How to Ask for Help — Without Looking Stupid

by Jodi Glickman Brown

You may be afraid of looking dumb, but to be afraid to ask for and get the help you need is inexcusable, especially when the stakes are high. Asking for help in the workplace is a good thing. In fact, asking for help the right way can show how smart you are: it demonstrates that you've got good judgment and shows that you know what you know and what you don't know. Moreover, getting help up front saves endless time, energy and resources on the back end.

1. Start your question with what you know. Do your homework first. Get enough background information to put your issue or problem in context. Give the other person an idea of what you've completed to date or what you know already and then proceed to explain what's outstanding, where or how you're struggling, or what you need help with.
2. Then, state the direction you want to take and ask for feedback, thoughts or clarification. Form an opinion on what you think the answer should be. Don't just ask, "How should I reach out to the brokers?" Instead propose a course of action and get your boss's feedback: "I'm thinking of sending out a mass email to the brokers but I'm not sure if that's the most effective format...what do you think of that approach?"
3. If you don't know the direction to take, ask for tangible guidance. Instead of asking "What should I do?" ask specifically for the tools you'll need to make that decision yourself, such as a recent example of a similar analysis or a template for a given task. Or, ask for a referral to someone who has worked on a similar initiative or project in the past.

In the vast majority of cases, you'll get a lot further in your career by asking the tough, smart questions.

Read the complete story at:

http://blogs.harvardbusiness.org/cs/2009/11/asking_for_help_the_smart_way.html

Official Google Blog: Investing in a mobile future with AdMob

Official Google Blog: Investing in a mobile future with AdMob
On November 9, 2009 Google announced an agreement to acquire AdMob, a mobile display ad technology provider, for $750 million. This acquisition will enhance Google's existing expertise and technology in mobile advertising, while also giving advertisers and publishers more choice in this growing new area.

• The deal will bring new innovation and competition to mobile advertising, and will lead to more effective tools for creating, serving, and analyzing emerging mobile ads formats.
• This deal will benefit developers, publishers, and advertisers by improving the performance of mobile advertising, and will provide users with more free or low-cost mobile apps.
• The mobile advertising space will remain highly competitive, with more than a dozen mobile ad networks. The deal is similar to mobile advertising acquisitions that AOL, Microsoft, and Yahoo have made in the past two years.

Mobile advertising is a rapidly growing and competitive space, and Google and AdMob are currently specializing in different areas. Though Google offers many forms of mobile advertising, its focus to date has been on mobile search ads, while AdMob's focus has been mobile display ads and in-application ads.

How to Make Money with Free

by Nathan Hangen

We live in a world of free. If you’re trying to make money, especially online, you might think that would make things difficult.

Every day, someone releases a new eBook, video, or podcast that not only contains tremendous value, but gives away many of the “tricks of the trade” that we used to have to pay for.

You’d think that the paid content business would be shrinking in the face of all this free information, but it keeps getting stronger. How can that be?

For instance, there are a lot of free materials that teach people how to set up a Wordpress blog or to use Twitter effectively. A quick search on YouTube will provide you with hundreds of videos that can teach you to do almost anything you want to know.

Yet, there are still people making plenty of cash selling products explaining how to do any and all of those things.

How do they do it?

Building relationships

People buy from those that they know and trust.

Sure, there are people in the yellow highlighter brigade who can sell ice to an Eskimo, but it isn’t easy to do. (And you may not even want to.)

Most of us can’t write the ultimate sales letter. We also can’t afford to hire a $20,000 copywriter. So how do we do it? We build relationships.

When you establish a “winning difference” or USP, you can start attracting the people who really dig what you do.

If your stuff is good, I guarantee you can find at least one evangelist to recruit others to come check you out. They’ll spread the word for you, which attracts more evangelists, and means that you will have ever more people stopping by.

Nurture relationships with your readers and evangelists and your small army will continue to grow.

The benefit of free

 

Content marketing is all about giving away some of your best stuff for free. Not just your “pretty good” content, but content that will improve and add value to the lives of your readers.

As they learn more, their game will improve and they’ll keep coming around for more. And they’ll want to reciprocate by either buying your paid products or spreading your message.

Most people won’t buy from you unless you’ve proven to them that you know what you’re talking about. Great content is one of the best ways you can do that. When you give content away for free, you earn trust and anchor your business in the mind of that reader. If they use your stuff, and it works, they’ll keep coming back for more.

They’ll pay for souvenirs

I first heard this idea from Seth Godin when he gave a speech about book marketing, but the concept applies to nearly every online business.

He said that people buy souvenirs, not products. In the music industry, Nine Inch Nails does this by selling collector’s editions of their albums. In the blogging industry, we can do it by selling a physical version of a product, limiting quantities of digital products, or by publishing a book.

If your blog creates a great experience, think about what kind of souvenirs you could offer that would let them hold onto that experience.

They'll pay for access

Particularly if you've used your blog to build your reputation and authority, you can also sell different levels of access to you.

The people who truly love what you do want other ways to access your knowledge. Your raving fans will start by picking up every digital product you offer. From there, many will want more exclusive access, such as a consulting service, a mentoring or coaching program, or a monthly membership with exclusive access to you.

If you empower people to do what they most want to do, they’ll want to buy something in order to feel closer to you. (And, of course, it goes without saying that you’ll deliver value that’s in line with the prices you’re charging.)

JB Glossinger does a great job of this with his Coach Cast. Brian and Sonia do it with Teaching Sells.

You’d have to sell thousands of eBooks to make a living as a blogger, but it might take only a few hundred premium members to do the same job.

Free samples have been part of marketing and selling since long before the Internet. Give great value and follow a few proven models, and you’ll discover not only does “free” not hurt you, it can actually be a great boost for your online business.

About the Author: Nathan Hangen writes about web entrepreneurship at NathanHangen.com, and about how to use social media to fuel your brand at Making It Social. Follow him on Twitter @nhangen.

Everyone is clueless

This post is copied from Seth Godin's blog

The problem with "everyone" is that in order to reach everyone or teach everyone or sell to everyone, you need to so water down what you've got you end up with almost nothing.

Everyone doesn't go to the chiropractor, everyone doesn't give to charity, everyone has never been to Starbucks. Everyone, in fact, lives a decade behind the times and needs hundreds of impressions and lots of direct experience before they realize something is going on.

You don't want everyone. You want the right someone.

Someone who cares about what you do. Someone who will make a contribution that matters. Someone who will spread the word.

As soon as you start focusing on finding the right someone, things get better, fast. That's because you can ignore everyone and settle in and focus on the people you actually want.

Here's a video that David sent over. I am thrilled at how much this guy loves his job, and I'm inspired by his story of how he turned down Pepsi as a vendor. He turned them down. But everyone wants Pepsi! Exactly. Once he decided he wanted someone, not everyone, his life got a lot better.