Connecting the dots of startup and life

Today, we arrived in St. Barths and shortly after we got off our boat we spotted a Louisvillian just a few feet away.  His yacht shown below is called Touche and he actually left Louisville a few years ago.  We chatted for a few minutes and we lived less than three miles from each other.

Most folks know that I use people around the world to accomplish different business tasks, so I agree with the “world is flat” theory, but it’s also amazingly small.

Update:  I woke up today are realized the real lesson here is NOT that the world is small, but if there’s someone you want to meet professionally or network with… you CAN reach them.  It’s relatively easy to break down the  world of connections if you try.  I’ll post soon about how I got lunch with my favorite author and he PAID for it.

I start most mornings with my favorite coffee and a few emails, but today’s start was at 6:30 and I’m not sure I’ve ever had a better view.   We rented a villa in St. Maarten and this view may beat any I’ve seen.  Here’s some more pics from the trip.

Although our weather in Louisville, KY has been quite warm and rainy this summer today was just odd. Check out the two pictures I took coming to and from work in the SAME day!

People think marketing takes a ton of money, yet Angie’s List spent less than $3.00 for a very memorable impression.  They mailed me this very humorous letter shown below (click here for full size) and a large bag of M&M’s for referring a friend to their service. The crazy part is I let my subscription expire last year and they still mailed me this package.  Needless to see I’ve spread the word about how cool this is and I’ve renewed my subscription.

If you choose to join Angie’s List, feel free to use my name for the referral.

I realize I just posted about things to do BEFORE you promote, but when you’re going to promote differentiation is important.  I took this picture below at a convenient store and quite frankly I avoided moving the dispenser when I saw the warning signal.

After a closer look, HotWired coffee is actually made by John Conti coffee, a Louisville-based company.  The thought of good coffee (which Conti does have) with extreme energy isn’t what I personally want, but from what I read it’s popular.  I still argue you must have a quality product, but HotWired really makes me think about what creative packaging can do to boost sales.

I am a big believer in keeping things simple when it comes to instruction and education.   I love bulleted lists which is no surprise if you’ve read my blog before and I also love visuals, so this sign below was a winner.  The picture was posted by a friend on Facebook and really grabbed my attention.   It’s message was simple, humorous and memorable.

Personally, I struggle on how to teach my customers or inform my prospects without inundating them with content.  I attempt to use screencasts, image mockups (screenshots) and searchable FAQs, but it’s still tough to keep things simple.  If you look around the web, it seems I’m not the only one facing this debacle.  How do you teach your customers or prospects to best use your offering?  I’d love to hear your ideas and experiences (good or bad) below.