Alec Brownstein decided he wanted a job with one of NYC’s top creative directors, and wasn’t going to wait around for a job opening to apply. In a bold and impossibly creative move, he spent six dollars and came up with this:

Alec’s approach was so simple and so direct, that it will undoubtedly be copied frequently by other job seekers. And why not? It was imaginative, it was unique and it worked. No reason others shouldn’t push the same envelopes in their job search endeavors as well and take full ownership of their personal brand and determine precisely how it’s presented.

For those imaginative small business owners, you can do the exact same thing when preparing to meet with a client who needs SEO or social media services. Buy the Google adwords for their company name a few days ahead of your meeting. Then, during your pitch, ask them to Google themselves and see your pitch for their precise needs at the top of the page. They’ll wonder how you got the top position, they’ll be impressed that you know how to manipulate the page rankings and you’ll have demonstrated your capacity to outimagine your competitors.

Bottom line, for a few dollars and a few minutes of your time, you and your firm can appear distinctive and memorable. And that’s always a good thing.

I’ve been approached at several recent speaking events by businesspeople eager to become engaged with social media but afraid of the repercussions of negative comments or complaints. It’s not unusual for executives to see the negative potential of any new technology or initiative before considering its vast potential, so I thought I’d clarify what I told them.

If your business engages in unethical or inappropriate behavior, then you have legitimate reasons to worry about the potential negative impact of social media since social media doesn’t camouflage your true identity, it reveals it.

However, if your concern centers around the potential reaction to typical business slip-ups and oversights, then you really have nothing to worry about as long as you demonstrate immediate empathy and care for your clients. And when you make a mistake, as everyone does, follow these simple, proven rules:

1. Apologize. If you screwed up, simply acknowledge your mistake and say you’re sorry. We all  make mistakes every day. And we deal with companies that make mistakes every day. We understand that mistakes are inevitable. However, we expect that if you make a mistake that you will acknowledge it and proffer a sincere apology. Your apology isn’t an invitation to sue you or embarrass you, it’s simply an acknowledgement of societal norms that require the acceptance of responsibility for one’s actions.
2. Resolve to fix the mistake. The apology is a great start, but the problem still remains. You screwed up. You sent the wrong product. You didn’t deliver your proposal on time. You overcharged on your invoice. Whatever you did (or failed to do) still needs to be corrected. So, step up and tell them how you intend to fix the problem and ask them if that effort is satisfactory.
   One of the biggest mistakes I see companies make is offering a solution that benefits them, but not the client. If you failed to deliver your product on time, it’s your responsibility to overnight the product, to get it there as fast as you can. I don’t care if you have to eat the extra shipping costs. I expect you to do the right thing, even if it’s inconvenient or expensive. That’s how you show you really care about fixing your failure.
   If you offer to fix the problem, and your client says “that’s not good enough,” then you’ve got to work with the client to determine exactly how you can make things right.
3. Fix it. Steps 1 and 2 are actually pretty easy. You say you’re sorry and offer to fix the problem. The tough part is actually fixing the problem since this is your final chance to ensure that your relationship isn’t significantly harmed. If you promise to overnight a spare part, you’d better make sure that the part is put in a box, is properly labeled and is handed off to FedEx. Don’t delegate, do it yourself.
4. BONUS STEP: Follow up. Once you’re sure that the problem has been resolved exactly how you promised, make a follow up call (not a tweet or email) to let your client know how important they are and to demonstrate your care and concern. I know that your first reaction will be to ignore the problem rather than revisit it, but you’ll actually enhance your reputation by confronting it, ensuring that it’s resolved and proving your value as a reliable and caring business partner. Pick up the phone.

Typically, it’s best to take the conversation off-line while you’re addressing a client’s problems. After you reach out to them online to let them know that you heard their complaint and that you want to take care of the problem, suggest that they contact you through a Twitter direct message, an email or a phone call so your conversations and ultimate problem resolution remain private.

I never thought I’d have to write the following sentence, but a recent event demonstrated otherwise:

Never combine a condolence letter with a blatant, self-serving sales pitch.

