G to the Square

Recently I went for 6 days to Poland and took flight on Wizzair (a budget airline). When on the flight and pondering on how they cut costs and make flights that cheap (compared to the regular airlines) I came up with the following analogy:

Latte is to regular airlines as regular coffee is to budget airlines

Makes sense right? Well if it doesn’t I give you an explanation. When you buy a Latte you don’t just get coffee and milk mixed up, you get more. The milk goes through a special process, when given to you it looks nice (with a heart figure), tastes differently and looks more complex. However if you look at the ingredients is just coffee and milk, same happens with regular airlines. In essence you get to reserve a seat in a plane, they take your luggage (and you) from one point to another. However is not just that, you get nice service, complementary drinks, stuff for your kids, 2 pieces of luggage per passenger, etc. In contrast budget airlines, just move you from one point to another. If you take luggage (other than the one in the hand) you pay for it, want extra leg room pay for it, there is no seat assignment just a reservation and any complementary drinks or nuts, your right, you have to pay for it.

The interesting thing is the shift during time, first we had regular coffee and regular airlines and then we had some shifts in how we saw things, thanks to culture, trends and unfortunate events. The act of drinking coffee became more than drinking a hot beverage, became a statement. The Mocha, the Latte, the cappuccino, all started to say a lot of the individual, even if it didn’t cost much to add that extra to the coffee and turn it into different alter egos (Latte, Mocha, etc.), still coffee shops started to charge almost double for it.

The practice describe of charging a high price for “pimped” coffee is called practice is called price discrimination.  Regular airlines have been doing this for a while, that is why first class is so good and economic is so uncomfortable, if not they will not be able to charge the high prices for first class (a make a really good profit of it). But in this age of budget airlines and high oil prices, people want to travel as cheap as possible. So instead of shifting from basic to “pimped” like was the case of coffee, air transportation shifted from regular (or pimpled) to budget, cheap (or un pimped.)

All this is important for customer to understand, that will help them not be tempted or take better decisions when buying a product or service. In the case of business, well if done right they could find a group of customers that will buy their “pimped” product/service at price that has high return.

This is a nice presentation (and point of view) on how to make (and run) profitable business. The nice thing is that it goes “retro” where gives arguments on that the revenue model of putting a price on a product/service, still works and that its really better that trying to be the next youtube, facebook, etc.

The reason I find it so interesting is because in Honduras, that is the way you start business and run them. You don’t look for VC money, go on the web and offer things free or go IPO. What is really done is start it with your own capital or take a loan and work [hard]. And those who do this are doing OK, the challenge that the middle class (which have the minimum resources to start a business) is very thin.

Small business are the fuel of a country economy and when this is not big enough the countries economy suffers and becomes very fragile and sensitive to world events and shifts. At the end of the day that is why David Heinemeier Hansson stats, is the best thing to do, especially for third world countries. The big challenge (again) is having enough people with enough resources to do so.

Note: I’m not stating that Honduras problems and third world status are a result of the middle class disappearing or being to small, although this a more complicated matter, still I think that middle class is the reflection of that overall status of a country.

Freeriding in Stockholm’s public transportation system is illegal. If (and if) you get caught you pay a fee. planka.nu is a organization that provides a service for people that wish to freeride and pay any fee if caught. This is the fees:

You can become a member for four different time periods

One week: 50 kronor
One calendar month: 100 kronor
Half a year: 500 kronor
And weeknights and weekends with Planka Lite (one calendar month): 50 kronor

It’s an organized way to protest for a belief “public transportation should be like the sidewalk – paid by all, free to walk on”. What I’m wondering if they are making money or just paying bills and putting everything in the fund. However they recommend that the member to evade raids and controllers, because this “is based on solidarity.” So doesn’t matter what they do, they urge their members to not “waist the fund”, meaning that the business model is similar to insurance companies where they try to minimize to the max the insurance to pay.

At the end of the day is another protest made by customers (or people in general) over the status quo, that is what BitTorrent is doing to the movie and music industry.

I have had this topic on my mind for a long time and wanted to write a blog post about it. It was going to be on how the only good customer service left, can be found in Apple Stores and at my mom’s store. Concluding that Apple some how, found a way to train their staff to provide good customer service (and my mom just rules too much). But all this changed this weekend, the reason: I went shopping for a traveling Backpack (see image bellow). Also, like this blog post, for a long time wanted to buy one, but I never got totally convinced.

