earth; only opportunity." – Douglas MacArthur
I’m Here To Kick Your Butt
I had someone contact me recently who wanted some help. He wanted to figure out how get get from where his company was at to "the next level, dollar-wise."
"Okay. I need to know what your current dollar volume is by year and by month, your current marketing and sales goals, and where you want your sales to be on a yearly level."
"That information is proprietary. I don't know if I can give that to you."
I get it. We've been conditioned that money is what we're all after, but to talk about it is a dirty thing, like sex or food. Or maybe. . .
"You don't know, do you? I mean, what your company's income is. So you don't know where you want it to be. You just know you want it higher."
"I'm sure I've got the figures some where. How 'bout I call you back when I find them?" You don't have to guess – he hasn't called me back.
If someone called you and asked for directions, what would you want to know? First question – where are you now? Second question – where do you want to go?