The backstory:

Yesterday I received a message through LinkedIn from the CEO of a local firm that specializes in social media marketing. Yep, one of our own. The message’s subject line read: We heard through the grapevine about your loss, referring to the sudden and tragic death of one of my colleagues last week.

I was taken aback by the message since I did not personally know the CEO and had never conducted any type of business with his firm. However, I read on, expecting a standard note of condolence. Holy cow, was I wrong. The message read:

All of us here at Company X are very sorry for your loss. If there is anything we can to to help keep everyone’s chins up, just let us know.

The Technic on July 24th might be a great outing to start looking forward to – we are expecting over 300 and Microsoft has joined the sponsors list.

All the best,

I was stunned. Did he really just suggest that in the aftermath of a shocking personal loss I should start looking forward to a summer picnic he was sponsoring? And then wish me all the best?

This was exploitation of social media at its most crass and tasteless. Apparently, the sender was looking for a way to connect with me to promote his event and decided to use LinkedIn to find me and employ tragedy as his hook. Brilliant marketing strategy.

I did some investigation and found that this CEO actually teaches classes on how to establish strategic business relationships using LinkedIn. Personally, I’d challenge his qualifications.

UPDATE:  The author of the message called me this afternoon to express his regret that his message was interpreted as an insensitive and clumsy attempt at promotion. He explained to me his true intentions which I believe were sincere and supportive. I expressed my appreciation for his reaching out to me personally to clarify his intentions and informed him that I would immediately update my post to reflect his sentiments.

This messaging confusion illustrates one of the biggest drawbacks of communications that take place solely through social media channels: the total absence of non-verbal cues. I’ve been embroiled in SM controversy myself after posting sarcastic comments that were interpreted literally. Attempts at humor have fallen completely flat. In the real world, the recipient of these messages would also receive the verbal intonations, the smile on your face and the suppressed chuckle in your delivery and would understand your actual meaning. In the online world, those cues are missing and can lead to serious misinterpretation.

In this instance, since I did not know the author of the message, I had no emotional connection to him and interpreted his succinct expression of condolence and suggestion that we look forward to this summer’s summer Technic as a tactless attempt at promotion rather than a genuine expression of support and assistance.

Written communications, especially those that deal with sensitive topics, have to be written very carefully and thoughtfully to avoid any chance that your intentions could be misconstrued.

Is it any surprise that university students really get social media and understand how to create authentic and compelling content to seed out to multiple social media platforms?

I’m spending a couple of days this week with my elder son visiting Loyola and DePaul Universities in Chicago so he can make his final decision to attend one of the schools this fall.

From the university’s perspective, it’s tough to make an indelible impression on an 18 year old in the space of just a few hours on campus. So, how can they build an ongoing relationship with prospective students and show them what life is really like on their campus? Turn the job over to their students and turn them loose with social media.

The university students understand better than any school administrator how a high school senior thinks, what they want to know, what they’re anxious about and what appeals to their peers.

Take the issue of student housing. For virtually every freshman, their first year will be the first time that they’ve had to live communally with strangers. Most are anxious about dorm life. What are the rooms like? What kind of social life will they have? What can they expect?

Loyola had students submit videos to a Loyola Cribz contest – a takeoff of MTV Cribs – that let the students show how they really live. On campus, off-campus, real students show how they live, share their gorgeous lakefront views and provide a glimpse into the life of a Loyola student.

The students use video to generate interesting and genuine insight into their daily lives – how they live and how they study. These videos are much more believable than the University produced videos that are well done, but are almost too well produced. Authenticity rules in the SM world, and slick production just doesn’t convey authenticity.

There are a lot of businesses who could take notes from Loyola’s social media campaign. Focused on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter, the university understands where their target audience lives and delivers compelling content that is teased and delivered through their Twitter and Facebook channels.

Although it’s apparent that the university’s entire social media program is still new, it shows promise and does a terrific job cross-pollinating positive and authentic messages across Facebook pages, student blogs, Twitter feeds and YouTube channels. Is your business doing the same?

Someone should create a mission statement for any company attempting to create a mission statement. Something like this:

We will critically examine our company to determine why we do what we do. What inspires us. What drives us. What excites us. Then we’ll write a brief statement that accurately, and singularly, describes our company. That can fit on a t-shirt. It will not contain the words: best, leading, biggest, profit, diversity, growth or exceed expectations.

