When you get down to it, we all cater to our customers.  And we have to, if we want their business that is.  There are many ways to cater though, and each is modified to best reach a specific target market.  Because what works for Harley Davidson customers, probably wouldn’t attract high-end antique buyers.   But when it comes to communicating with our customers, being a consultant is a universal good idea.

The basic caveats of communicating like a consultant is best described on the EdelmanChange blog.  For example, “shift from being an order taker to a strategic thinker” represents a fundamental shift for many businesses.  If we ran a restaurant, well, wouldn’t we automatically be order takers?  If we communicate and consult our diners though, we have opportunities for upselling, ideas for specialty dishes, and many other ways to improve their experiences and keep them coming back.

“Don’t be afraid to ask,” is another good consulting tip.  After all, if we don’t ask, how will we know?  It’s interesting that sometimes even the customer doesn’t know what they want or need.  It’s our job to ask, to find out, and to provide them with what they truly desire.

This one is my favorite: “Align decisions and actions to business goals.”  This basically means that instead of measuring the success for a customer with our benchmarks, we use what’s important to them as goals.  In communicating, it’s not enough that we simply talked to x amount of people a day.  Instead it’s vital that we made x amount of customers satisfied and happy.

Are any of your communication quotas set independent of true customer needs?  Do you dig down and get to what is best for the customer?  Or do you simply expect them to conform to you, and give their order when they do?  Tell us about it in a comment.

It looks as though Lisa Schulz of Women Wine and Wellness has got herself a great idea.  Business networking for women and helping them realize their dreams is Schulz’s passion, one that she’s become very good at.  And for women near the South Metro Denver area, this is a great thing.  For those that aren’t near there... I guess you’re out of luck.

Which brings up a very good point.  Are there any ideas out there that cannot be spread nationally?  Or internationally?  Is there really a business that must stay local to work?  No, not even handcrafted ottomans made by one man in a tiny shop in South Dakota should stay local.  Obviously he can sell them online, post pictures of completed pieces, future projects, how-to videos, take commissions, and even organize tours for the really motivated ottoman lover.

And Schulz with her networking for women idea is confined to one part of one city?  I can’t believe it!  Perhaps the article didn’t mention online courses, or weekly conference calls, or branch locations in other cities with nightly meetings that have video conference linkups.  I hope networking and communication tools like these were simply overlooked in the article, because this is an idea made for sharing across the globe.  This “networking” idea was made for conferencing.

Does anyone out there have a business, or part of a business that they truly feel cannot receive benefits from conferencing?  Tell us about it in a comment, but check back for ideas from everyone on how it can be done.

The newest form of the iPhone just came out in the iPhone 4G.  Now, I missed the original iPhone, and was slow to get the iPhone 3G--it had been out over eight months--and I never got the 3GS.  But this time, I’m not making the same mistake. 

Now I haven’t gotten the 4G yet, hence the “pre-experience” part of the title.  But I’d thought I’d talk about the top five features I’m looking forward to, then do a review after I’ve spent some quality time with my own personal 4G.  So in ascending order of anticipation, here is what I’m looking forward to.

5.  Multitasking - On my 3G there is none, but since I’ve never had a smartphone that did, multitasking wasn’t something that bothered me too much.  Sure, I have to suffer through app load times, but it’s only a few seconds of my life.  However, being able to flip between apps like my laptop should be sweet.

4.  Noise-Suppressor - This addition is something I can really get behind.  A great blessing and curse of my 3G is its incredible microphone pickup levels.  Of course when outside, it tends to get a bit muddled.  It will be great to have a second mic to filter out the background noise.

3.  App Folders - I hate doing it, but every couple of months I go through the laborious process of reorganizing my apps.  I put the ones I really use at the front, the ones I kinda use in the middle, and so on.  And of course as soon as I’m done, the first app I need to use is on page seven.  I can’t wait to put similar apps into folders, then have one page of folders!

2.  Unified Inbox - Yeah, this is a major drag not to have.  Imagine having a page with a list of inboxes--mail accounts--choosing one, choosing its inbox, reading the mail, going back to folders, back to all inboxes, choosing another inbox, and so forth.  So frustrating, especially since the standard mail program on mac computers is unified.  This can’t come soon enough!

1.  FaceTime - Oh baby this will be so cool!  We can actually make video phone calls now!  Remember Dick Tracy and his video watch?  How about all those spy movies?  Well FaceTime joins them in supercool status by being a video-phone program.  Seriously, video conferencing is great, especially with laptops.  But to make a video call... well, I just wish I could show it to my eight-year-old self.

Sometime soon I will return to this topic to tell you how my iPhone 4G experience actually is.  In the meantime, leave a comment and tell me about yours.

Tuesday is coming and you dread it.  Why?  Because at 10am there will be a conference call... just like last week, the week before, and as far back as your dulled mind can remember.  Why does this meeting happen?  No one knows.  What is its result?  Absolutely nothing.  Should it be cancelled.?  That’s your year ly birthday wish.

