I got to thinking today of the popularity of cell phones and just how intrusive they have become in our lives. I stopped to think when I bought my first plan. Technically, I bought a prepaid cell phone back in 2001 for my mother sorta as a family phone when I worked for Cingular. But I didn't get my own plan until 2003 (call me a late bloomer). So...

When did you buy/get your first cell phone?
	1999 (or before)
	2000
	2001
	2002
	2003
	2004 (or after)

Connect Magazine has a fairly new ad campaign aimed at soliciting user-generated feedback from its readers. The campaign shows close-ups of several individuals (some prominent) with the quoted text, "I'm Editor-in-Chief," suggesting that anyone can make recommendations for improvement. That's a good thing. So it is in this public forum and with the utmost respect that I offer the following two suggestions after reading the first article from the magazine's January issue (Nota bene: The online version only contains half of the print formatting problems I'll discuss below):

1. Reference yourself as a proper noun. As you'll see on both the online and print versions of Connect Magazine, the publication always references itself in-paragraph as "connect" sans capitalizing the "c" despite their being a proper noun. The reason -- I suspect -- is because the publication uses all lowercase letters in their logotype like several other companies do including my own. But the war waged against uppercase proper nouns in writing will never be won. Rather, the attempt in creating an exception to the rule is confusing to readers, and frankly, looks amateurish; like something a brash mom-and-pop shop would do shortly after creating their first company name. People don't expect proper English on a creative logo, but they do expect it when reading copy. So ditch the lowercase "c" at the paragraph level if you want to mitigate confusion.
2. Quit changing the font type, its size, or its color in-paragraph. In paper form, Connect now uses a bright orange (its corporate color) when referencing itself or its URL in addition to snubbing conventional proper nouns. It also appears that they change the font type and its size a bit. This issue is largely more problematic that the first. It significantly reduces the readability by disrupting text continuity. The overall reading experience feels like that of driving your car over those annoying speed bumps in front of elementary schools. I'm betting the magazine did this in a vane attempt to combat the reader confusion cited above, which -- if accurately assumed -- would be ridiculous. And no, just because online articles can get away with colored hyperlinking doesn't mean you can in print form. You're a magazine not a website!

The above two suggestions are sure to increase the professionalism, usability, and most importantly, the readability of an already excellent publication. After all, Connect sells reading material for a living. They'd be wise not to alienate that experience for creativity's sake or ambitious differentiation. Disclosure: I write for Connect.

Dell lost its position as the number one PC manufacturer last year to HP. Though I used to swear by Dells, their prices have increased while their quality has rapidly decreased, hence, the last PC I bought was an HP. So what's behind Dell's recent funk? Bureaucracy says the newly appointed CEO, Michael Dell. "We have great people ... but we also have a new enemy: bureaucracy, which costs us money and slows us down," Dell wrote. "We created it, we subjected our people to it and we have to fix it!" Note: No one can fix bureaucracy, but transparency sure can help mitigate it. But come to think of it, I can't think of any large company that manages it well. You?

If you are interested in learning more about angels and VCs, I found 2 blogs this week that provide great content.

1. An unknown angel investor out of Colorado has started to blog at www.5280angel.com.
2. Also, Brad Feld and Jason Mendelson (Mobius Venture Capital) have started Ask the VC blog.  The 2 of them use the blog to answer common questions that VCs get asked.

This year, I've been invited to serve as a judge for the Stoel Rives Innovation Awards. The following is taken from the Stoel Rives site:

Entry Deadline

Entries can be submitted beginning Thursday, January 11, 2007. The official entry deadline is February 23, 2007.

Entry Categories

Innovations in the following seven areas are recognized in the Utah Innovation Awards:

• Biotechnology/Pharmaceuticals
• Chemicals/Materials Science
• Computer Hardware/Electrical Devices
• Consumer Software and Web Services
• Enterprise Software and Web-Enabled B2B Solutions
• Mechanical Devices
• Medical Devices

Judging  A Selection Committee comprised of approximately 50 professionals from Utah's business, technology and academic communities, all with technical experience pertaining to one of the program's seven categories, will carefully review the nominations during a three-week evaluation process. During this process, each Selection Committee member will also review nominations in a Subcommittee pertaining to his/her area of expertise. In the event that conflicts exist between Selection Committee members and nominations, members will provide full disclosure to the rest of the committee. Following the evaluation process, each Selection Committee member will vote on ALL nominations submitted in EACH category. The three nominations receiving the largest number of votes, will be named as finalists in each category.

