Strategy Avenue

Imaging USA

I'm so sad that I won't be attending Imaging USA this year for a few reasons.  The first is that I have a really big celebrity wedding in Florida on January 10th, and trying to get from Florida to Phoenix to home within a matter of a few days in the midst of purchasing a new building is enough to make any sane person insane in the membrane.  Sometimes I find this business is a matter of recognizing that we can't always do everything, and being at peace with it.  

The second is that PPA is smart enough to rotate speakers from year to year, so there is always fresh material.  Because I gave a platform last year, I am off this year and will be back in action in 2010.  In the meantime, I have some wonderful friends giving great seminars.  A few of them include:

The Client Experience Workflow: Connection, Capture & Post Processing with Jesh De Rox and Tamara Lackey. This is a fantastic combination of two people with heart and soul and a great business to match.  

Sales and Customer Service with Julia Woods.  Julia is, hands down, the best instructor of sales I have ever met.  She is articulate, clear and FUN.  I am amazed by her every time I see her, and cannot recommend this class enough if you are having a tough time with selling.

The Joy of Pricing with Sarah Petty.   If you have ever met Sarah Petty you know how fun, energetic and just overall fabulous.  She is teaching several workshops at Imaging and if you can see her, I highly recommend it!

I a sure that there are many others on the bill who are excellent, these are just a few people who I have seen speak personally and believe that they have a lot of wisdom to share.  Take lots of notes from Anne Geddes for me and I'll see you at WPPI and Imaging in 2010!

Laura

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PPA Charities

As imaging professionals, we touch the lives of others every day…by being part of someone’s wedding day, capturing a child’s personality, helping businesses succeed and so on. Extend that personal touch with PPA Charities and become a force of positive change.

To learn more about family portrait month, click here!

The Big Picture and the Energy Bus

Just as I was leaving the office today I received the weekly newsletter from the author of Never Eat Alone - Keith Ferrazzi (by the way, great book). In the newsletter, Keith provided his weekly tip and a story from Jon Gordon's new book The Energy Bus.

"There's a story about when President Lyndon Johnson visited NASA and as he was walking the halls he came across a janitor who was cleaning up a storm, like the Energizer bunny with a mop in his hand. The president walked over to the janitor and told him he was the best janitor he had ever seen and the janitor replied, 'Sir, I'm not just a janitor. I helped put a man on the moon.'...Even though he was cleaning floors he had a bigger purpose and vision for his life. That is what kept him going and helped him excel in his job...So drive with purpose today and every day and cultivate it in your team and they'll not only stay on the bus when it's cruising but they'll also get out to help push it when it breaks down."

The story got me thinking. As photographers, the business is so much more than just taking a picture-in many cases you are putting a "man on the moon". Never lose sight of the bigger picture in what you do and why you choose to pursue photography.

If you get a chance, take a look at Jon Gordon's new book as well. It outlines ten rules to fuel your life:

10 Rules to Fuel Your Life, Work, and Team
with Positive Energy

1. You’re the Driver of the Bus.
2. Desire, Vision and Focus move your bus in the
right direction.
3. Fuel your Ride with Positive Energy.
4. Invite People on Your Bus and Share your Vision
for the Road Ahead.
5. Don’t Waste Your Energy on those who don’t get
on your Bus.
6. Post a Sign that says “No Energy Vampires
Allowed” on your Bus.
7. Enthusiasm attracts more Passengers and
Energizes them during the Ride.
8. Love your Passengers.
9. Drive with Purpose.
10.Have Fun and Enjoy the Ride.

Happy New Year

“We will open the book. Its pages are blank. We are going to put words on them ourselves. The book is called Opportunity and its first chapter is New Year's Day.”

- Edith Lovejoy Pierce (Poet)

Happy New Year from Strategy Avenue.

With the month of January comes new beginnings and opportunities to recommit to the business planning and goal setting process. In 2008, let's all resolve to keep our focus and better ourselves.

