Delano, Jack,, 1914-, photographer.  find it here

Retiring a locomotive driver wheel in the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe railway locomotive shops, Shopton, near Fort Madison, Iowa. The tire is heated by means of gas until it can be slipped over the wheel. Contraction on cooling will hold it firmly in place. Santa Fe R.R.

1943 – March

If you’ve seen much of my blog, you might have noticed that I’m using pictures for most of my posts these days.  I’m a visual person and really drawn to photography – hopefully it’s something that other people enjoy.

What’s really cool is that I’ve found a couple of resources to use as a free and legal source for great images.

The first resource is a great article from Skelliewag (a blogger from Australia that does a great job on blogging in general).  Her article: Guide to finding and using incredible Flickr Images gives a step by step process on how to find Creative Commons (i.e. not copyrighted) photos that you can legally use by attributing the photographer.  Copyright infringement is a big deal and she gives a very clear explanation on how to avoid it.

The second resource I just discovered today on Wisebread in this article:  Help Yourself to Amazing Photos from the Library of Congress.  Earlier this month, the Library of Congress announced that they were working with Flickr to make thousands of their most popular photographs available to the public without any copyright restrictions!

Not only is that a great resource for blogging, publishing, etc, but the pictures themselves are fascinating.  I haven’t had a chance to go through in any detail yet but there are some really amazing historical images on there.  I have a feeling you’ll be seeing quite a few more of these in future posts.

You can find the primary page Here.  Enjoy and let me know what you think!

Shawn Kinkade   www.aspirekc.com

By now, as a small business owner, you’ve likely seen all sorts of articles and posts on why it’s important to have a blog to promote your business.

www.Entrepreneur.com  has a great article from almost a year ago Should You Start A Business Blog?  The answer is yes and their primary reason is as a marketing tool to help generate sales leads.  Here are some other key points from the article:

• A blog allows you to interact with your clients in a totally different way than any other marketing approach.  You can educate and get to know prospects without ‘selling’ to them.
• Because they are interactive, a blog can be used for real-time candid feedback and product development ideas.
• A blog gives your company a personal side and a personality (although this is less of an issue for small businesses, it’s still important).

Read More…

There’s a lot of hype, misinformation and general confusion around the term Web 2.0.  There’s also an entire generation entering the workforce (“Generation Net”) that’s never known a world without being connected and interacting over the web.

So what is Web 2.0?  As a small business owner should you care? and how does it apply now or in the near future?

First off I’ll take a shot at a definition/explanation:

Here’s a mindmap that was developed by Tim O’Reilly in an article he wrote in September of 2005 (What is Web 2.0?) (Click the graphic to see a larger version)

From the Wikipedia entry on Web 2.0 wiki Web_2, here are some of the primary Web 2.0 characteristics :

• “Network as platform”  delivering (and allowing users to use) applications entirely through a browser.
• Users owning the data on a site and exercising control over that data.
• An architecture of participation that encourages users to add value to the application as they use it.  This stands in sharp contrast to hierarchical access control in applications, in which systems categorize users into roles with varying degrees of functionality.
• A rich, interactive, user-friendly interface based on Ajax or similar frameworks.
• Some social-networking aspects.

I’m not an expert on this, but if I had to simplify and summarize my understanding, Web 2.0 is the evolution of the internet, primarily the critical addition of interactivity and simple sharing of information in all sorts of formats based on the user’s needs and wants (and not the providers).

Greg Balanko-Dickson (who is an expert on this…) did a great series of articles on Relationships 2.0 (i.e. using Web 2.0 to build relationships with customers).  You can see the first article here.

The reason I was sparked on this topic was a couple of articles that I read today along with an interesting conversation I had last night.

First up was a column in the Kansas City Star from Diane Stafford – Web 2.0 the next frontier, the article was a write-up of a seminar on Web 2.0 Marketing that she attended.  Her conclusion is that a Web 2.0 approach is the future of marketing, but there’s a long way to go before people really understand and embrace it.

Next up was an article/blog entry from FastCompany – Web 2.0 and Personal Branding.  The interesting quote out of the article that caught my eye was:

“Suddenly, thanks to web sites and interactive tools like blogs, podcasts and video, you have the opportunity for seemingly gazillions of people (over a billion folks today are online) to know about you and your brand. Frankly, if you’re not taking advantage of this, you’re not truly marketing.”

