Ending the Name Game

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What's In a Name...

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Somebody Has a Funny Sense of Humor

Last Saturday Brody and I went to breakfast together. We walked past a small construction area where the below drawing was on the sidewalk. Somebody has a funny sense of humor...

The Marketing Value of Personal Recognition

I recently have been the lucky recipient of personal recognition as a valued customer. For many organizations personal recognition marketing gets regularly overlooked as one of the best and very cheap ways to spend marketing time and money.

Have you recently personally recognized a customer for their value? Without them you wouldn't be in business...

Example #1
I've written before on my transition to using a local bank (or credit union in my case) versus a big-impersonal-conglomerate-that-apparently-does-not-care-if-they-have-my-money-type-bank (aka Wells Fargo). Since switching to Wescom I have received now at least two (maybe three) personal letters from staff at the bank. I think it is important to note that it is not always from the branch manager but from the bank teller of my last visit. I have never banked at any other bank where the teller sends a "you are valued" letter.P.S. Despite what Chrystal says it is not because I'm Daddy-Big-Bucks. Not even close!

Example #2
When I switched from a PC to a Mac I found the need to have an MS Office compatible program with the hope to not pay through my nose for it. On the recommendation of a friend I downloaded NeoOffice and have been "reviewing it" for about 6 months. This week I came to the final conclusion that "it is awesome". I think it is awesome for two major reasons. First, all the functionality I need is there. Second, it's FREE! That's right, a FREE Office Software Suite that includes compatible versions of MS Word, MS Excel, MS PowerPoint, and MS Access. It also has a very basic Visio type program. I only use Writer (Word) and Calc (Excel) but I have not yet had a single compatibility problem. NeoOffice asks for donations to support keeping the software free, so upon deciding how useful it was I made a donation. I immediately received the below automatic email.
But then I also received a personal email from Patrick thanking me for my donation.
Oh, and for the record my very large donation was $100, which seemed really cheap considering it saved me the $400 expense of buying Office for Mac.

On Feeling Like an Adult

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Blanchard Block Party!

Last Sunday afternoon our REALITY Home Group hosted a block party on Blanchard Street (the street we live on). It was so much fun! The wind picked up and it got cold but people stuck it out. Todd cooked up some absolutely mouth watering tri-tip. Like I've never had tri-tip this good...ever. Everyone from our Home Group pitched in and we really had such a wonderful time, and I think everyone that came did as well.

We were planning for about 50 people and didn't get quite that many but we got to meet some neighbors and hear some awesome stories. Our neighbor directly across the street has lived there for 32 years and has never seen anyone on the street coordinate a block party! That really amazed me as every neighborhood I've ever lived in has done a block party, and I've never lived at any address longer than 6 years.

Todd apparently saying something very funny to Georgina.

Rich and Charles doing it unplugged style on the wall.

When it got so cold our neighbor brought out blankets for all the girls.
I think a bunch of them wanted to keep the blankets because they were so awesome!

I'm hoping this will be the first block party of many. I've already got some serious ideas about getting permission to block off the street for Fiesta!

The main reason for the block party was to connect with our community but to also invite people to the Easter Service at REALITY. If you normally head to Church on Easter but are not sure where you are going we would all love to see you at REALITY on Sunday morning. The service is held outside at Carpenteria High this Sunday at 10:00 am. After the service we'll have carne asade and the kiddos (if you have them) can jump in the bounce houses and play games.

If you do decide to come visit try and and find me as I'd love to meet you. It may be easier to find my gorgeous and very pregnant wife. Either way we hope to see you there!

Compelling Rhetoric About Your Resume

A few months back I wrote a post about resume writing called Care Enough to be Different. Today I read a post by Seth Godin that moves the ability to be unique and remarkable in your resume to a whole new level. His opinion is to be so bold as to not even have a resume.

Read his post here. It is worth your time to think about his thoughts.

Remember The Name(s)

I'm terrible at it. Absolutely horrible. When I meet someone it is almost for certain that 10 seconds later I can't remember their name. I know it is one of my worst traits and I hate it about myself.

Image provided by ArstySF

I'm envious of people that remember names because it comes natural and even more envious of those that have trained themselves to be better at it. I have tried almost all methods: say it 8 times in the next minute, word association, activity association, writing it down...none of it works for me.

It is important to remember someone's name for many reasons, but I think the most important is because it shows you care. Note I did not say it shows you listened. Listening is important, but caring is more important.

As I was trying to find a parking place at Church today I saw my new friend Dave from the Mammoth Ski Trip. I rolled the window down and yelled, "Hey Dave!" He came over and said, "Hey Kevin," and then looked in the back and said "Hey Brody, gimme five." It is important to note here that Dave had never met my son Brody. He had heard about him during our trip but never met him. He cared enough to not only remember my name but to remember Brody's name. He knew Brody was really important to me and it showed that he cared about that. I immediately felt like I was important to Dave...which made me feel great.

The next time you want to make someone feel like you care, remember the name(s) of people that are important to them...which will always include their own name.

And if you have any fail proof method of learning names please tell me...I would love to be better!

"Blogger Buster" - The Best "How To" Blogger Site

As I've gone through the process of customizing my blogger blogs and struggling through the html on how to get it setup. I've used lots of different help resources using multiple Google search terms. But last week I found THE site for blogger users on customizing your blog. Blogger Buster by Amanda Fazini is now my one-stop-site for anything "how to" on blogger. I even emailed Amanda directly last week on a problem I was having with the line height on htms (for the record I had no idea at the time the problem was with my line height). She emailed me back the next day with the most likely resolution...and she was totally right! I also found out how to implement page links for my htms blog on Blogger Buster. I was thinking about switching to WordPress because I could not figure out how to do page links, but now that I've figured it out I'm no way changing.Amanda also gave me props on my blog layout, which makes me feel great because I think her layout is KILLER!

Here is what else I love about Blogger Buster. Blogger Buster offers everything FREE! Amanda even wrote a pdf guide on tips for designing your blog and it's all FREE! The value of FREE cannot be understated! It not only brings people to your site but also breeds loyalty because your hard work supports others success. It is a wonderfully authentic and extremely effective marketing tactic.

Thanks Amanda!

"Ya-ttitude" - A Great New Blog

For those of you that have not found it yet, "Ya-ttitude" by Benny Greenberg is one of the best new blogs on the web. If you are interested in joining the allied forcies against the Procrasti-NATION read his blog and join the fight.
Thanks Benny for the insightful wisdom and witty rhetoric!