In an article in the NyTimes.com, I found some tips on avoiding unnecessary meetings that I think you’ll enjoy.  The first thing we should do is...

Have an Objective - While this has been said before, it’s vital enough to repeat.  What is the purpose of the conference call?  What do we hope to accomplish and is a meeting the best way to do it?

Drop-ins Okay - Have you ever had to wait for thirty minutes until the meeting got to your part?  Did you really have to be there beforehand?  Sometimes it’s impossible to plan exactly when a speaker will be needed to speak, but if you plan correctly, it can be simple.  If people are to speak in the last ten minutes of a conference call, let them join the meeting at a later time.

Follow-Up - In the article, they encourage us to have someone take notes, including action items for the decisions made.  In a conference call, everything is recorded.  While this is easier, more efficient, and far more reliable, we still need to have someone be responsible to review the recording and follow-up.

Everyone in the Room - If we have a meeting to decide things but our report has to go to another meeting for them to approve our decisions, then we’ve just had an unnecessary meeting.  Get ALL of the involved parties into the same meeting.  Present, get feedback, answer questions, and make the decision all in one go.  This can be difficult to achieve with only face-to-face meetings, but with conference calls, it’s a simple thing to make it happen every time.

How do you avoid unnecessary meetings?  If you have any tips for us, leave a comment and tell us about them.

As you may have already guessed, I’m a big fan of alternate mediums of communication, remote meetings, and conferencing.  However, I came across a YouTube video today that only has applications for face-to-face meetings that I wanted to share with you.  Why?  Cause it’s just so cool!

See?!  Today it’s a self-adjusting meeting room, but tomorrow the Cylons attack!  (Probably because they’re tired of cleaning up after our meetings...)

Something just occurred to me though.  What if these robot tables were used by one person?  What if this video is the harbinger of the super office?  Think about it, you’ve got a big table that has your laptop set up on one quadrant, a desktop computer/media station on another, a layout table for plans and pictures, and a filing system on the fourth.  With that setup, well...

You arrive at work, sit down in the middle of the room, press a button, and the tables form a square of efficiency around your swivel chair!  When you need to leave temporarily, a button makes one of the tables open up for you.  Have a face-to-face meeting?  Three tables could line the wall behind you, with one set between you and the guest chair.  For a video conference, press a button and the table with the camera moves your chosen best backdrop into view while the others become handy but off-camera.

Now that I think about it, I want these awesome robot tables!  What would YOU do with them?  Tell me about it in a comment! 

Over time a picture will become unrecognizable if you make a copy of its copy, and copy that copy, and so on.  Or so they say.  But that saying does hold true for YouTube.com videos, if you were to upload, download, and upload it again one thousand times.  While it’s cool to see a video so carefully distorted by repeated byte compressions, imagine what horrors duplicating could do to our presentations.

Think about it, we all can tell when someone has given the same speech too many times, read the same lines seemingly ad infinitum.  They’re listless, unexcited, even bored and it shows.  They stick to their worn script and soldier on past any deviations or tangents.  They either rush the Q&A, or their answers are short and impatient.  They don’t want to be there, and we in turn agree with them.

And therein lies the danger; a “really great” presentation over time can become stale to the presenter, who will pass on those feelings to the participants, even first-time ones.  There is good news though.  We can prevent such a stagnation.

A simple way to keep it fresh is to switch the order of information covered.  A slightly more complex method is to add or take away supporting points for each of the main points.  A great idea is to start off a web conference using a poll or chat to ask the participants what they expect to learn, what they want to hear about.

The best solution, I believe, is to go zen and not have a presentation at all.  Oh sure, we still have the video conference or conference call, but instead of a speech or detailed sections, we simply have a short list of the main points in front of us.  Then we talk about them with our participants.

Because if we have actually given the presentation a thousand times... well, we know everything there is to know about it, right?

Have you heard about IT? Have you seen IT?  Do you even know what IT is?  I came across the IT method at EffectiveMeetings.com.  IT is a simple checklist process that neatly summarizes a five-step process for planning and developing your presentation.  Here IT is in its simplicity:

1. Brain IT!
2. Group IT!
3. Trim IT!
4. Spice IT!
5. Do IT!

The first step, Brain IT, is a freeform brainstorming session—group or solo.  This is where you write down everything you think of, or may want to say.  And we do mean EVERYTHING.  Don’t edit the ideas or your thought process, just get it all out.  A particularly good suggestion they say is to use post-it notes to free yourself from the borders of a normal sheet of paper.

Next is Group IT where you put all the ideas into categories—this is where the post-it note idea really shines.  Naturally group your ideas; don’t try to artificially pigeonhole them.  If a category has more than ten ideas, it might actually be two categories.  Now order your groups by what will be delivered first, second, etc.  Three is a good number of groups to use, but just keep it simple.  Save the unused groups for support or Q&A.