So all of this would tend to lead you to believe that it’s all about technology and, if you believe the hype, the spoils will go to whoever can use the most widgets, gadgets and online sophistication.

Which leads me to the conversation I had with Bill Patterson of Nation Ranch, a Marketing Communications firm here in Kansas City. (link to the Nation Ranch Blog).  The logo for Nation Ranch is a steaming coffee cup, symbolizing that business, even in today’s high tech world, is done over a cup of coffee – by people. 

Bill’s point (borrowed from his website) is the following:

Technology is an important means of communicating with your customers, but technology should only facilitate human interaction and not replace human interactions with your customers.

The conclusion that I reached from all of this (I’m sure you were hoping I had a point here somewhere…) is that Web 2.0 technology is important now but it’s most important that you connect with your customers as a person.

To quote Jeffrey Gitomer (among others) “People buy from People” and even more importantly, “People buy from people they know, like and trust”.

So what are some things you should be considering?

1. Start off small – get a website!  According to the 2007 survey done by the NSBA (NSBA survey) only 60% of businesses have a website.  Even if you only put up a page or two describing who you are, what you do and why someone should work with you, it would put you in the game.  Money much better spent than a phone book ad for most businesses (in my opinion).
2. Start learning about all of this new technology.  You don’t need to be an expert, but you should get comfortable with the basic terminology and products and tools that are available.
3. Consider starting a blog.  It can even take the place of a website.  I’ve seen several businesses that use their blog as their business website.  With the blogging platforms that are available now, anyone can easily learn and be up and running in no time.  I use WordPress, but Blogger, Typepad and others are all viable options.
4. Consider talking to an expert in the space.  I already mentioned Nation Ranch, but you could also talk to Matt Simpson at Infusion Creative or Tobin Truog at Brain Bucket all of them are great guys that have some fantastic ideas on how small businesses can embrace the internet.

I’m sure I missed a ton of ideas – are you using anything unique or interesting to take advantage of new technology that is actively bringing you customers?  Share it here.

Shawn Kinkade  www.aspirekc.com

Adam over at Ask the Biz Coaches blog recently had a great post on What can technology do for your business?  Adam suggested a few tips to consider when it comes to technology and your business:  (see details in the post).

Adam was inspired by using a new state of the art driver at the driving range.  About the same time I ran across the following news story that I was inspired with and found amazing:   2007/08/06 Levitate in the London Telegraph. 

In case it’s not clear, that is a picture of levitation in action.  The article explains that this is possible by reversing the Casimir force (a consequence of quantum physics) and could be used for all sorts of amazing applications. (read the article).

As the little kid in the movie the Incredibles says “THAT…WAS…AWESOME!!!”

It’s stuff like this that makes me believe that we are living in the most amazing time in recorded history.

You probably don’t need to do any planning for incorporating levitation into your daily business operations just yet, but there are a lot of slightly less amazing things that are coming out all the time.

Here are a couple of examples that I thought were interesting:

http://www.dimdim.com/  An Open Source Web conferencing application that allows shared presentations across the Internet for free.  Could be used for remote teams, clients or prospects.

http://www.billingorchard.com/  – “an online electronic billing software application that maintains hourly time billing, along with flat fee and recurring billing, managed using your web browser.”  Easy to use  application to track hours across your team, fixed fees and invoices for customers.

http://www.plaxo.com/about  – “Plaxo, Inc. keeps people connected by solving the common and frustrating problem of out-of-date contact information. Founded in July 2001, Plaxo provides a free service that securely updates and maintains the information in your address book.”  Ingenious way to make sure you keep up to date with all of your contacts, great for networking and prospecting.

There are literally hundreds (probably thousands) of additional applications that are available with a click of your mouse.  This is just a quick sampling.

Is there some aspect of your business that’s frustrating you or holding you back?  It might be time to search to see if there’s a new tool, application or way of doing business enabled by new technology.

What would you upgrade right now if you could?

Have you used anything new or cutting edge in your business?

I’m off to wash my hover car – have a great day!

Shawn Kinkade – www.aspirekc.com