Now, if you really, really feel that a mission statement is essential to understanding and guiding your business, you have the rules. My question is: Why do so many companies break these rules and create irredeemably awful, platitudinous and ultimately pointless mission statements?

My ire was inspired by an article I read on the Smart Business Online website this week detailing the efforts of Staffmark CEO Frederick Kohnke to rebrand his national staffing company around a unified vision, mission and values. The project took nine months and resulted in one of the most useless, generic mission statements I’ve ever read.

Really. That’s not just hyperbole. Although the resulting mission statement wasn’t included in the article (wtf?) I found it on the Staffmark website. Their mission:

To always strive to exceed the expectations of our employees, business customers, and external stakeholders.

How’s that for exciting? Really gets your juices flowing, doesn’t it? Strive to exceed expectations. What’s the matter, think outside the box was taken?

If you spend nine months creating a mission statement, odds are that it will be created not by the company founder or CEO, but by a committee tasked with the job of creating an inclusive mission statement. One that will take into account all their stakeholders, will be legally benign, generally inoffensive and ultimately uninspiring. One that will be guaranteed to include no distinctive or compelling voice, no descriptive or detailed verbs and certainly nothing that will differentiate it from any other staffing company. Staffmark succeeded spectacularly on all these counts.

What’s so terribly disappointing is that genuine, heartfelt mission statements can be inspiring and unique. Consider Ben & Jerry’s mission statement:

To make, distribute & sell the finest quality all natural ice cream & euphoric concoctions with a continued commitment to incorporating wholesome, natural ingredients and promoting business practices that respect the Earth and the Environment.

There’s not another ice cream manufacturer that could claim that mission statement. Euphoric concoctions. How wonderful is that phrase?  The precise wording matters because it captures the essence of Ben & Jerry’s. It could not be transferred to Briar’s website, or Edy’s or Haagen Dazs.

Or consider Coca-Cola’s mission to refresh the world. It captures their company spirit in a way that PepsiCo’s mission to be the world’s premier consumer products company focused on convenient foods and beverages doesn’t.

Being the premier, leading, biggest, most profitable company isn’t a mission, it’s an objective. It’s not inspiring to anyone outside of the company boardroom. Not one of your employees will get out of bed tomorrow and say to themselves “How am I going to make Company X bigger today?”  But I’ll bet there are Disney employees who get up and ask themselves “How can I make someone happy today?” And I’m certain that there are Apple employees who can’t wait to get to work to do something insanely great.

But apparently Staffmark is content with their employees exceeding expectations. Whose expectations? We don’t know. How are the expectations measured? We’re not sure. How will anyone know when they’ve exceeded expectations? They won’t. But, gosh darn it, it’s better to exceed expectations than fail to meet them, right? Then that’s the goal.

And I’ll bet that if I were to call 20 of Staffmark’s employees today, not more than one or two would be able to recount their company’s mundane mission statement. Anyone want to take me up on that?

One of the most frequent and irritating faults of marketers is their belief that if a little personalized service is good, then an overwhelming amount of personalized service must be better. No. It’s not.

Let me freely acknowledge right up front that I love Chipotle and think their iPhone app is one of the most thoughtfully designed and easy to use online ordering apps. In fact, if I intend to eat at Chipotle – even if I’m in my car outside – I’ll order on my iPhone because it remembers my last order and I can complete the entire ordering process with a few taps on the screen.

Chipotle has eliminated pain from my life. The pain of waiting in a snaking line in the middle of the lunch rush, having to yell your order over the din of the crowded restaurant, and having to juggle food and money when finally arriving at the register. The entire exercise to obtain my food is time consuming and generally annoying.

Recognizing this, Chipotle released their iPhone app, allowing customers to order from their phone (or online) and proceed directly to the register to pick up their pre-paid lunch. Annoyance eliminated.

Or so I thought.

Then the phone calls started. Every time I ordered from my iPhone, I’d receive a phone call about an hour later asking if my food was ok. Every order, another phone call. Another intrusion. Another unwanted and uninvited interruption of my afternoon. With no apparent way to get them to stop.