Trim IT organizes the ideas in each group by importance or pertinence.  Remove extra or duplicate ideas and put them with the unused groups.  Again, in each group three ideas are ideal, but not mandatory.

When you Spice IT, you’re adding the stories, quotes, props, slides, audio, handouts, and whatever else will punch up your presentation.  Don’t leave out the beginning or ending!

The planning is done, all the words are there and in order, and the spicy extras are chosen.  All that’s left is to run it together seamlessly—and “edit, edit, edit!”  Now Do IT!

Man, the ancient Greeks could do it all!  They created the founding principles of modern mathematics and philosophy.  They held off hundreds of thousands of Persians with just 300 warriors.  And they developed the powerful presentation formula that our best speakers use to this day.  

As Steve Kaufmann points out on PickTheBrain.com, the Ancient Greek presentation formula has five main parts: exordium, narration, partitio, refutation, and peroration.  Let’s take a look at each!

Exordium, or the Opening - This is where you get listeners to like you--or at least be sympathetic to what you have to say—and establish your credibility.  Humility, friendliness, and directness will help you achieve both.

Narratio or the Purpose – What are you going to talk about?  What supporting points will you cover?  This is an agenda of sorts, or at least an orientation for your audience to easily follow you through your presentation.

Partitio or the Value – Going hand in hand with the narration, this part tells the audience why they should listen, why they should care.  In other words, you’ve told them the issue, now tell them why it’s their issue.

Refutatio or the Devil’s Advocate – Now is the time to address what naysayer’s would bring up, or point out where your logic might be weak.  Of course you’re bringing up “bad” points so you can talk about your “good” counter-points.

Peroratio or the Big Finish – like any decent fireworks display, you’ve got to end with a grand finale.  This is where you pull out your best arguments, your flashiest logic.  You’ve lead your participants and set them up, now knock ‘em out with a dazzling finish.

I loved this article on the ancient Greeks because I see their presentation formula in pretty much every great speech or lecture I’ve seen.  Over two thousand years have passed, but their methods still are the best.  

How cool is that?

Meetings are a fantastic use of time in which to collaborate, disseminate information, build a team, and be productive… except that is, when they aren’t.  I’ll bet that most of us have been in more useless meetings than useful ones, and not to point fingers, but a lot of times the leader is to blame.

Or are they?  Ca n they be blamed for a blather-mouth employee, or an over-bearing one?  No, but when a leader lets them ruin a meeting then yes, the leader is to blame.  Here are some of the strong directives from the Corner Office blog on controlling highly charged meetings.

“The Setup” – This is a great tip to set the tone for the meeting, as well as putting us in a strong position.  At the beginning we should explicitly explain what the meeting will cover, what we expect from the participants, and what we don’t want to happen.  As the Corner Office blog explains:

“We’re going to determine our product’s value proposition to customers, but we’re not going to sit here and wordsmith it to death; we’ll do that offline.”

“Channel Useful Debate” – Debate is good, but only as long as it stays useful.  If we sense that a debate is going off-topic or getting bogged down, we need to speak up and bring the discussion to a halt.  Then when we have the floor, we summarize both sides, and get a consensus.  Once things are back on track, we can move on to the next item, or if more debate is needed, at least now it’s focused.

“Table Useless Debate” – This is a point we hammer on a lot in this blog.  Tangents, divergent points, useless debates are meeting killers and time wasters.  However, if we’ve clearly stated the point of the meeting, we can dismiss a runaway topic, or if it’s a good tangent point, record it and schedule another meeting for it later.

How do you corral a runaway meeting?  Do you use a heavy hand or a light touch?  Tell us about your methods in a comment.

Five months ago Heineken got bosses, university professors, and girlfriends in Italy to convince their employees, students, and boyfriends to miss one of the biggest soccer matches of the year… to attend a poetry/orchestra event instead.  The 1000+ victims didn’t know it was an event organized by Heineken, they just knew that life was full of heart-wrenching decisions.  

Watch what happens after the curtain goes up! 

Even though the actual Heineken event was small, it’s become enormously huge worldwide—as was planned I’m sure.  I wanted to share this with you just for fun, but I also think that we could do something similar with a video conference and some sideways thinking.

I had a great idea based on the Heineken experiment, but it requires a company with employees in at least two locations—branches, divisions, etc--in different cities, with extra points if the cities have rival football teams.  We schedule a serious, mandatory, “three hour” video conference meeting between the two locations on a Sunday —preferably when the football teams are playing each other--with a start time of fifteen minutes before kickoff.  

Of course at a minute before kickoff, the meeting is interrupted in both locations with food, drink, and the game on TV.  Not only does everyone get to watch the game, but the two groups of employees get to bond by watching the rival game “together!”

That’s just one video conference “experiment.”  Let’s come up with some more!  They could be for friends, family, employees, customers, or whoever.  Just put your ideas here as comments and we’ll build on the best ones.  I can’t wait to see what we come up with!