Author: Garth Beyer

Lost Glove. One Cold Hand.

Garth Beyer

Glove

At least 18 people felt bad today. I counted.

I waited for the bus to pick me up and transport me back to work. I noticed a single glove in the middle of the sidewalk where people get on and off the transit. It appeared not stepped on, stirring me to assume it was recently dropped. Perhaps from someone who loaded on the bus moments before I arrived at the station. Not sure what to do with it, I watched it and noticed something peculiar.

Every person who walked past the glove looked at it, stared at it just long enough to think something like “well, that sucks for someone. I wonder if they figured out they lost it yet.”

Similarly, no one knew what to do with it. They just left it there.

It surprised me to find that Jennifer Gooch tried finding a solution to this problem with onecoldhand.com. The hyperlink goes to a shout out at Carnegie Mellon University (where she attended) and not the actual website because the website no longer exists. (You can see what the website looked like by using the Internet Archive Wayback Machine.)

To keep this post short, I’ll keep my argument short.

Jennifer Gooch had the business plan backward.

Today, one person lost one glove. I then watched 18 people empathize until the 19th person actually stepped on the glove, picked it up and handed it to the bus driver. The bus driver shrugged his shoulders and tossed it on the council, certainly to stay there until he decides whether it’s better off being tossed or brought to the transit’s lost and found office. (More likely the former.)

In Pittsburgh, Gooch focused on finding the owner of the one glove, only sometimes relieving it’s owner of the minimal stress of having lost it. Both her and my own’s take is to satisfy one person is, well, satisfying. However, not remarkable.

To satisfy 18+ people in one swoop is remarkable. Instead of creating OneColdHand to meet a demand that isn’t much of a demand (most don’t think, how can I find my glove. They think, when can I go buy a new pair), Gooch could have created OneColdHandTwoWarmOnes – pairing one lost left-handed glove with one lost right-handed glove, then giving them to someone without any.

A reason so many businesses flop when trying to find a niche market is that they go after the wrong long tail. Yes, there are people who use spinoff OneColdHand websites, but there is no profitability in something that is (rarely) at most, satisfying.

Consider when you’re trying to define who you want your audience to be, that although there are people wanting to reunite with their lost glove, there are far more people who have none. The question every entrepreneur or freelancer needs to ask is “who cares more?”

Ask that question enough and you’ll have your target audience. (A profitable one.)

 

Stay Positive & If Mixmatching Socks Is A Thing, Why Not Gloves?

Garth E. Beyer

Photo credit

Every. Word. Matters.

Garth Beyer

I came across this agency’s website this evening. I love their message and nearly, just nearly, do I love their motto.

Words

“We are fearless. Inventive. Humanistic.”

Am I the only one that thinks the word humanistic looks, sounds and feels opposite of what it’s meant to? Why not shorten it. “We are fearless. Inventive. Human.”

Every word matters. You would never say your were humanly over the weekend. Nor would you say you were humanistic. Then again, I guess making mistakes like this is only human.

 

Working Like You Drive

Garth Beyer

I made the short trek north from Rockford, Illinois, to Madison, Wisconsin, today while it was snowing. The roads weren’t terrible – heading north, at least.

As for those heading south, I saw nine accidents, one of which had about an eight-car pileup. Although the road I was driving on was clear, everyone was hitting their breaks and driving 30 miles under the speed limit resulting in what’s known as gaper’s block. They slowed down to look at the accident and all the pretty lights. They focused on the accident, backing up their own traffic.

This happens often in work and on those who are taking the long trek toward a common goal – they create a gaper’s block by focusing on the failings, mistakes and accidents of others.

Fortunately, no one refuses to drive because they see an accident. It puzzles me then, how someone could quit their pursuit after seeing someone else fail.

The point: keep going.

 

Stay Positive & Don’t Look Back (Or To The Other Side Of The Road)

Garth E. Beyer

 

How Blogging Can Help You (+tips)

Garth Beyer

The following are notes and tips from fabulous blogger Danielle Bruflodt.meet-dani

How could blogging help you?

1) It puts your name out there.

2) You can control the content found when someone discovers your blog or social media accounts. What impression will you make?

3) It creates an online portfolio that speaks for itself.

4) Blogging teaches you valuable skills that you might not have had and helps improve the skills you already had.

5) Even if your career path doesn’t lead to blogging, the skillset is in demand for almost any occupation.

Tips for starting a blog.

1) Put thought into your name and brand so that you can avoid changing it later.

2) Learn to create your own graphics. Find a way to get free access to Photoshop and learn it.

3) Don’t focus on traffic. Put the content out there and focus on what you are creating and how you are presenting yourself.

4) Be consistent.

5) Look to the month ahead. You’ll be more likely to post if you plan in advance and the quality of your posts will likely improve.

6) Let your personality shine through in your writing.

7) You don’t have to be a great writer to be a blogger. You don’t have to be great at creating graphics to be a blogger. You don’t have to be great at social media or HTML or photography.