Source

I like to travel around and is tough to do it with regular luggage (although I don’t travel as other do, I travel ). I always went to checkout the bags, but never understood this product and is tough to buy a product when you don’t understand it. You may ask yourself, what is to understand about a backpack? Trust me there is a lot, but at first glance the only thing I saw was size, materials and the brand name. I thought this characteristics defined the price, although they have a saying, they share the responsibility with other properties or characteristic of same importance.

I went to InterSport in a outlet shopping center in the outskirts of Stockholm. I went in to the store and like always I helped myself to checkout the bags. After five minutes an a employee asked me if I was looking to buy a bag and I told her, yes. What happened in the next 30 minutes was mind boggling, I got a crash coarse on backpacks. I mean I was amaze by how much is to this bags and she did a very good job. She went around explaining each bag, trying to find out my needs, what will fit me, my type of travel, etc. She made me try them and see how they felt and fit. From that point one can get  a feeling that this person knew what she was talking about. The way she dealt with me was very good, because she sensed in a good way, I was price sensitive and tried to find the best value for me. Also remembered me about the 30 day return policy most stores have in Sweden. So, I bought it and follow her instructions to fill it up with clothing and test it, if I don’t like it I will return it, that simple.

Of coarse this doesn’t make us understand if this is an abnormally or is there something to learn from the shopping experience. And things didn’t click until the cashier commented that she is very experience in this because she hikes and loves to hikes. That was my moment of “ahaaaaaa”. Well it was like an hour later after I was able to digest everything, but it was thanks to the conversation with the cashier. The key word here is love, a word that is used so lightly this days, but still is very important. What does apple store clerks and this lady have in common? You guessed right, Love for what the product or service they are in charge of (selling or helping). Yes indeed they love it. Apple customers are the best sellers you will find, because plain and simple, they love their products and is easier to sell something you love  contrast when you don’t. [Clarification for any smart ass: in the contrary if you sell a person you love that means the opposite]

Finding people that provide customer service and are crazy about a product is tough to find, that is why ladies and gentlemen, good customer service is a rarity these days. And is not an easy task to make people love a product that they own or don’t have a saying on how is made. So there lies the challenge: how to train people to love the product or service they are providing customer service for. Maybe next time you put an ad for new employee, the main requirement: “love our product”.

I was working, some weeks ago, on a assignment with my partner. He is a rock fan and loves music, so much that he is in a band. So while we worked he was listening to a Internet radio station www.181.fm (Eagle Classic Rock). Anyway’s, I’m a hip hop, R&B, rap, contemporary rock, alternative, electronic, fan. Once in while some of the songs played where to familiar to me where I realized that some of the songs a listen to today sample or “cover” from this classic rock songs. Here is some of the songs I remember:

This is not news, most people that are more than casual listeners know this happen. Some even sample from “classical music”. Take for example Jedi Mind Tricks in his song On the Eve of War ft. Gza, which original is from Karl Jenkins - “Palladio I - Allegretto”. But it made me wonder how difficult is it today to be original or is it productive to try to do it. Apple has done a business on being “original” or trying to be “original”, to the point where some copy from them in one way or another. The evidence can be seen on how many click wheel (from iPod) or touch screen (iPhone)  clones we see around. Today most mobile manufacturers focus is touch screens, and before that most mp3 manufacturers tried to out done the iPod.

The point… well its hard to be original because we are overloaded or bombarded  with so much information. So all that information is what makes our “inspiration” comes from somewhere. Although it maybe be argue that nothing in the world is purely original, but today in this age, how much of what we come up is it ours and how much is from everybody?

Well.. at least you know they come from Cartoon Stock.

When you think of process data and presenting data, you think of excel and charts. But generally all this is static or hard to show complex relations and concepts. In addition you can’t easily see how this data changes over time. At the Stockholm Challenge Week, I was recommended to see a presentation on Gap Minders. The presentation was made in TED and can be seen here.

“I have a head.. I don’t need a overhead”, that is a phrase (by a Lady in government) that I heard in a Business Forum when I was fresh here in Stockholm (fall 2007). The meaning of this is that when you present, people pay so much attention to the slides and forget about the presenter. This is ironic since the slides should support the presenter and not the other way around.

