Consistency Is King
By Cheval John
Photo Courtesy of Stuart Miles
Small business owners are always searching for ways to stand out from the crowd.
Who could blame them.
They are competing against other small business owners and also the large corporations.
They have limited resources to operate with.
The good news is that they have been very innovative in sharing their message with the world and at the same time promoting their products or services.
One of those innovations that some have used is a podcast.
The reason is that they are about 250,000 podcast in the world while they are about 260,000,000 blogs.
That makes it a much smaller barrier for anyone.
It also allows the small business owner to reach out to more potential customers and build a loyal following.
If you are thinking about starting a podcast, congratulations.
Before you get started, you should do your research and be very prepared when launching your podcast.
Also, you should attend Podcast Movement to learn from some of the veterans of the podcasting industry and listen to some great presentations as well.
Joel Boggess will be leading a workshop with his wife, Dr. Pei Kang and Russ Johns on Creating Your Podcast, Launch To No.1, Build Your Brand on the first day of the conference.
Mr. Boggess returned on my podcast, “What’s The Word?” and shared some of the “Seven Common Mistakes Most Podcasters Make.”
And I will be very transparent with you.
I am still learning as I go about being a podcaster even though I have been running the podcast for over two years.
I still make common mistakes with my podcast.
And I will show you the downloads over the last two years, starting with the total amount of downloads.
No. of downloads to today: 90,459
That seems very impressive and it is.
However, I will break it down by year
2013: Over 78,000 downloads
2014: Over 10,000 downloads
First 6 months of 2015: Over 1,000 downloads
Now that you see the breakdown of my downloads, you might be wondering why the decline.
I really believe that the reasons for the decline is that I was not consistent and I was not promoting it enough.
I did not stick to one day and time on when the show was coming out.
I was aiming to have the guest on at the time that they were available because they had taken the time out of their busy schedule to share their story with me.
And I felt that I had owed it to them to respect their time.
I thought that I could have only recorded the show live on the BlogTalkRadio platform that I was using.
What I did not know back then was that I could have recorded the interview on the same platform in private, produced it using Audacity which is free, and then upload it into the digital studio to release the show at the appointed time.
The sad part was that I had figured it out way too late that I had needed to be consistent with the show.
Because of that inconsistency, I lost a lot of listeners.
So in a sense, I “relaunched” the show and having it on Monday nights at 7 p.m. central time so that I can own the time and remain consistent.
And another thing I had learned is that I needed to promote the show as well.
Though it is great that the guest will share about their appearance on the show, I am the main one responsible for promoting the show.
I will be honest, I am hesitant because I do not want to be self-promoting.
At the same time, I understand that if I don’t promote the show, I will lose an opportunity to attract new listeners.
So I am aiming to remain true to sharing other people’s content first before sharing mine using the 80/20 rule.
As I close, I hope that these lessons above will resonate with you and that you will have a successful launch with your podcast.
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Lack Of Resources Creates Innovation
By Cheval John
Photo courtesy of Stuart Miles
We often think that it is important to have all the resources to be successful.
It is true that resources like money is what makes things go.
Whether it is running a business, an organization, a university, etc., we believe that having more resources will make everything easier.
We think that if we have more money, we can make a great impact on the world.
Sometimes it is better to have less money/resources because it will make you think of creative ways to get work done.
You will have innovative ideas on making something better and in the process disrupt an entire industry.
Here are two examples of people/organizations who were innovative with their ideas and showed everyone that you can make something out of nothing.
Next week Thursday, I will share two more examples of people/organizations who are making something out of nothing.
1. London Heathrow Airport.
When travelers pass through London Heathrow Airport, they get a chance to see a glimpse of the innovative culture of the British people.
In a sense, Heathrow represents the ingenuity of the United Kingdom.
What I mean is that Heathrow only has two runways.
Yet, they have found a way to keep themselves relevant with the rest of the world.
Heathrow has served over 73.4 million passengers in 2014, making it one of the busiest airports in the world and the busiest in Europe.
The second busiest airport in Europe, Paris Charles De Gaulle, handled over 63 million passengers despite having four runways.
You might think that an airport that has a lot of space and a lot more runways should be able to handle more traffic.
To a large degree, it is the case.
However, Heathrow has proven that they are capable of handling more with less.
They basically went with the build as you go approach.
When they saw the wave of the jet age in the 50s and 60s, they modified their runways and build the terminals large enough to handle the large jets.
They kept at it when the bigger jets like the 747s came into existence in the late 60s/early 70s and added more terminals to accomodate them.
With four terminals already in operations, they saw that the airport was facing overcapacity.
So they added the fifth terminal, which allowed them to handle more passengers even with two runways.
You might still wonder how they get all of the jets in and out safely without any delays.
If you ever flew into Heathrow, you might have noticed that the plane was circling around before they landed.
You might wonder why they do that?
That is where it gets interesting.
Your plane was circle around because they were in a “holding pattern”
While the plane was in a holding pattern, air traffic controllers were trying to put the smaller planes behind each other in one taxi-way and the bigger jets behind each other because they wanted to gain them more space.
If a smaller jet is behind the bigger jet and it takes off, the smaller jet will probably have to wait for about a minute or two before they can take off.
Once they get the planes in the right spot, then the air traffic controllers gives the pilots permission to land.
That is how Heathrow has managed to remain relevant and be the airport that connects the world one flight at a time.
Billy Bean and the Oakland Athletics
Major League Baseball has grown into a 9 billion dollar industry.
With that type of money, baseball players will want a piece of the pie.
The really good players will be able to command the high multi-million dollar contracts.
With that being said, a team would have to be able to afford the really great players if they want to compete.