8) The Internet is your friend. Google and Youtube will become your best friends.

9) Be consistent with your branding and bio across all social media platforms. (logo, username, icons, business cards)

10) If you aren’t interested in being the “face” of a blog, look for a local blogger who needs help with ghost writing, graphic creation or social media and offer your services.

 

Stay Positive & Feel Free To Email Me For Input thegarthbox@gmail.com

Garth E. Beyer

Lessons And Reflections From Krypton Course #001

Garth Beyer

If you didn’t know, Seth Godin and his team created the Krypton Community College over the summer of 2013. The gist: get together with people to discuss, learn and create together. (Here’s the link to the first course Krypton Course #001 Go: How to Overcome Fear, Pick Yourself, & Start a Project that Matters)

The following are lessons and reflections I thought it was necessary to share.

Week one

1. You don’t need a huge group. My team started with a total of two students and one organizer. Then it dwindled to one student and one organizer. It only takes two to tango.

2. Everyone has similar fears. But they won’t believe that statement until someone speaks up and shares their fears.

3. Fear can be narrowed down to either fear of embarrassment or fear of injury. Surprisingly, people would rather risk injury than risk embarrassment. Wow.

4. Fear – the 20 second rule

Week two

1. You can plan (not set) a path for creating projects that add up to a valuable portfolio of experiences. There’s a middle ground between setting something up and allowing for complete spontaneity. Find that sweet spot.

2. Finding your edge is crucial for success. You can’t find it alone, though.

3. Feel free to read Start Schooling Dreams.

Week three

1. Committment means something different for everyone.

2. Not everything you create should be shared. Not everything you create should be kept secret. Make time for what you keep private, make more time for what you share.

3. As the famous Hugh MacLeod said, “Ignore everybody.”

4. Let what you create and share go. You’re better off creating something else, something new. Once you deliver something, detach yourself from it and go make something else remarkable.

5. Success is not a straight line. (obvious, but worth mentioning again)

Week four

1. If you’re going to share your project idea with someone, make sure they have a project idea to share with you too. Sharing your idea with someone who doesn’t have one leaves you with everything to lose. Sharing your project idea with someone who has a project idea too leaves both of you with everything to gain. (I can’t fully explain the dynamic. You will have to trust me on this one without a long explanation.)

2. You’re going to talk about your project idea and get excited. Make a conscious decision beforehand that you will use that excitement for action and not settle at just talking about it. This is the most difficult part of the entire course.

 

Stay Positive & I Hope You Will Give It A Shot*

Garth E. Beyer

*if you live in Madison, Wisconsin, let me know. I will be holding course #002 at the start of 2014.

 

Online Comments Are A Waste For News Sources

Garth Beyer

From time to time, when I get bored with Facebook, bored with the news, bored with all the other websites that I go to just to escape the pressing reality of upcoming assignments, I look at the comments of online news stories and columns. There’s real entertainment there.

In the latest of The Badger Herald comments, kyleharris215@gmail.com noted “fuck u eat shit” on a news article. The brilliant response of another, bobontheknob, was “fuck you eat shit fuck you eat shit.”

After I attended a panel discussion on “Trollish Behavior and the Future of Online Comments” hosted by the Society of Professional Journalists Madison Pro Chapter, I have it on good authority that there are equally colorful and outspoken people commenting on other news sources like Isthmus, the Wisconsin State Journal and The Capital Times.

The reason I can’t pull such vibrant examples of comments from them is that they have filters and moderators deleting the comments that are crass or aimed to harm others. What ignites the fuse to verbal fireworks in the comments section is the ability to post anonymously, according to panelist Dietram Scheufele, the John E. Ross professor in science communication at the University of Wisconsin.

As a result, many news sources force commenters to either use their Facebook login or their real name. However, according to Tim Kelley, digital media manager at Madison.com, “You would be amazed at what people will post even under their personal account.”

An extensive discussion on how to handle trollish behavior in the comments section then took place. The conclusion? There’s no real solution other than to sap the time and positive personality of the journalists themselves. The Wisconsin State Journal said that it is now having its journalists use time in their day to review the comments left on their articles. This is a harsh solution. If you’ve read any comments (or left ignorant ones of your own), you should understand why most journalists never look at the comments on their stories.

All of this lead to one encompassing question: Why do news sources allow comments on their stories when…

  1. Almost no revenue is derived from allowing comments, according to Kelley.
  2. The upkeep of moderation and filtration is time consuming.
  3. Someone who has a suggestion or fact checking reply to an article can just email the author. Better yet, according to Mark Pitsch, SPJ president, “They can pick up a phone and call them.”
  4. Commenting on a news article is not a valuable form of civil or democratic participation.

The real conclusion that no one wanted to stand up and voice is that all the news sources are still trying to figure out why they allow comments. Then again, I figured we all do things that are a waste of our time. I suppose online news sources can, too.