Why wait any longer?  Find what it is you enjoy doing, and do it.  Do you enjoy speaking?  Then find out what it takes to get on the speaking trail.  Do you enjoy web development?  Then learn all you can about web development and go for it.  Do you enjoy playing or singing music?  Then stop waiting, get some programs on your computer and upload them to YouTube to try to make that your living.

You are more limited by your attitude than than opportunity.  Motivation is the engine that drives us to serve God, serve others, and put ourselves in a better position.  Passion. Fire. Juice. Mojo. Motivation comes in many forms and goes by many names.  Don’t wait any longer, find what you enjoy and do it.

Focus is so hard these days.  For instance at work, with facebook, texting, twitter, news, and everything so accessible it’s hard to focus on your daily tasks.  But if you truly want to make in impact with something, you need to focus on it.  It’s so hard for me to focus because my mind has seen so much.  I know so many bits and pieces about many things but not an expert in anything.  It’s hard and frustrating when I’m working on something and my mind just wanders thinking about the future and from thing to thing.

In think in order to feel fulfilled and satisfied in soul and spirit that God has called us to be focused on something.  Focus is a word that’s said a lot but seldom used.  How about you?

Remember to keep your blog active and visitors coming you have to post interesting things and often.  A dead dry stagnant page will not bring visitors.  Here’s some ideas.

1. Just listen around you to get ideas.  When you have a thought about something, write it down and use it as a posting idea.  Follow through on it…learn from me.

2. Since I’ve started this blog I’ve changed.  Don’t be afraid to change your style as you change.  I change for the better as I mature and God take’s be through this walk on the earth.

3. Have fun and post about things you genuinely have a thought about.  Genuinity will come through in articles, but fakeness won’t.  I know it breaks the rules of blog where you’re supposed to concentrate on a certain topic, but oh well.

Facebook is the most used website in the world. A well known fact is that population wise it is the 3rd largest country in the world. Through my time on Facebook I’ve noticed 8 different kinds of personalities. Like all personalities no individual is 100% in any one category, but they do tend to lean that way. Which are you?

1. The Overposter
This individual posts incessantly all day everyday. The strange thing is that it doesn’t seem to be limited to just teenagers. I’ve seen individuals who have full time jobs that make a lot of money who post more on Facebook than I do in a month.

2. The Philosopher
This individual only makes posts where people will give them comments like “wow I’ve never thought of it that way”. Sometimes the person is smart and really comes up with good ideas, but most are posers. They surf the internet or read books and post statements as their own when they’re really not in hopes that people will say how deep, smart, and awesome they are.

3. The Binge Poster
You won’t hear anything from them forever and then they just explode with posts for 2 days and then disappear again. Kind of like any Hollywood type who needs some quick publicity.

4. The Promoter
Ah yes, these are the individuals who brazenly and shamelessly promote their business, cause, or product. They add nothing of value to any conversation and when they do comment they always seem to somehow relate their service or product to the comment.

5. The Cool Kid
This is the person who get’s as many friends as possible but never posts anything on Facebook because “they never really log into Facebook anyway, they’re too busy.” They often time have huge numbers of connections to people who they really have no connection with.

6. The Parent
These are people who only post on others posts to tell others what they should or shouldn’t do. Also in this group are parents who are only on Facebook to watch what their kids are doing, otherwise they have no use for this new fangled thing.

7. The Intellectual
These people always impress you with their elite knowledge. They quickly comment on a normal post and hijack it to make it an intellectual battle of wits. It’s very obvious how superior they are to everyone around them because they know what the word cacophony means and they can Google things really well.

8. The Animal
These are the people who post and you can barely read or make out anything they say because it’s written in Elvish code. It usually reads something like this… “OMW dyou c wut dwade sd abt lebron woot woot!

Bonus Facebook Types:

9. The Gamer/Tech Nerd
Usually a techy nerd type is also a gamer…that’s why they’re lumped together. Their conversations usually consist of talking about their computer system and how they’re excited to get the latest core i5 with the Nvidia chipset. I’ve also heard conversations on how they reached Paladin level 84 by going through the Forest of Galgondeth. After fighting a nest of dragons they healed themselves with the elixir of fire and were able to obtain the sacred singing mushroom of power. P.S. If you know what “BOOM HEADSHOT” means, you’re also in this category…face it, don’t deny it.