Why I mention the above? Well.. Gap Minders tools may shift the attention to the slides, since is a way to make a presentation of complicated data with rich media and then the presenter gets a big overhead. The interesting part is that with enriched media like this, used in presentations and controlled entirely by the presenter, the “slides” become an extension of the presenters voice. And thanks to that extension, maybe now you can fill that gap which will permit people to not only remember you or your slides, but your message.

Today I was checking an email account that I log in occasionally or when I remember, and not as a habit (it used to be a habit). I saw an email from a presenter at a workshop I attended some months ago (I think it was in February). We had a conversation in the event and then exchange some emails. I had shown interest in a trend analysis report that at that time was only in Swedish. Two months later the report is in my inbox, as she promised and the most astonishing thing is that she remembered me, in contrast my interest on it was in the limbo of my memories. Then I realized that its called Reciprocity.

It came out of the blue, “but reciprocity is responding to a positive action with another positive action”. Giving me the report is not a positive response, but is intended on creating a sense that I should be respond to her action in a positive way. I confessed I feel flattered that she remembers me and I can say she is woman of her word, but I can see she wants me to do some marketing for her. How do I get to this conclusion? Well, it is also mentioned in the email that I can share the report with anybody and that they are working in a new web site, where we can buy the reports. First of all I will had pass it on with their permission or not, may sound a bit harsh, but that is how the world works. If you get it for free, why not share. Second if she had not mentioned nothing from the new site I will have thought its pure “mensching“. I may be wrong, maybe she is mensching, but still its very interesting how human act and response.

In part I feel guilty because some people might think this post is rude (or maybe not), but I’m not complaining, it just serves as an example of how important is to understand how humans think. How this will help you in market your product or service better or even understand the customers that you think you know.

She has a lot of merit for still remembering to send me the report and I really appreciate that, because some people tell you that they will send you something or call you, etc. and they don’t do it, only if you are Bill Gates or they need something. This is a cool tactic, not as some “comment spammers” leave generic comments saying they like my blog, so I visit their blog and leave a comment.

will share with you the report and the web site where you can buy it if you like it, still she got me to spread it around, in one way or another. I wonder if the sharing of the document and the site is it a result of guilt, reciprocity, chance or something more complex ?

Site:www.urbanlifestylereport.com

Urban Lifestyle Report March 2008

Update
If the above link is to complicated for you, here is a public storage folder

Public Storage

Recently I did the post “Why aren’t you a millionaire entrepreneur?” which show a video, used to point out, it might just take to change the lens of how we view life. With the purpose to identify a profitable business opportunity (if you’re in the mood of a wacky explanation then check the post). I got a comment on this post stating (in the commentator’s opinion) that being a millionaire doesn’t guarantee that will be happy since she knows many that are not, and prefers a “simple life”. The comment turn into food for thought and this post was a result.

First concrete thing that came into my mind was that is not that hard to be considered a millionaire. To qualify as a millionaire as define by the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, the estimated wealth should be a million or more (as of dollars or pounds). If you think about it, that isn’t much when you consider a person with a house, a couple of cars and a paying job that provides you with 200,000 USD a year (after taxes) of course assuming that the person owns the cars, house, etc and is not on a lease. Add to that the retiring fund, to reach a million after some time working, is not a impossible task. If that person has a successful and growing  business (a mom a pop shop could could count if its big), instead of a job, that million doesn’t look such a big deal, right? Well that depends on the opportunities and background of every individual, but there are more millionaires out there than what we think.

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Most people that own a business and fit this mold I just described might be hard working families, couples or individuals, sure they don’t have the life a Jack Ma, Bill Gates or Pierre Omidyar, but surely that live a good life. And it might be better because they are not always expected to pay the bill. The three mentioned are high profile people, but when the network of people that you know, know you have money, things might get tough.

If you or anybody that you know is a millionaire and unhappy, it might be time to rethink your way a of life and this leads to the second thing I remember when reading the comment: as somebody once told me, “happiness is a journey.. not a destination”. As pointed out in the article/Q&A called the “The Entrepreneurship Myth”:

You do point to this data that people are so much happier working for themselves that they’d need to earn 2.5 times as much working for someone else to be as happy. If that’s the case, then despite the personal financial risks they take on, is there anything wrong with that?

It makes a lot of sense if people say, “You know what? I’m going to earn less money running my own business, but I really don’t like to work for other people, and that’s why I’m doing it. It’s making me happier and I really don’t care.” I think that’s great. The part of it that becomes a problem is when people just won’t admit the reality that it may make them happy and they’re doing it because they want to be independent, [but] then they delude themselves into believing that also it’s financially better.