After the first call, I was understanding. After the sixth I was aggravated. After the tenth I was pissed.

I elected to order from my iPhone precisely because I did not want to call and speak with their employees. I elected convenience and privacy. I never elected to chat with the Chipotle staff. I never opted in.

Chipotle never asked me if I wanted a phone call from their customer service staff. I never gave them permission to contact me on my personal phone. They simply assumed that their definition of good customer service would be met with gratitude and understanding. They were wrong.

So, to test their ability to deliver real, personalized customer service I sent them an email. I complained about their intrusive phone calls and asked to be removed from whatever contact list is generated after an iPhone order.

And Chipotle came through. They responded the same day, apologized, acknowledged that they should have incorporated some type of opt-in button or check box, and assured me that I wouldn’t receive any more calls. And then they followed through. After placing two more orders last week I anxiously awaited a follow-up phone call that, to their credit, never arrived.

So, what’s the lesson for your business? The definition of excellent client service is defined by your customer, not by you. And your service delivery processes have to be flexible enough to adapt to differing definitions. I have no doubt that Chipotle still calls many of their iPhone ordering customers, and that’s fine with me if it’s fine with those customers. They just needed to know that my definition of outstanding service never involves calling my mobile phone. I just want tasty tacos with extra salsa, hold the phone call.

Exactly one year ago today I wrote that you could put a fork in Motorola. They were done.

At the time, Motorola was reeling from a string of lackluster phone releases that failed to generate any consumer excitement, their product designs were uninspiring and their engineering and development staffs were incapable of developing innovative products for the half-dozen different mobile operating platforms that they supported.

They’d lost their design mojo and appeared unable to recapture any Wow! factor.

The New York Times reported today that their new CEO, Sanjay Jha, has bet the company’s future on Motorola’s newest iPhone combatant, the Droid. And the early buzz indicates that the Droid may very well save the company.

How did Jha design a company saving product strategy that you can apply to your business?

1. design a better experience. The single biggest complaint about the iPhone is its lack of a real keyboard. The Droid offers a thin keyboard that slides out from the phone, thereby resolving the iPhone’s most glaring weakness and instantly appealing to thousands of users who love the iPhone concept but could not live with its touchscreen keyboard. Instant win.
2. personalize the experience. There are now more than 100,000 reasons why the iPhone is so popular with its users: applications. Every user has personalized their iPhone with the apps that complement their lives. Every user’s iPhone is unique to them, and by adopting Google’s Android mobile platform, the Droid has access to a growing library of Android apps that will allow Droid users to create a uniquely personal device that can’t be replicated on any other platform.
3. create a sensory experience. Although Motorola was known as a design innovator, they haven’t introduced a compelling product design for several years. The Droid changes that. Jha understood that the visual aesthetic and the tactile sensation of holding and using the Droid was crucial. Motorola smoothed some hard edges and covered the back of the phone with a tactilely pleasing rubberized coating. In addition, they’ve incorporated a larger, 16:9 hi-res display that delivers a compelling visual experience. Overall, it’s a sensorial delight.
4. create a WOW! experience. the Droid is being released with a new navigation system from Google that has amazed the early reviewers. It’s the kind of killer app that can generate huge volumes of sales on its own since it replaces the need for in-car navigation systems. It’s visually exciting, it’s instantly understandable and it delivers exceptional value. They captured Wow!

Apple has retained its position at the top of the smartphone heap for over two years. Challengers have been easily dismissed. Until now. And if Motorola can continue to focus on designing and delivering exceptional user experiences, they may very well challenge Apple’s dominance.

Any iPhone users thinking of making the switch and betting on the Droid?

The Palm Pre was one of the most highly anticipated smartphone launches this year. They primed the media for months with photos and detailed specs of the unit, ensuring reams of coverage for their iPhone-killer.

On June 6th, Palm released the phone to collections of eager fans who could have all assembled in the lobby of their local Sprint store without disturbing the regular patrons just there to complain about their monthly bill.

