It can be hard to hold a room these days. Between the Twitterstream and the BackChannel, and our relentless need to surf as we learn, keeping your audience alert and engaged requires skill, smarts, and a great presentation. While not every speaker can be a rock...
I was a little surprised last week by all the attention surrounding Chris Brogan's day rate. A little of it reminded me of when I started my business and a few (former) friends decided I was really sitting around eating bonbons and cashing trust fund checks....
One of the toughest challenges of consulting is the “feast or famine” syndrome. If you've been doing this work for any length of time, then you have probably experienced both those times when you’re working really crazy hours and the weeks when you’re climbing the...
Should you be on LinkedIn? Plaxo? BizSugar or Open Forum? While it’s easy to be online, the vast array of options can leave even the social-media-savviest business person overwhelmed. At last check, my AddThis button linked to over 230 separate platforms/sites....
Remember the Deck of Cards that the U.S. military unveiled after the 2003 invasion of Iraq? In addition to Saddam Hussein, it featured a who's who of the regime's inner circle. If you'd diagrammed it, you would have ended up with a traditional hierarchical chart with...
So you want to know the secret to a great client relationship? Ask them how they want you to communicate with them. Maybe they like phone calls (office, mobile, other number?), or perhaps they respond better to e-mail. If they're on Twitter all day, they might want...
What should we do with all the data? It’s a question I have been asking a lot; good solutions—not so many. So imagine my excitement when someone finally answered the question of how we can use the huge (and growing) volume of competitive business intelligence. In a...
One of the questions at last month's IABC/Washington panel discussion on 2010 trends was on core competencies. What skills do communicators need to have today? Panelists cited several, including: the ability to identify influencers knowing how to tell a story tech...
The fire alarm in my building had a glitch last night. By glitch, I mean it was going off every 45 seconds or so. (And yes, the fire department came out the first time.) The management solution was to have someone man the switch and try to turn the alarm off as...
Google's announcement that it would stop censoring search results in China is huge news--and smart strategy. In exploring the background, the Financial Times reported: Google argued internally that while censoring was an unpalatable compromise, it would at least make...