Religion and capitalism have never been better friends. Sure, Disney backed away from promoting “Narnia” as a religious film, but Mel Gibson’s “Passion of the Christ” was a hit. Christian music is flooding the radio and products marketed to the faithful are everywhere. (Don’t tell me you haven’t seen the WWJD bracelets.)

This month’s marketing challenge focuses on a local company that has grown right along with this trend, but with an interesting twist.

The Situation
Shade Clothing makes high quality, modest clothing. In Utah, where the dominant religion heavily emphasizes modesty, Shade is a big hit. Much bigger than founder and CEO Chelsea Rippy had expected. The first year of the company’s life went something like this: a customer would buy a shirt, love it, then buy 10 more and tell her friends about it. Each of the friends would do the same.

This explosive growth outpaced supply. Competitors sprung up, as they do in any successful industry. Shade took a step back and evaluated the market. Its word-of-mouth marketing was organized into a network of personal shoppers that offered incentives for people to refer their friends. This is still, according to Rippy, the most effective marketing channel.

But Rippy is finding success in other channels, too. Shade launched sales in Costco and a number of boutiques and mall carts, with a retail presence now in 13 states. Its Web site (shadeclothing.com) offers direct sales and features regular promotions – only 30 percent of the Web site sales come from within Utah. Its PR firm has done a great job and Shade Clothing has even been featured in the New York Times.

The Problem
The problem is that outside of Utah, and aside from a few other pockets of predominantly Mormon areas, “modest undershirts” are not the same instant selling point they tend to be here. The products are not obviously religious, or restricted to any specific religion in any way, but the religious emphasis on modesty has clearly been a large factor in the company’s success in Utah. And while it’s not saturated, the market in Utah is slowing down. Competition is eating at market share within the state. So reaching out is essential.

Rippy mentions a new product line, “Basic Black” semi-formal dresses, as a possible solution. With her brother, she launched a site selling high-end, designer t-shirts (brotherforsister.com) as another venture that might help. These products might sell better, but the company faces a big step as it looks to change focus.

The Challenge
So what should Shade Clothing do? How can it best support its successful, national PR campaign? How can it reach people and what should it say? Should it focus on new products, or can the traditional products sell? Rippy doesn’t want to risk alienating her core customer base, but what can Shade do to reach a new group of customers?

Remember, this is a column where you do more than just read and think. We want you to read and write back! (Preferably with some thinking between the reading and writing.)

Next month, we’ll feature the best answers we received to the last installment’s challenge about the Bombay House restaurants. And after that, we’ll share the best ideas we get for Shade Clothing. And the lucky writer who submits the idea we judge to be the very best will get a $50 gift certificate to Shade Clothing and the good feeling that comes with knowing you’re an absolute genius.

You can e-mail me directly at tom@connect-utah.com or post thoughts and questions on our blog, at (www.connectblogs.com/marketing-from-the-masses).

Happy thinking!

I realize this commercial is over a year old, but it still cracks me up. And you gotta watch it a second time for the full klepto goodness. But on an advertising ROI basis, I'm not sure if the ad increases Starburst's bottom-line. It may only be memorable via its wittiness rather than its ability of creating an emotional impulse to buy more Starbursts. Regardless, it's good stuff.

It’s been a while since I’ve done a Friday round up. Here it goes… 

Good bye Provo Labs aggregator, hello Connect Blogs!

I just got dumped by the Provo Labs aggregator! It looks like someone at Provo Labs finally figured out that I haven’t been with the “company” for about half a year. My traffic dropped off by 25% when I was first dumped but then it was back up to normal levels within a week.

I can’t wait for the Connect Blogs to get up and running all the way (it’s still in beta). Its going to be much cooler than the P. Labs aggregator. It may surprise you to learn that the original Connect Blogs was actually an idea hatched out of 10Speed Media. The original business plan at 10Speed Media had us building blog networks for major media outlets and then using those outlets as promotional vehicles for our clients. Judd Bagley and I met with Colin at the Tucanos in Provo last March and set the plan in action. We actually paid for the original development of Connect Blogs - that’s why you also saw the “powered by 10Speed Media” line on the site until about a week ago (10Speed has gone the way of the dodo but that’s for another post).

So, I’m glad to see at least one positive thing come out of 10Speed Media.

Linkedin Raises $13M

Linkedin just raised $13M putting their valuation at $250M. Arriginton thinks they are positioning themselves for an IPO. About the time that Linkedin started I was dabbling in social networking. Crap, why didn’t I think of this? 