10. The Satirist
These are people who insist on taking a contrary view to anything anyone says. They’re most often satirical in their approach. For instance when someone posts “Wow I can’t believe it’s December already” The Satirist says, “yes this happens every year after November and before January. We recently went through November, were you not there!?”

Sometimes it’s fun doing the complete opposite of what the mass marketing machine wants you to do.  For instance maybe I’ll go into Bath-n-Body today and buy a whatever-they-sell in-there.  I have no use for their products, but it would be completely unexpected for me to do so.   This is completely against my buying habits.

Am I the only one to ever fudge those marketing surveys?  Like I always tell cashiers my address is 90210; it doesn’t matter where I’m at in the country.  I guess I don’t like disclosing all my information to help the marketing of the companies I buy from.  They don’t need to know who I am and where I come from.

Do something out of character today.  Buy your gas on Sunday afternoon rather than Monday morning.  Stop buying coffee just to mess up your routine.  We are creatures of habit, and then we get stuck in the cycle of the marketing machine telling us what to buy.

The US Debt is now above $14 trillian.  This now means that if the US Government were to tax every individual at 100% for one year, there would not be enough money collected to pay off the national debt.  Essentially the Gross Debt to GDP ratio is now over 100%. 

When the Government says we need to increase taxes on the rich to pay for this debt, that’s like sticking a hose in the ocean and putting it in a tank on land.  Technically it makes a difference, but it’s not practical and too small.  The real problem is spending. 

The US Government budget for FY 2010 included discretionary or $1.3 trillion, or 38% of total spending.  More than half ($815 billion) was security spending, which includes the Department of Defense, overseas contingency programs and Homeland Security.

Non-security spending was $491 billion. The largest departments were: Health and Human Services ($84 billion), Education ($64.3 billion), Housing and Urban Development ($42.8 billion) Justice ($27.6 billion), and Agriculture ($25 billion).

This does not cover mandatory spending required by law.  Please vote for fiscally conservative political officials who are not afraid to cut spending and will not pander to loud minority groups who do not want to work for anything.

It’s time for me to sound off on the current debate going on in Congress for the extension of Bush era tax plans.  There are key points that I need to make sure are at least out there on the internet somewhere.

1. This is NOT a taxcut.  Taxes even at current levels from the Bush era are too high.  By extending the current tax schedule no taxes are being cut, with the exception of the payroll tax being decreased from 6.2% to 4.2%.  Some experts estimate this won’t even be a significant tax benefit unless you’re making over $20,000 as an individual or $40,000 as a couple.  I don’t have time to explain why, but if you’re a reader here you’re probably smart and can figure it out.
See the story here: http://money.cnn.com/2010/12/15/news/economy/payroll_tax_holiday/

2. This WILL NOT increase the deficit in principle, but will it physically?  Yes.  Let me explain it like this.  Let’s say you bring $100 a month.  You’re current level of spending however is $150/mo.  This means you are running a $50 deficit every month.  Now let’s say that your income changes and you only bring in $95 a month, which means you bring in $5  less everymonth.  Your spening however stays the same at $150/mo.  Does this increase your deficit?  Yes, your deficit spending is not $55/mo.  

House members just want to bloviate a while & get some camera time. They’ll pass the bill or risk losing elections in 2 yrs.

BTY it’s not a taxcut, it’s a prevention of tax increases. In principle the deficit isn’t increased, instead gross overspending is exposed.

I have noticed more and more over the last several months that web-focused business have poor marketing strategies.  Let me qualify what I mean.  First, what would I classify as a web-focused business?  Here’s a List.

• A website designer and developer
• A web or Internet marketing consultant helping you figure out your marketing strategy online
• E-commerce specialist helping you put your business online
• Outsourced website content updating service

Second, a marketing strategy should consist of several components.  Nowadays this list has grown.

Marketing History
In the 1800′s there was no mass-marketing.  You had a physical building with a sign, and you interacted with people physically and worked hard to serve your customers because word-of-mouth was your only marketing tool.  If your town was lucky to have a newspaper you may take out a short ad there.  1800′s marketing was all physical. 

