Keeping track of each of the 20,200 or so people who follow me on Twitter would be a 24/7 job if I had a couple of assistants. I don’t, so, naturally, the ones who stand out tend to get the most attention.

Drew Williams up in Toronto stands out.

Maybe it’s his “avatar”. It looks like this:

I vaguely wondered what it represented and I didn’t find out until just recently. It’s his Beast.

I found out the usual way – accidentally.

One day, I was ranting about problems with my so-far-unwritten new book. My agent had retired and everyone at my last publishing company was brand new. Help!

Drew, whose Twitter bio says “Happy to help you any way I can”, actually did help. He and his writing partner, Jonathan Verney, are nursing their new book through the publishing process. He told me they were working with McGraw-Hill; after some emailing back and forth, he sent me his editor’s name.

How nice is that?

I asked him about his book and he sent me a Preview, and I’m looking forward to getting a real copy when it comes out in July. The title is Feed the Start-Up Beast. A 7-Step Guide to Big Hairy Outrageous Sales Growth.

Drew and Jonathan write about patience, persistence and a Plan, all of which entrepreneurs (like me) need. Even better, though, is that the book provides a roadmap to success.

Feed the Beast isn’t theory. It’s real business through and through. But this is about how the Social Media world, especially Twitter, is a great place to meet new friends, like Drew Williams. And if you’re not involved yet, on a personal level, you probably should consider it.

Then, last weekend riffling through the papers on my desk, I came across a bland and eminently ignorable note from an entity named Green Tree Lending. The letter informed me that Green Tree now owned my mortgage. I thought I had never heard of Green Tree, but apparently I had.

Looking around for letters from Bank of America I found one that had slipped my mind completely. It mentioned that BoA was dumping me off to Green Tree. The letter was just one of an endless stream of impact-free communications Americans get these days. My first takeaway from all this is DO NOT GIVE SHORT SHRIFT TO MESSAGES FROM ORGANIZATIONS THAT CAN MESS UP YOUR LIFE.

I thought I knew who and what BoA was but I was wrong. I went online to see who and what Green Tree is. If you have a strong stomach, check them out yourself. You’ll find lots of miserable stories like this: WorldFreeNews.com

I’m not as horrified by Green Tree as I know I eventually will be. For now, I’m more horrified by Bank of America. There is something seriously wrong in the bowels of that formerly reliable institution. I have no idea what it is but I suspect it goes back to the disastrous government-driven policy of issuing mortgages to people who couldn’t possibly have paid for them and the blood-sniffing sharks that took advantage of it.

Or maybe I’m missing something. If you know what it might be, I’d appreciate reading about it in your comment below.

BTW I wonder why banks (like BoA) spend all kinds of money on Branding, and then let it fall apart. I wrote a piece about Brand on my Forbes column (Marketing Matters More Than Ever): Why Brand Matters and there I said, “In one sense, perhaps the most important sense, a brand is a promise.”

So what happened to the Bank of America’s promise to me?

This is an odd post to be put up on my blog.

As many of you know, I also have a column on Forbes: Marketing Matters More Than Ever

There I write about how to make your advertising memorable, and why you should consider marketing to a niche (among dozens of other ideas).

Every once in a while I wonder about the value of these blogs. Do they really help generate business for my agency? I was discussing that very thought on The Jim Blasingame Radio Show. Here is the “tape” of that show (for your listening pleasure): To Blog or Not To Blog

Share your thoughts on blogging and please comment below.

The next time I drove by, I looked for a store name. Lo and behold, there it was in dropout white type (on a gray background), small and off in a corner.

Why would anyone spend a ton of money on a billboard people can’t read?

And what ROI did they expect?

The ad looked okay, attractive even, but what good does that do when nobody knows who the advertiser is?

Lately, I’ve been paying more and more attention to this kind of thing- unaccountable marketing is a good way to describe it. Glamour magazine, has a lot of ads with no website, no phone number, no offer, and certainly no way to track results. Exposure is great, but how does anyone know if the investment was worthwhile? If you pulled the ad and saved the money, would it make a difference in sales?