Without an established collection of Pre fanboys committed to camp out for hours in front of every Sprint store, the groundswell of Pre passion seemed rather demure and underwhelming.

No matter. Palm announced that they realized record sales nearing 500,000 units during their first weekend, dampened only by Apple’s release of their own new 3GS iPhone, which sold over one million units in its first weekend.

Now that the smartphone dust has settled, it appears that Palm’s Pre will never become the iPhone killer they had hoped. Total sales for this year will finally settle between 1 and 1.5 million units, compared to Apple’s total iPhone installed base of over 40 million. Not much of a comparison really.

So, what went wrong? Why didn’t the technical tour de force that is the Pre stumble so badly? In a word: marketing. Or, to be more precise, lousy marketing.

Palm ran a series of ads introducing the Pre that have been universally panned, frequently eliciting adjectives including creepy, eerie and confusing. Great adjectives if you’re Rob Zombie, introducing Halloween 2. Not so great descriptions for a cutting edge smartphone trying to gain traction in a market dominated by Apple and RIM’s Blackberry.

Take a look for yourself at YouTube. Creepy, right? And nowhere in any of the ads does Palm provide a single reason why you need a Pre. What does it do? How is it better? How will it improve my personal/professional/sex life?

Come on, people, these are the fundamentals.

When Apple released the iPhone, their simple visuals set against a plain white backdrop focused all the viewer’s attention on the phone and its remarkable touchscreen. They showed precisely what you could do with the touch of a finger. They conveyed a Wow! factor that generated interest and desire bordering on lust. In contrast, the Pre ad suggests that if I have their phone, I may encounter nothing but green lights on my way to work. Really? That’s your pitch?

The truly disappointing factor is that the Pre is a remarkably innovative phone. It’s the only touchscreen device capable of genuine multi-taking. But Palm never tells me why I need to multitask. What can I do with a Pre that I can’t do with my iPhone or Blackberry? Besides making concentric circles of orange-clad Asian men dance in unison?

Don’t make the same mistake Palm made. Understand what makes your product/service essential and then clearly communicate your distinct value. Sure it’s fundamental, but even the big guys forget to focus on the blocking and tackling sometimes. Like Palm.

This past week saw the public release of three of the silliest attempts by professional sporting associations to manage and control the use of social media channels. The NFL, the SEC (who count as professional in my book, since three of their teams could beat last year’s Detroit Lions) and the USTA all published social media guidelines intended to control the dissemination of information by players, coaches, media representatives and even fans.

The SEC was first out of the gate with their near universal prohibition on any and all social media communications during a game. Yep, their first draft even prohibited college gameday fans from tweeting about or, heaven forbid, sending a photo of, their team’s gridiron splendor. To their credit, the SEC revised their published guidelines and acceded to the desires of rabid and frequently gun-toting fans to celebrate through concise tweets the magnificence of their student-athletes and their impressive SAT scores 40 yard dash times. As long as there are no commercial interests attached to their 140 character broadcasts.

The NFL, in all their controlling authority, were next to publish a set of draconian restrictions on social media participation. This time, the league’s prohibitions were directed at players (and anyone representing them), coaches and officials from engaging on any social media channel from 90 minutes before gametime until after all media interviews after the game’s completion. The media were also put on warning about sending any tweets or other messages that could compete with the broadcast of the game. So, a fan sitting a row below the press booth can tweet the score, but the reporter sitting six feet above him cannot. Makes sense to me.

The USTA released the silliest and least enforceable social media policy, warning against the dissemination of “certain sensitive information” that could be considered “inside information” about a match. Even Andy Roddick commented on the lameness of the USTA’s efforts. Specifically, the USTA is concerned about:

“information about the likely participation or likely performance of a player in an event or concerning the weather, court conditions, status, outcome or any other aspect of an event which is known by a Covered Person and is not information in the public domain.”

But, once someone tweets about court conditions or weather, doesn’t it immediately become public domain? Are there really any super-sensitive tennis secrets that, if revealed, would alter the fundamental nature of the sport itself?

I can understand the league prohibitions on tweeting during games. Players, coaches and officials should be focused on the game itself, not on satisfying their Twitter followers or Facebook Fans with status updates. But prohibitions on media members and even fans is both ridiculous – do they really believe we won’t tune in to watch the game if we can get a Twitter update instead – and utterly unenforceable.