We wish you luck in the year ahead as we all "move confidently in the direction of our dreams".

managing the holiday stress

In the past week or so, I've been thinking quite a bit about different ways to manage the holiday madness and some advice I might be able to offer here on Strategy Avenue. But since I am a big believer in only dishing out advice you would personally use I figured it would be helpful to admit that we are all going a little mad at Laura Novak Photography. It seems that Murphy's law often kicks in at the most inopportune time such as disk space on the server filling up the day we had five portrait sales meetings in a row. Or maybe during our busiest customer pickup week the office's main printer dies a sudden painful death, bringing me outside staples at 7 am to purchase a new one. It's no doubt that anyone in retail deserves a neck massage each day they get home this time of year.

With several weeks to go during this madness I thought I would offer some of the ways in which I get through December, and I hope you will share your methods as well in the comment box at the end of this post.

1. Eat well, take your vitamins, and keep exercising. The only thing worse than standing outside waiting for Staples to open at 7 a.m. is standing outside waiting for Staples to open at 7 a.m. with a cold. This time of year I actually ramp up my exercising and healthy eating, which is so hard to do when we are all so busy. I actually attend hot yoga at 6 a.m. three times a week which is where a lot of my energy and daily perseverance comes from. I know, you are all probably groaning at the idea of getting up that early but try it, I promise you will be 100% more productive with such a great start to the day.

2. Give your clients options, but not total control. The most important way to keep customer deadlines on time is to have a detailed workflow that occurs within parameters that allow for a margin of error. Give your clients total control and of course, everyone will want prints for Christmas and order them on the 21st of December. Give them total control over the Holiday card designs and you will get 10 back and forth email revisions with an unhappy customer at the end of the process. By giving your clients clients limited choices, and strict deadlines by which those choices need to be made and you will have a successful season with very happy customers.

3. Plan out your day. This time of year, I am constantly making lists. It's so easy to move into chaos mode, where you are trying to do everything all at once and really just spinning your wheels feeling confused about what is really priority. Sometimes, when you are super busy it's easy to forget to take time to plan. Every evening when I leave, and every morning when I get into the studio I prioritize my tasks using iGTD. Here is a screen shot of today's tasks, what was completed and what I have to do tomorrow.

4. Stay Positive. Sometimes it's easy for negativity to creep in, especially when things come back from the lab wrong or the prints you spent an hour packing are damaged once they get to your album company. Even though I think there is a value to venting, too much negativity can be sensed by your clients and drain your energy. This week I've been offering positivity bonuses at the studio - where employees are financially rewarded each time they say something positive. It's a small amount, but a fun game. And yes, the girls do make fun of me for being ridiculously hokey but the energy stays positive during a really challenging time of year.

That's the Burden of Adulthood

Over the weekend, I read an article in the NY Times about Bruce Springsteen. Being from New Jersey, I naturally would have found some interest in the article, but it was one of the quotes that got me reflecting over the last several weeks. The Boss, as we know him in the homeland, was discussing loss and claimed it as a burden of adulthood.

In her last post, Laura mentioned the news about both our grandfathers passing away. Although sad, we both can rejoice in their long and loving lives. We also both understand that this is part of life and in most cases - or in the words of Bruce - a burden of adulthood.

When I get a chance to review Laura's portrait work of children, I am always drawn to the carefree expressions of the children. Captured in time for posterity, the children seem so unburdened and simple.

This post isn't so much about a strategy or marketing tip, but in simple appreciation of photography. For the chance to capture an image of child, untainted by the burdens of adulthood, is a gift photographers can provide their clients. It is gift that the child will treasure when they fondly recall the days when he or she was once called "my grandson" or "my granddaughter".

The Power of Nice

I like to focus on expanding my knowledge base into a large variety of different topics and although a lot of the information is pretty intuitive, I have enjoyed reading The Power of Nice by Linda Kaplan Thaler and Robin Koval. This book talks about how to conquer the business world with kindness - and with the industry that we are in, I think we all should we be practicing kindness every day.

Some of my favorite points are:

*Positive impressions are like seeds. Negative impressions are like germs. You may not see the impact they have on you for a while, but they are there, silently infecting you and everyone around you.