Marketing should be about tracking results.

Unless the advertiser is extremely well known and has a gigantic budget, unaccountable marketing should not even exist. If you can’t track the results of your ad, then you should think twice before launching it.

Clients come to our agency, because they know that we are able to deliver results. It may take several tests of a marketing program before it becomes profitable, but in the end the client knows where their dollars have gone and their ROI.

Just like you keep your employees accountable; be sure to keep your marketing accountable, too.

Here are two things to remember about keeping your marketing “accountable”:

1. Try to track results. This can be so simple: It starts by engaging prospects then moving them to a landing page (or micro site). A specific phone number, email address, or QR code. That way you at least get some idea where your customers come from.

1. Creative is not everything. Yes, it’s great to have a cool looking ad, but it’s not the most important thing. If your customer can’t read it, it’s a wasted effort. Remember the 40-40-20 rule, a direct marketing principle that certainly applies here. Success is 40% offer, 40% list (or medium), and 20% is due to the creative. Our creative director tells me the real formula is 100-100-100. Everything has to be 100%.

If you have any thoughts on the subject, please comment below. I would be happy to hear what others have to say. Thanks!

For example, when Rachel, who came to work for us as an intern two years ago, she did everything right except that the word like appeared far too frequently in everything she said as in “Did you, like, get the copy and did it, like, make sense?” She sounded like a Valley Girl.

Rachel is very bright, so I decided to throw down a challenge. I bought a small coin bank in the shape of a house and taped “Like” Bank on it. I told her that every time she used the word “like” as punctuation, she had to deposit a quarter in the bank. The quarters added up quickly at first, then slowed down and, eventually, stopped coming. Rachel had rid herself of the habit in less than a month! I’m so proud of her.

I had, like, a bigger problem years ago when I was a chain smoker. I tried everything smoking cessation classes to lollipops and hypnotism. Nothing.

Then, one day I was running up the stairs at Grand Central Station and couldn’t catch my breath. I stopped at the landing with an old man looking at me, alarmed, as I coughed and wheezed and actually couldn’t breathe. When I recovered, my pack of cigarette went from my purse to the garbage pail on the landing. That was the last time I ever had a cigarette. Now I know I could bound up that staircase easily but that would be showing off.

Other bad habits I’d like to break include:

• Messy desk syndrome. A beautifully clean desk with not a paper on it would be so cool.
• Fear of cooking lest I kill myself or, worse, kill my guests.
• Fear of water, actually fear of drowning, so I can learn to swim.
• And so many other including fear of driving on the Interstate, fear of strangling rude people … maybe I can beat them one at a time.
• Eating chocolate ice cream whenever possible.

Now, all I need to do is create a system for breaking the habit (like Rachel’s “Like Bank”)

So, let’s say I tackle the messy desk challenge. Every day I clean off the entire surface before I leave the office. Hmmm…that might be too hard to do. Let’s say I start with easier goals: 1) Put all the pens into the holder. 2) File everything that is in one pile on my desk, 3) Write a “To-Do List” before I leave the office each night.

Hmm…this is starting to look like fun. Implementing it, might be slow….but I think I can get rid of some of these habits….and then adopt some new ones from Andrea Nierenberg’s column….and start the New Year, 2013 on the right foot.

I’d like you to join me in this Crusade. It seems like the economy is dragging us about, and having this positive goal-setting routine in motion might help us all. What do you think?

Want to break any bad habits?  Let me know in a comment below. Maybe we can tackle them together.

It takes 30 days to either break a habit or start a new one, I’ve read. In my Bikram yoga class- there’s a 30-day challenge now- where you attend a 90 minute class for 30 days straight and at the completion– you are clearly more fit, healthier and stronger.
In the last year- I have set my own “30-day challenges” to learn something new daily on building my business and expanding my knowledge on a variety of subjects.

Over a year ago, I decided to focus on Social Media, learning something new daily. All you need is your computer (with internet access) and a strong dose of discipline.

