Alberta Business Marketing

I got a very timely and critical email from my mentor Arlin Sorensen the other day.  Arlin just has the knack of hitting me with his virtual 2×4 at the right time and he does it well.  Arlin is the mastermind behind the Peer Power blog and Heartland Tech Groups.  Arlin is a very faithful man and a leader inside/outside the tech support community.

This post of his got me thinking about social media.  There is a lot of people making a tremendous amount of noise, but do we have a leader in our space?  Not the person who is the most technical or the smartest marketer.  Someone who is humble enough to lead our community?  A person who can call it like it is and be there to support our group?  Do we have an Arlin Sorensen in the Social Media world?

One of things Arlin did for me was tear down the walls of competition…plus he helped me through a very rough patch in my life.

Can I lead this community? Do I have what it takes to do what Arlin did in the tech world and apply what I learned from him in the social media world?

Does being a leader in the Canadian social media community mean dismissing competition and embracing those around me?  Does this mean we are here to serve and to put the needs of others before my own needs?  Do I still put my oxygen mask on first?

I know the entire online marketing community here in Calgary and across the globe needs some leadership.  A few are providing this and doing a great job.  But we can always use more.

Are you willing to step up?  This means openly sharing what you know for the great good of our community.  This is something I have noticed big time during my transition to the marketing world.  These guys don’t like to share within their community.  It is like old school business…let’s not tell anyone anything and never think about helping our competitor or someone who claims to do the same thing we do.  I even got caught in that yesterday.  I was reminded about competition from Bob Burg as well yesterday.

Gotta walk the walk if I am going to talk the talk.

Read Arlin’s blog post on Leadership in our community.

Tags: bob burg, Calgary, Human Interest, leader, media community mean dismissing competition, media world, Music industry, online marketing community, Read Arlin, social media, The Master
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Great lesson from Frank Allen

One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people. He said, “My son, the battle is between two wolves inside us all.

“One is Evil – It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.

“The other is Good – It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith.”

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather: “Which wolf wins?”

The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

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Ulistic focuses on serving the needs of Canadian Small Business, REALTORS, and Information Technology firms across Canada and United States. Helping your business understand, deploy and leverage social media, search engine optimization and online communications to generate business opportunities and make an impact inside your community and industry.

My business partner David and I are business professionals first. We understand what it takes to run a successful small business.

I invite you to reach out to me personally at 403.775.2205 or email Stuart at scrawford@ulistic.com.

Tags: Behavior, Emotions, empathy, Envy, ethics, Frank Allen, Human Interest, Humility, Jealousy, Kindness, Pity, Psychology, Seven virtues, Social psychology, Stuart's ramblings
Posted in Alberta Business | | Comments Off

Thank you to everyone for all the emails lately.  Many of you who have been used to getting my blog posts delivered via email have emailed me concerned about the slow down or the drop off in the frequency of the emails.  Thanks for that.  The reality is this, I have just been very busy.

Ulistic is growing and expanding.  We have welcomed Frank Allen as one of our sales reps and are currently in discussions with another amazing person who will become a vital component of our team just like Frank.  Ulistic is blossoming into a Internet consulting firm across Canada and the United States.

Next week, David and I are heading back down to Los Angeles for a couple of days and then come home right in the middle of Stampede.  No Microsoft WPC for me this year. Going to miss seeing everyone who I have become friends with in the Microsoft community but it will also be great to spend a week networking in the Calgary business community.

All is well with me.  Trying to get back into my routine of working out, working on the business and working on my own personal goals and family.  It is truly a fine balance.  I haven’t even watched much World Cup Soccer.  Football however during the month of June kept us busy and it will again come August.  Football even reduced me business networking where I had to just pop in to say hi to those colleagues in a local Calgary Oil and Gas Meetup group.

All is well…just busy.

________________________________

Ulistic focuses on serving the needs of Canadian Small Business, REALTORS, and Information Technology firms across Canada and United States. Helping your business understand, deploy and leverage social media, search engine optimization and online communications to generate business opportunities and make an impact inside your community and industry.

My business partner David and I are business professionals first. We understand what it takes to run a successful small business.

I invite you to reach out to me personally at 403.775.2205 or email Stuart at scrawford@ulistic.com.

Tags: business networking, Calgary, canada, Human Interest, Internet activism, Internet Consulting, Los Angeles, Meetup.com, Microsoft Corporation, Online social networking, Stuart's ramblings, technology, United States, week networking, World Cup
Posted in Alberta Business | | Comments Off

Tags: bob burg, Business, Business Success, Business/Finance, Calgary, canada, dallas, EMMY award, Human Interest, jeffrey gitomer, Scott Schilling, Shawne Duperon, Social Media Ventures Inc, speaker, Wisconsin
Posted in Marketing | | Comments Off

I am so pumped about today.

Why?  The Mind Over Marketing Event is being held in NE Calgary and in just a few short hours I will be taking the stage to share so information on Search Engine Optimization and the importance of Social Media in the Canadian economy.

My good friend Teresa de Grosbois decided to put on this event a while back as a way to give back to the community and to share some of her best relationships with us.  I can really appreciate the hard work involved with putting on an event of this magnitude.  Way to go…Teresa! (also Lynne and Jodi).

Thanks Teresa for doing this and thanks for the honour to be speaking to your attendees.

Social Media and Search Engine Optimization in todays’ world is my topic and also my passion.  This is where I have decided to serve the Canadian Small Business community and those who work in the Information Technology community.  So of course my talk to the room of Calgary business people assembled at Mind Over Marketing is on what I am passionate about.

One of the vibes I am picking up from my brief attendance yesterday is the importance of being authentic and also being real. People can spot phonies a mile away.  The importance of authenticity especially in today’s world is crucial and a critical success factor.  You just have to look Apple commercials to see what being authentic is all about.

Over and over again I am seeing examples of where people are immediately tuning out to the hype of sly sales tactics.   You know the ones who use fancy words such as amazing, Limited Time, Hurry, Only a few seats remain…yes, even I have used them recently.  (insert virtual hand slap here).  Authenticity also means admit when you screw up and not being ashamed about it.  After all, we learn all the time don’t we?  I guess I have some baggage from all those free breakfast and lunches I attended here in Calgary a few years back.  Man, the damage those events caused is still unbelievable to your thought patterns.

I will be also be speaking about the importance of SWIPE (thanks Dawson Lane) today.  Sharing with intent, purpose and emotion or sharing with intent purpose and excellence…still trying to shake this one out a bit.   The keywords are sharing, purpose and intent.  A few days ago I shared this concept with many of you on my blog.  The original wording was Steal with integrity, pride everywhere.  Not sure if this really flies in our world today.  I prefer sharing vs. stealing.

For those coming to Mind Over Marketing…I hope you enjoy my talk and for those who weren’t there and are interested in hearing it…call me 403.775.2205.

Tags: 403.775.2205, Calgary, canadian social media speaker, dawson lane, Human Interest, information technology, Jodi, Lynne, mind over marketing, search engine, search engine optimization, social media calgary, social media canada, Teresa de Grosbois
Posted in Marketing, Online Marketing | | Comments Off