And the teams with the highest payrolls, mainly the large market teams (New York Yankees, the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Chicago Cubs) are the ones who get those types of “elite” players.
The ones who are in the bottom don’t have that chance to gain the “elite” players.
Most of the time, it does not put the smaller market teams in a disadvantage because they develop the players in their farm system to get them ready for the big leagues.
And most of the time, the small market teams moves further in the playoffs.
Example of this was the Kansas City Royals, who went to the World Series last year and lost in seven games to the San Francisco Giants.
But I want to focus on the Oakland Athletics, who made the playoffs from 2000-2003 under general manager Billy Beane.
The Athletics are consistently ranked in the bottom half of the MLB payroll.
However, Beane was very innovative in finding the right players for the team that fit the system of the Athletics.
As a result, the Athletics were able to make four consecutive playoffs in the early 2000s.
Amidst that run, Oakland became the first American League team in a century to win 20 consecutive games in 2002 and eventually won their division.
Beane’s innovation as a general manager caught the attention of national media and Hollywood with the movie, “Moneyball.”
One can guess that many small market teams like the Royals are following Beane’s approach to running a franchise with a much lower payroll.
So if you have the not-enough blues, do not complain because the lack of resources is an opportunity for you to be creative in getting your work finished effectively.
Videos courtesy of Rachel Matt and Major League Baseball, respectively
Your Intuition Is Your Best Friend
By Cheval John
Photo Courtesy of Stuart Miles
When a person is at a crossroads of whether to change careers, start their own company or make a crucial decision that can change the direction of their business, they always make sure to check the facts and look for solid information.
They understand that if they make the wrong decision, it could set them back for years.
Even after finding out all the information that can lead to them making the right decision, they are still indecisive on what to do.
One of the additional ways that they can overcome that indecisiveness is to follow their intuition.
Your intuition is one of the best guides that you ever had.
Nine times out of ten, your intuition is always right.
But how do you know whether to decipher if it is your intuition or just another feeling.
The best way to answer this is to practice.
With anything whether it is writing a story, playing a sport, or riding a bike, you always have to practice until you perfect your craft.
Following your intuition is the same thing.
Once you perfect the process of recognizing your intuition, then you are really setting yourself up for success.
I can say that I had two instances where following my intuition led me to working for a chain of coffee shops and the time when not following my intuition led to me spending about three hours in getting home.
I was planning on going to downtown Houston on Tuesday a couple weeks ago.
I had felt that my intuition “saying” not to go that Tuesday.
That Tuesday, it ended up raining like crazy.
Then I felt that I needed to be in downtown Houston that very Thursday.
So I decided to go on Thursday.
The only problem was that my truck was not working for me to get to the Park and Ride which was a couple of blocks away.
So I decided to walk to the Park and Ride station and then took the bus to downtown.
When I arrived, I went to the coffee shop and then I asked if they were hiring just to make sure that they were hiring (which they were because I saw the sign that they were hiring).
I applied for employment with the company and was hired a couple of hours later.
I was told that I would start the very next Monday.
That week was part of the training week because I was learning about the different types of coffee.
Then I was told to come to work the closing shift.
At that time, I was thinking of whether to drive my truck, which was working again, or take the bus to downtown.
I was driving towards the light and decided at the last moment to park my truck at the station and take the bus.
I felt that I had made the wrong decision.
As I was leaving work, I realized that I had missed the bus that would have taken me to the park and ride station.
I had to take the other bus towards the 1960 area and then waiting on the next bus towards the station.
From there, I walked about 40 minutes before arriving at the station.
After that, I drove home.
In that moment, I realized that I should have followed my intuition and driven my truck to downtown for work because I found out later that I could have parked my truck in the property where the coffee shop is located in.
Hopefully anyone who is reading this will practice following their intuition.
Once they master recognizing their intuition, they are on the road to success.
The World Is Your Oyster
By Cheval John
When a person travels overseas, they have a chance to explore a different culture.
They can see how people live differently from them and also pick up some new habits that can benefit them and their business.
Many people only get to see the surface of the culture when they are visiting a country due to the “dreaded” vacation.
That vacation time for most lasts only two weeks.
Plus they might only be in the touristy spots of the country if they only speak English.
That makes it more difficult for them to really enjoy the culture.
For those who believe that they can spend time overseas and make it part of their work, I am very happy for them.
They understand that in this day and age, everything is more mobile and internet friendly.
If they have a computer and internet, they can run a business from anywhere in the world.
That is why so many people are going the entrepreneurial path and are taking their business overseas.
They see that it will allow them to explore their culture and also have something great to do while they are not worrying about the cost of running a business.
For example, many expats are living in the cheapest countries in the world while they are growing their business.
They see that the expense is much lower when they are living in the developing countries compared to the Western World according to this article on the Tropical MBA website.
And they don’t have to run an online business to live overseas.
If you are running a fitness training online, you can have the opportunity to live overseas and train the clients who are looking to get themselves back into great health.
Jamie Logie had the opportunity to live and work overseas in the fitness industry.
He now runs a website called Regained Wellness.com, which allows him to show people how to eat healthy and avoid the foods which makes them more sick.
He has a podcast by the same name which reached No.1 on iTunes in the New and Noteworthy section of fitness and nutrition.
And he has written two books that allowed him to attain Amazon Best-Selling Status.
So if you do have the opportunity to live overseas, now is the best time to begin.
If you put it off until the perfect time, that perfect time will probably never arrive.
Plus, you will also be among a small percentage of people who have either studied or lived overseas and in the process gain more opportunities to grow your business if you are an entrepreneur or gain full time work if you want to be an employee.
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