I had to get up to speed and with watching You Tube videos, reading blog posts, articles and Tweets, visiting Slide Share, I spent 15-30 minutes daily learning.

One month turned in to the next and before I knew it- a year had passed and I’m still repeating and continuing my knowledge by starting a new 30-day challenge each month. I know I don’t have to worry about the abundance of material that I can find. I have now also expanded my challenge to learning more subject matter- on my specific topics in my consulting practice– Presentation Skills, Strategic Networking and Business Development.

Recently, I was working with one of my Executive coaching clients, and his focus is on Personal Finance. He wants to be more competitive because he hadn’t taken many advanced classes in college. I decided to give him the 30-day Challenge in learning one new piece of information daily on Personal Finance. He is already into day 10 and says he feels more confident and knowledgeable and just by spending 15- 30 minutes daily.

This is what is great about the ‘challenge‘– set your goal and time frame and stick to it– If we can’t find 15-30 minute nuggets- start with 5 or 10 minutes. You will still be learning and focused.

So– take the “Challenge” for whatever you wish to keep improving and excelling in:

C—Carve out a specific time of the day for your ‘challenge work‘– I do mine first thing in the morning to start my day.

H— Hear yourself as you read out loud and then record a highlight of the daily information you are gleaning and then implementing.

A– Take action and start the process. Begin with a smaller time slot and then it can grow to 30 minute. Just begin.

L—Learn one new piece of information daily- and then share it with someone.

L– Really listen to the author or speaker you are learning from and connect with them.

E– Enjoy the process. It is fun when we are learning in life! Someone once told me that by listening to Italian for 30 minutes a day for 1 year, he felt comfortable speaking to people on his trip to Italy. He said he had almost become an “expert”.

N–Do not say “No” to yourself. If you miss a day- spend double time the next day. Reverse the letters of NO to ON– and find the time to continue your challenge.

G– Set a goal to accomplish. In 30 days, I will have mastered——- (fill in your goal) Very similar when people set a goal to lose a specific amount of weight in a certain time.

E–Envision yourself more confident and in control having mastered new material and knowledge to make you better at your work or in life.

We all make choices on how to spend our time– break this opportunity into a bite size nugget and see how you feel in 30 days. If you are like me and others I know- you will continue the challenge and keep going and growing.

If it seems so big and daunting- remember this saying—“How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time!”

Contact Andrea Nierenberg at: andrea@nierenberggroup.com and read her blog at: NierenBlog.com

Pinterest is one of the newer kids on the block. It’s a virtual pin board for sharing images. With over 17 million users, the majority of whom are women, it has caught the attention of businesses. It’s barely two years old and it has already passed Bing, Twitter and Stumbleupon as a referral traffic site, and will soon pass Yahoo.

Pinterest’s unique demographic, 80% women between 23 and 54, half with children, are interested in fashion, interior design, crafts, gifts and leisure.

If this is your target audience Pinterest could be great for you. Here are 5 quick Pinterest tips to help you get started:

1. Pin, Re-Pin, Follow, Like, Comment. Repeat. Pinterest is very interactive and engaging. People want you to interact with them, so… interact!

2. Be original. About 80% of the content on Pinterest is a Re-Pin. As a business, you can be the source for the original pinning, and your unique images will be re-pinned.

3. Get people involved. Create competitions that involve people going on your website and pinning products or images on a board. That way you’ll get people interacting with your brand and leading to your website.

4. Tag you’re it! Tag your followers or other businesses on your posts to increase interactions. Make sure to put keywords in the descriptions of the images; it’ll help on searches and direct people to you.

5. Referrals, Referrals, Referrals. Every image you post should have a link to your website or blog. Pinterest is the 5th largest referral site! Use that to your advantage. You can use Google Analytics to track all the visits you get from Pinterest.

Hope this helps! Pinterest can be a great tool for business, especially when you have beautiful products and interesting images to share.

If you have any questions, feel free to comment below.
Guest Blog Post from Rachel Rodriguez
LGMG Account Exec.