Interviewed by Inc. Magazine

Speaking of Linkedin, on Tuesday I was interviewed by David Freedman at Inc. Magazine for a story on Linkedin and social media. Check out David’s new book - A Perfect Mess and look for his article with quotes from yours truly on the next couple of months.   

Hillary Clinton

I’m going to go out on a limb right now and predict that Hillary Clinton will not be the next President. Not only will she not be the next president but she won’t even have her parties nomination. There are too many things in the news that indicate that her support among key insiders is gone. what’s more, only 4 out of 10 registered Democrats support her. My prediction is Obama will have the nomination.

Books

I’ve been reading like a maniac lately. Here’s a round up on what I have read in the last month:

• Hiding in Plain Site. The book was poorly written and some key information went without outside sources but its was still an interesting read.
• China, Inc. If you read this blog post you don’t need to read the book.
• The Naked Capitalist. Excellent review of Quigley’s Tragedy and Hope by Cleon Skousen.
• The Naked Communist. Excellent rebuke of Karl Marx and his crap philosophy by Cleon Skousen.
• None Dare Call it Conspiracy. Excellent book on the history of global banking and the socialist movement.
• Awakening to our Awful Situation. A careful comparison between our times and the Nephite civilization of 2000 years ago. I highly recommend this book.

In the queue I have:

• Collapse by Jared Diamond. This is a study on how societies choose to fail or succeed.
• Blowback by Chalmers Johnson. 
• A Perfect Mess by David Freedman (see above)

Can you recommend a good book for me?

Podcasting

I finished editing several podcasts this week. I’ll post them on Podango and Rocky Mountain Voices next week. More to come. 

Final Note on Sundance

Sundance turned out to be a dud for Podango. We were supposed to be in some club with the people from Absolut Vodka but the Absolut people forgot to get a liquor license and had to shut down their events. Imagine that!

Also, no 4 am departures from the Heber airport this year. Thank you Hollywood freaks.  

Rollins out at Dell

Kevin Rollins has been fired by Michael Dell. Here’s a quote from Dell: “Kevin has been a great business partner and friend. He has made significant contributions to our business over the past 10 years. I wish him much success in the future.” 

Translation: Rollins was fired.

Let me guess - accounting improprieties, defective products and slipping market share to HP were probably more than the board could tolerate. Don’t even get me started on their India-based customer support group.

I wonder if BYU will still keep the Rollins Center for eBusiness? Kind of embarrassing for the school if you ask me.

Trump should join Rollins 

Apparently Donald Trump tried to negotiate a Playboy shoot for newly rahabbed Miss USA, Tara Conner. Boy, what a scumbag. So porn is OK but drugs aren’t? Nice one, Donald - you chump!

Billionaire Boom

Speaking of Billionaires, I want to leave you with this excellent commentary by Arnaud de Borchgrave of the Washington Times. It’s a great read on the current state of our society.

The Secret

Has anyone seen the movie The Secret? It’s about the law of attraction. if you’ve seen it, do you recommend it? Why or why not? 

Finally…

When the heck is PayPerPost going to die? I HATE this company and I especially can’t stand this clown. You’ve got to love the Calacanis hit jobs on these guys. It’s great to read and I agree with Jason 100%! Die, PayPerPost. DIE!

Have a great weekend!

Indemnification:  When a business owner sells a business to a new buyer, the seller makes a host of representations about the condition of the business and then provides an indemnification or guarantee that the representations are accurate.

The indemnification may take a variety of forms.  Typically, an insignificant amount of damage occuring to the buyer based on errors in the representations is considered normal and the sellers provide no compensation for such de minimus claims.  At the other end of the extreme, the seller's liability is typically capped at some level (rarely equal to the proceeds, but it can approach that threshold).

For example, if following the sale of the business in which the seller represented that no employee claims were outstanding or threatened for actions of management prior to the sale, an employee makes a claim for $10,000 for vacation pay that was not previously paid but should have been, the buyer would typically have to make that payment.

On the other hand, if an employee were to make a multi-million dollar claim for sexual harrassment, the seller would typically be called upon to solve the problem for the buyer, up to a limit.

Of course, this assumes that the buyer has purchased the seller's share's in the corporation and not merely the assets from the business.  If the assets are purchased, the liabilities not expressly assumed by the buyer are retained by the seller.

Junto is accepting applicants for the 2007 class.  Check out the new website and new video intro.  If you are a first-time entrepreneur, I would recommend applying.
I recently started a blog entry entitled “The Skinny on the Junto Partners Program” that I will be publishing sooner than later.  It’s been a wild ride for 20 months and I’ve learned a lot.  My Junto Partners rock.