*Start out each meeting, sales appointment, etc. by establishing rapport. In every encounter, only 7 percent of our communication is verbal. The other 93% comes from nonverbal cues such as gestures and tone of voice.

*When you learn to let go of your pride and stop keeping score, you'll find that actually do much better. People who we see as our opponents are just those who have wounded our egos.

*There is a finite amount of energy each of us has to expend every day. Spending time fighting with someone is the quickest way to lose business, because you are no longer trying to build something up. Instead, you're expending your energy tearing someone down.

*Simply respond. "never explain, never defend, never justify" You have a right to live your life and set your own boundaries.

One of the central lessons in this text, (one of the many) is that people remember acts of kindness and acts of selfishness and cruelty. These authors share how much business can (and will) be improved at the workplace by focusing your energy on playing nice.

Going Into "Lockdown"

Sometimes when you feel overwelmed with your to-do lists, the best thing to do is just dive in and try to clear out the mess. I used to have a manager that would proclaim "I'm in the weeds"-meaning that she was burried under to-do's and just got down to business.

This actually happened to me this past Friday afternoon. I just needed to get "some singles" and stop swinging for the fences or a homerun (forgive my sports metaphors). As I am sure we can alll agree-great businesses are often built brick by brick---basically going into lockdown, clearing out the inbox and checking items off the list.

When I need to go into lockdown, I usually find myself thanking Steve Jobs. Lockdown many times consists of either my iPod or iTunes cranking out some songs to get me through. From time to time, I get a little bored of my soundtracks and music library and need something different.

As a fan of live music, I was excited to find a site that offers some great classic concerts. Many of the shows date back to the late 60's, 70's and early 80's. Concerts range from the Grateful Dead,Paul Simon, U2, Billy Joel, Bruce Springsteen, The Who and Rush.

If you are in need to something to help your through your production hours and want to check out some old live tunes check out the Concert Vault.

Your Authentic Self

There is a blog site that I check out weekly that is based on the book Never Eat Alone. The book was written by Keith Ferazzi - who served as Chief Marketing Officer for Starwood Hotels - think W Hotel and Westin marketing. In the book, he outlines steps to build a better network.

Ferazzi sends out weekly tips and frequently posts some interesting topics to his blog. One of his recent topics really caught my attention.

He comments about a recent interview for a CNBC show and writes:

"The disappointment I have with my performance is confirmed by others, so this is not just me. I was trying to be something I was not. My authentic self didn’t come through because I was too focused on my performance. In my head, not my heart. Ever been there? Ever go into a meeting and walk out and say, “Damn, if only I had just chilled out and tried LESS, and not so hard…” "

I thought it was a great point. When we are selling our services to a client or pitching our business at a local chamber of commerce mixer - be sure to be yourself....your authentic self...it is what sells.

My Top Ten From Dale Carnegie

Lots of people collect things. Some people collect stamps, others collect coins or comic books. I collect a number of different things- wine corks, political buttons, and shelves of books. Two books in my collection, How to Win Friends & Influence People and How to Stop Worrying and Start Living, I got as a result of taking a Dale Carnegie course about ten years ago. It was a fascinating course and I learned some great lessons.

Below are my top ten lessons/advice learned from Dale Carnegie relating to dealing with people:

10-- Don't criticize, condemn or complain
9 -- Become genuinely interested in other people
8 -- Remember that a person's name is to that person the sweetest and most important sound in any language.
7 -- Be a good listener. Encourage others to talk about themselves.
6 -- Talk about your own mistakes before criticizing the other person.
5 -- If you are wrong, admit it quickly and emphatically
4 -- Let the other person do a great deal of the talking
3 -- Try honestly to see things from the other person's point of view
2 -- Make the other person feel important and do it sincerely

and #1 - which comes in great if you are managing employees...

1 -- Give the other person a fine reputation to live up to.

If you give your employee a fine reputation to live up to, they will work towards that reputation, develop themselves and help grow the business.