A brand is really a promise. You know what you’re going to get with a well-branded product. Brands with well-established promises include:

Nordstrom: Great customer service
McDonald’s: Fast, inexpensive and good food (especially the fries)
Volvo: Safe and comfortable
Apple: Creative and cool. “Think Different”
Hallmark Cards “… you … send the very best”.

A brand is more than its logo or colors. It’s about how your customers feel about your company, what they think about when they see your name.

We’ve had several companies ask us to help them create a brand. When we ask questions about unique selling proposition (USP) or why people like their business over their competitors’, they look at us with blank stares, wondering, “What does that have to do with my brand?”.

In their minds a brand is their color scheme and all the aesthetics of the brand. That’s only a part of it.

For more details on how to create a great brand take a look my recent Forbes article, “Why A Brand Matters”.

I recently spoke at the Coral Ridge Country Club in Ft. Lauderdale for a group of entrepreneurs, at an event called BIG Breakfast. When I explained to them, that 40% of the success of a direct mail campaign is the offer, they looked at me as if I had two heads. I continued on to tell them that another 40% is the list they’re mailing to, and the final 20% is the creative. What do most people spend their time on? Of course, the fun stuff… the creative.

A common problem we encounter is that most businesses don’t understand the science behind direct mail.

To a critical and untutored eye a great direct mail letter doesn’t look like much. It looks simple, which is much more difficult to achieve than something sophisticated – a word that in this context usually means corporate gobbledygook. The critic reading the direct mail letter is rarely a member of the target audience so, naturally, the letter doesn’t resonate.

If you’d like to read some great examples of how simple letters work very well, visit my recent Forbes article:

Hope you’ll pick up an idea or two for your own business. Let me know how it works out.

Mom’s birthday was coming up, so I rallied the troops (aka dad, brothers, sister-in-law) and we decided on a surprise party.

My job was to keep Mom out of the house while the troops prepped the party. What better excuse than a day of pampering at a spa? I browsed Groupon and LivingSocial and found a great deal on an entire day of beauty!

Spa reservation √ Food √ Drinks √ Décor √… Perfect!

Then just two days before the appointment, the spa called. “Ms. Rodriguez, I’m sorry to inform you that we’re overbooked and we’ll have to reschedule your appointment for another day. Currently, we are booked through August.”  Grrrr.

To make it more Grrrr-inducing she spoke in that enraging flat voice, a version of Connecticut-lockjaw, that says “I couldn’t possibly care less about you.”

Fuming, and boy, can I fume, I called LivingSocial, where I’d bought the deal. Joey answered and unfumed me immediately. He was a delight, a credit to the whole human race. Joey isn’t part of LivingSocial’s customer service team, no, no. They have a customer advocacy team! I love that. He made me feel that I mattered and he cared.

LivingSocial’s refund policy says you have to request a refund more than seven days before the event but Joey arranged a refund right away. Throughout the whole conversation, I was referred to by name and asked if there was anything else I needed.

Opposite ends of the service spectrum­: unbearable idiocy followed by sublime customer service. Here are some takeaways:

Can we put ourselves in the customer’s shoes? Many times we forget the golden rule: “Do unto others before they do unto you.” Oh wait, that’s not it. It’s “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Nobody told the spa lady.

It’s about the customer. Like Lois’s friend Andrea Nierenberg tells us, “People listen to only one radio station and that’s WII-FM (What’s in it for me)”. When dealing with customers, we need to consider how to make everything better for them, not more convenient for us – unless we work for the DVM. Think of the lifetime value of a customer, not just what it’s going to cost at the moment.

Think feelings and solutions, not products. Customers are not just buying a product or service; they’re buying an experience, a feeling, or a solution to a problem. Living Social was great, because Joey immediately recognized that I had a real problem and made it better. This puts it perfectly, “People will rarely remember what you did, but they will always remember how you made them feel.”

Eventually, after a lot of scrambling, Mom’s surprise birthday party went off without a hitch. I will always remember how the spa (which shall remain nameless, for now) and Living Social made me feel.