Daily Intent

Santa Barbara, CA
Eight conscious Catalyst For Thought members shared in an intimate lunch at Santa Barbara’s prestigious University Club Wednesday.  I was fortunate enough to facilitate the event focused on Wild Web Marketeer Ms. Lorrie Thomas.  Current trends were discussed.  Social media foundations highlighted.  Propelling ones business forward into the new “wild west frontier” extrapolated. In short, many nuggets of greatness empowered those in attendance.  

Ms. Thomas founds her teachings on a basic principal: “marketing is about building relationships.”  Whether one is in tech, media, insurance, or finance, marketing begins with getting to know your client and your client getting to know you.  Trust and understanding are main pillars in doing so.

She described “social media” as an “interactive rolodex”, and one of many wonderful web tools to use in building trusting business-to-client relationships.  If used correctly, it does three things: “communicates, collaborates, and entertains.”

With Twitter and Facebook at the forefront of the social media marketing buzz, Lorrie encouraged each member to analyze their own businesses.  “You only want to drive traffic back to a website that works.”

Do you have infrastructure set up to handle Twitter and Facebook leads?  Are there people in place to respond when prospects reply back to your tweets and status updates?  Are you leading your clients back to a website that is ready to ask for a transaction?  Or does your website lack direction, thus losing the impact of your leads?  For you could drive 80,000 people to your site each day, however if you can’t convert them into sales, you might be wasting your time tweeting.

In regard to tweeting, understand, at the end of the day, people want to feel you are educating them.  We all receive plenty of extra emails wanting our attention.  Respect the recipient and their time.  Tweets should be of value to not just you the business owner, but also your prospective client.

In conclusion, she asked us all to dig deeper into our businesses.  A business owner should always be asking: “Who am I?  What/who do I serve?  How do I make money?”  If your new marketing campaign or business ideas don’t fall within these guidelines, you may just need to set it aside.

Focus.  Be purposeful in your actions.   Tweet away.
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Inspire Santa Barbara - “It is not what happens to you, it’s what you do about it.”  W. Mitchell. Last night the event was phenomenal.  W. Mitchell had the crowd laughing then crying, and all leaving inspired.

Catalyst for Thought - “Invest in Yourself.  Invest in Your Community.”  July 21, 2009.  The Canary Hotel.  6pm.  $10 online.  $15 at the door.  www.catalystsb.org.

Buzzword: Active Box
“This refers to the physical location in a brokerage where securities are kept.  These securities are usually held as collateral for customers’ margin positions. Also known as open box. ” -Investopedia.com

For those that participated in the 4th of July “Box Game” OR have the greatness last name ever mispronounced “Bochsler” aka Boxler, this one is for you.

  Five Points to Ponder:

   1. Markets suffer as investors fear poor earnings reports next week.  The consumer confidence index decreased  to 64.6 after four months of gains.  The trade deficit narrowed to its smallest margin since 1999.
   2. Markets - The Dow is trading at 8123, S&P 500 at 877 while the Nasdaq is at 1753.  Oil is down to $59/bbl.
   3. US meets Russia.  Obama and Medvedev.  Then Putin.  Nuclear weapons and economic cohesion the main takeaways.
   4. The G-8 Summit concluded today with climate change and world trade leading the talks.  Seven documents of agreement were signed.
   5. Celtics sign Rasheed Wallace.  The Laker’s Lamar in limbo.  Vasquez, local Santa Barbaran, pitching well for the Pirates.    Ricky Ho wins NiteMoves.  The ocean is now warm enough to swim in!

Positives:

    * Renewed talks between the United States and Russia have set forth agreements reducing nuclear arm holdings and increased transparency in business and trade.  US companies have been pulling out of Russia due to a risky business structure.  Government recognition and progress should aid in our resurgence.
    * Gas prices ought to be coming down in time for your summer road trips.
    * Vasquez has put in a lot of hard work in the off season, and in double and triple-a.  It is great to see a success story come out of the competitive minor league system.
    * People are pulling back on making big purchases due to lowering confidence.  This isn’t great for GDP levels, or GMs revival, however it is good for savings.

Negatives:

    * As the stock market falls, so does consumer confidence.  Our emotions are quite fickle.  Investors change in their bets on the future determine our feelings about our home, our finances, and our happiness.
    * Unemployment is expected to hit 10% by year’s end and economic news next week could perpetuate the recent downfall in confidence and stock prices.
    * Our US trade deficit shrinking is due to the rest of the world rebounding quicker than Americans.  Other countries are beginning to buy more as we are continuing our stagnant purchasing ways.
    * The Celtics are going to be tough with Rasheed.  The Lakers picking up Artest will help keep them in contention.

Services: Changing Jobs?
Many friends and business associates have mentioned they are in a time of transition.  Whether you find yourself being laid off, in a job you dislike, or currently unemployed, please reach out to me.  I would be happy to get your resume into the hand of those that seem to be possible matches.

Local:

Semana Nautica Beach Challenge
Where: East Beach
When: 10am - 12pm
Cost: $10
Why:  Start your beach day with some exercise for great causes. (SB Team in Training.  SB Lifeguards)
Forecast: Sunny all day.  74 degrees.

Live and Be Well,

Jeff Bochsler