The 1940′s warring generation brought waves  of radio advertisements sponsoring America’s favorite radio shows e.g The Lone Ranger, The Shadow, Jack Benny Program to name a few.  This was really the first time that mass-marketing became main steam and non-physical over the airwaves and via posters plastered everywhere by Uncle Sam. 

Then the 1950′s post-war boom drove mass-marketing to new heights.  Companies adopted a wide array of mass-marketing tools.  Magazines sold in millions and were filled with ads, lunchboxes and toasters were plastered with brands, Radio ad’s continued to flourish and grow, and a little thing called Television became mainstream. 

From the 1950′s to the 1990′s marketing changed very little.  You needed four basic components in your marketing strategy: Physical (stores with signs, serving customers, product demonstrations in the supermarket isle), print (newspapers, magazines,sign posted at the baseball stadium), radio, TV.  For forty years America trudged right along with no major advancements. 

The Internet
Then came the Internetin the 90′s.  The Internet has been added to the list of marketing key elements.  It’s also CHEAP and is accessible to everyone.  The marketing industry has been trying to figure out how to effectively take advantage of this medium since then.  Pay-per-click advertising has proven to be a lucrative model, but is it truly effective?  I think it’s effective at supporting millions of  mom-and-pop entrepreneurssitting at home, but it’s not truly effective for mass media.  The audience the Internet reaches is global.  What may be effective in one culture is not necessarily effective in the next.

The website craze has also come and gone.  You don’t have to persuade people to have a website anymore, you have to persuade people to keep it updated.  You have to persuade people that their website is hideous and needs to be redesigned.  The next wave of successful web-focused service businesses will be those who can convince customers that they need updated relevant content.  Outsourced or content management and generation business.  That is companies already have a website, but are they keeping it updated?

What Marketing Strategy should a web-focused  business have?
As you’ll see above, the one key marketing element that carried through out the last 200 years was, “physical”.  I think the most new and relevant thing you can do marketing wise, is to maintain and keep the “physical” element.  Marketing has gone so far to the virtual side, that it’s now cutting edge and unique to have a physical marketing presence.  In a day and age of virtuosity, companies can have a local phone number in Kansas City but be based out of LA  This makes them appear as though they’re local.  One thing that CAN’T be faked is the physical presence.

Web-focused companies need to conqueror their homeland before the world.  Grow locally and then branch out to the world.  I’ve seen web-focused business posting “ad’s” on LinkedIn touting their expertise.  They’re right along side 50 other “companies” (most of them are individuals with full time jobs and they only do their web-stuff on the side) who say the same thing.  It’s like a bunch of hungry dogs scrapping over a piece of meat.  It does me no good to market my website maintenance services to a web design company, they’re not going to use me.

Get off the Internet!
So my message to web-focused business is to Get Off the Internet!  You have to do some physical contact to truly make it.  You have to make physical phone calls, you can’t just be passive over the Internet if you hope to ever make you business something to be reckoned with.

       vs.    

I spent some time trying to figure out which platform would be the best for a blog.  A free service like Blogger or a more customizable solution like WordPress.  Initially I started out on Blogger, but have since moved to WordPress.  (Our original blog can be found here.)

The short answer is that if you’re more technically inclined and like more detailed control then WordPress is the way to go.  If you’re looking for point and click with no worry of background maintenance, then the free service like Blogger is the way to go. 

Why is this even a debate?
Several years ago WordPress was hard to install an maintain, and point and click services like Blogger were easier.  Now with additions to hosting accounts like Simplescripts, installing a WordPress site on a web hosting account couldn’t be easier.  Of course understanding how PHP and MySQL work is a plus, but it’s not needed at all.  With plugins galore, WordPress truly is a point-and-click customizable content management system.

The other debate is the need for software updates.  It can be troublesome to contiually have to update your WordPress site with the latest version of WordPress to pick up the latest bug fixes and security flaws.  While it’s generally painless, it does require deactivating your custom plugins.  With Blogger, there is no updating at all.  It’s all taken care of by Google, and there is nothing you need to do.