Want some reasonable social media guidelines?:

1. explore ways to engage online before, during and after the games. Post a scrolling Twitter feed on the scoreboard with a scrolling feed of all comments that include your team’s hashtag. I did this during the Final Four, and the Twitter feed was more fun than the game. There are some hilarious tweets flying through the ether that could be shared with the entire stadium.
2. toss up a twitter poll during the game to make the game more interactive. Twitter poll question: Will Tom Brady throw for more yards today than the entire Cleveland Brown offense generates? 63% say YES.
3. put a highlight YouTube video up on your Facebook Fanpage at halftime and again after the game. Tweet about the video so fans can click a link and watch in the stands on their iPhones and Blackberrys.
4. sponsor contests that spectators can enter via Twitter
5. publish online stats, again distributed realtime via Twitter and Facebook
6. accept the fact that you cannot control this social media phenomenon. You can continue to publish more and more specific prohibitions and narrowly defined exceptions in a vain effort to wrestle control of these assorted publicly directed channels, but you are tilting at online windmills. Embrace the brave new world of social media, and learn how to harness its power to fulfill your own goals. They shouldn’t be too different from your fans’.

Social media can be your friend. If you play nice.

I was invited yesterday to attend a couple of high-level presentations at an enormous Cleveland-based health care concern that intends to pursue web-based fundraising initiatives.

Two groups were invited to compete for a seven figure campaign to test the efficacy and potential of web-based fundraising and each sent high-powered teams to deliver their extraordinarily mediocre messages through their numbingly ineffective PowerPoint presentations.

At the end of the day, after our private recap of both presentations, we were all in agreement that neither company did themselves any favors with their presentations, although each had the potential to blow the other out of the water with an exemplary, creative, memorable and distinctive presentation.

What went wrong? Both were wedded to the PowerPoint presentation template that insists on delivering text based information in a visual environment. With bullets. Endless bullets. Each one read to us. Just in case we had become suddenly stricken illiterate.

So, let’s review. Each presenter brings a laptop to connect with a high-resolution LCD projector capable of displaying brilliant video, and each decides to present…. (wait for it)… TEXT. Brilliant.

Here’s the rub. Both competitors had amazing, compelling and memorable stories to tell. Huge, nationally recognized clients with exciting success stories. Creative campaigns that generated lasting results. And neither elected to tell any of these stories.

However, we were graced with annoyingly derivative methodology diagrams, dense process flow charts and unnecessary recitations of dry stats and figures that contributed nothing to our attempt to determine one thing: are you the guys we want to execute this campaign?

Let’s revisit the irony here… two firms send teams to demonstrate how wonderfully creative and capable they are and both center their presentations not around story, emotion, community, engagement or connections (words not even mentioned for the first 90 minutes), but around bullet points. I’m sold.

I know it’s been said before, but let’s say it again:

1. tell a story. first. foremost. If you don’t know how, read Beyond Bullet Points and learn. Before your next presentation. I’ll remember a story. I won’t remember that 4.8% of direct mail recipients will elect to give their contact information if presented with a free premium option. Or is that 8.4%? Or 6.9%? Oh hell, I forgot.
2. use visuals. See the slide deck embedded above. Simple graphics aren’t so simple, but they are devastatingly effective. And they support your story. (see how this all ties together?)
3. edit ruthlessly. Don’t use eight words when five will do. Or two. This is a presentation, not a shared group reading session. If you pick the right visual, you won’t need a single word on the slide.
4. learn your presentation. I believe that most presenters fill their slides with bullet points as a crutch. They’re afraid that they’ll forget to mention something, so they make sure that every single talking point is included in their slides. The solution: practice. Learn what you want to say with each visual. Use the slide notes feature if you need to have a visual reminder visible only to you. Just get rid of the lists of text that detract from you and your story.

Want to separate yourself from your competitors? Learn how to tell a visually compelling story. Your clients will be eternally grateful that they never have to sit through another miserable PowerPoint bullet point recitation and you’ll be their hero. Win win.