Having a million or none will not make you happy, but I bet that there are people that went from nothing to a million and are “smart” enough to not get caught up, look back, will be happy (at least for a moment) and continue living. Working hard, but having the presence of mind to take your time to enjoy other things, will give you those glimpses of happiness that will continue to fuel your tank in these ride called life. It all depends on who you are and if you are up to having a boss or being the boss. Maybe getting to the first million or having your business survive for more than 5 years is what made you happy, but somewhere in the road, we lose perception of what really counts and the value of the intangibles (health, friends, family, peace of mind, etc.) And there is where the questions and dilemmas start: can money buys happiness?, how happy I am?, what makes me happy?, how come I’m not happy, I have everything but I feel so empty, etc.

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What if you already have enough millions or your business is so good that it will make a lot in the upcoming years? Well, you could use that money and invested in a VC fund. This VC fund will not be like those that funded those high or green tech startups, but how about investing  people that don’t have much in life. Its high risk, may take while, but the return of investment might be greater any hot startup. Some people called micro finance, other social entrepreneurship, but at the end of the day these tags are just part of the trend. If you think about it is a investment, since you are providing financial resources, which you expect back and may not get back (part of the risk). In addition the return of investment is not money, but social impact, satisfaction given from helping people and providing the resources (and that is life) you had and they didn’t. It’s not a game of feeling guilty or just giving out money, for it to really work it should be treated like any investment. Why? Well, so the money doesn’t go to waste and when people are given things, they don’t work as much as when they have to earn it and pay it back.

Investing on people business and providing them with this “loans”, is not the only way to go. How about setting up computer labs at public schools for kids in developing countries. This again is not charity, because you are investing on this kids, to learn to use a great tool (computer & Internet) and then they can because part of the work force or an entrepreneur that you might later invest on. In the other hand you hare also investing in the future of your kids, since the more educated people we have in the present, the better the future will look.

You don’t need to develop big initiatives like One Laptop per Child, that at the end are just big marketing campaigns to make companies look good. Its not needed, especially today with all this low cost portable laptops like the Asus Eee PC. They are good enough for Internet and office apps, and they are cheap and can resist a lot of punishment (look at the video bellow).

Even if the places where the kids live don’t have electricity to charge the laptop, that is not a problem but a opportunity to provide the community with something else: source of electricity. The community can use it for their needs and to enhanced the business.

At the end of the day is all about the perspective and how we look at life and that will determine if we get caught up in things that are just not worth it. Of course like most things that are not done: is easier said than done. Which reminds me that is time to figure out how to walk the walk.

Have you ever ask yourself why you don’t come up with the next killer app or business idea? Well this video sums it up:

We get caught up with our way of living, stall our creativity and make everything a habit: eating, sex, fun, sleeping, exercise, etc. We do things without thinking, without questioning, we accept the society way and  become stagnant droids. Well I think I exaggerated and started some social complaining, but you get the picture. At the end of they just because we are told to do something and is expected for us to do it, doesn’t mean we must, we have something called choice, the least we can do is use it and mix it with creativity.

The next time you don’t have nothing to do or maybe have a lot, take a step back (I wonder if you are going to do it or question why you should.. that is a good start) and observe the “jungle” around you and you might see that next big thing developing in your mind. If not, monkeys are funny… so enjoy.

Recently I wrote a post on the Kobe Bryant Jumping over a car video, in addition to other stuff concerning viral videos. As you can see, that video has created some buzz like or not, good or bad, the buzz is there. But when such video, event or “thing” starts to appear as “spoofs” around YouTube, you have nail it. In the case of Kobe Bryant (and concerning the USA market) when a TV station like TNT creates a spoof in their show “Inside the NBA” well that is priceless.

Here is the spoof created by TNT with Kobe Bryant watching it

Funny stuff and Inside the NBA is the best.

But back to viral videos, Kobe’s “stunt”, is on the verge of becoming pop culture. When more videos like the following will appear in different forms, you know you have done it.

Of coarse, like most things, its easier said than done. The key here is to be creative and feed on others momentum, like the two videos you will see at the end of this post. And the create thing of video sites is that you can monitor the success of your video, so it can become a trial and error process. The resources to pull it off are out there (as the videos on the bottom show), but in this media of viral videos, what matter is only one thing: the content.