Mike Walker Creative

I came across this nugget from the great Phil Cooke regarding mobile phone broadcasting. If you are a content producer/provider this is the wave of the future. Imagine being able to send your content direct to peoples cel phones….

This is a great tool that will need the right strategy. This combined with the power of Ministry Give are incredible tools to reach directly to people. The broadcast networks gave us “potential households” this gives you direct access to people and the ability to track them as donors or viewers. Cool stuff….

President Elect Barack Obama is planning on introducing an economic stimulus plan this week. I, along with the rest of the country, am very anxious and excited to see what he brings to the table.

Keep in mind, this is the guy who raised an unprecedented amount of campaign capital. Not only did his campaign set records, it eclipsed anything people have imagined. Here’s the really crazy thing…he did it during the middle of an economic recession. They had the right tools with the right strategy.

In a time where churches are seeing on average of 15-25% reduction in giving it’s time to start looking at a new way of doing things.

Monday morning I met with Yuri Star of Church Media Group about a new product they have called Ministry Give. Ministry Give uses the same technology that the Obama campaign used to raise record amounts of capital…..AND…it’s not expensive at all. It allows your donors to give online, at a kiosk, or via their cel phone. It’s a very cutting edge solution for fund raising.

Check out Ministry Give and put together a strategy that will help your organization. If you have questions please feel free to drop me an email.

I have been fortunate to be able to do some work with the Dallas Cowboys franchise.

When Bill Parcells came in to take over the coaching he had a phrase he used to pound in to the players heads, “don’t eat the cheese”. When things started going well and the press would start giving out accolades he would remind his stars especially…”don’t eat the cheese. Your cheeks will get fat from eating the cheese”.

What he was trying to tell his guys was this, be careful about reading and believing your own press. You’re never quite as good as they say and never quite as bad.

Eating the cheese can be incredibly destructive to any organization. I have seen it first hand in several organizations. Some of the strongest teams with the most momentum have been undone because they started believing their press. They got distracted by the success and quit doing the things that got them there. The guy or girl who outworked everyone else suddenly became the one crying for another assistant so they could spend less time doing what made them successful in the first place….their cheeks got fat from the cheese.

Just because something worked for several years doesn’t mean it will keep working…which means YOU have to keep working to stay current and keep yourself and your company on the leading edge.

Don’t eat the cheese.

I am probably going to date myself a little, but I grew up during the age of arena rock shows. Every act aspired to perform in arenas. The size of those shows eventually grew in to stadium shows and as you can imagine every act aspired to have a stadium show.

In the late 90’s the industry went through it all again. In the early 2000’s everyone pulled out and pulled out quickly. Acts that were playing to scores of people inside stadiums went straight in to theaters and clubs basically overnight.

What happened was a series of things. Itunes changed the buying habits of listeners and the record industry didn’t (and still doesn’t) know how to respond. Creativity started lacking in the shows. It became cookie cutter. One of the biggest things that happened was the fact that the bubble burst. The costs of keeping a show in a stadium made them far less profitable. There was a ton of money coming in, but what it took to keep it going wasn’t worth it.

A show that might profit $150,000-200,000 in an arena after expenses might profit $275,000-325,000 in a stadium. More money right? Not exactly…it takes 2-3 times the man power, expense, and effort to put on a stadium show than it does an arena show. So while on paper it looks more profitable it’s really not sustainable. You have to maintain a larger staff, more hotels, more meals, extra production, more security, etc…so more is not exactly more.

The church world always has been and still is about 15 years behind. One thing I think we are seeing is that more is not always more. Churches are building larger and larger buildings and adding more and more staff. My question is, are they more effective? Some would say yes and some no.

I think churches should in fact grow. There are scores of lost people in the world who need to hear the message, but are churches growing smart and are they growing healthy? I have seen up close examples of some that have and some that haven’t.

We celebrate explosive growth, but that same speed of growth can also be the speed of your undoing.

Business has countless examples of both as well. In the early 2000’s we saw a boom in mortgages and refinancing. Today we are reaping what was sowed. The mortgage industry handed out bad loan after bad loan (a lot of good ones too) and they had more business. I am curious if they had it to do over again if they would have been so anxious to write every loan or if they would have been a bit more strategic and taken the time to write better paper?

Again, the church has much to learn from this. Otherwise we will see in the church world more of what’s happening in corporate america. Just doing good business is not going to exempt the church from feeling the pressures of the economy, but it sure will help it cope effectively.

Smart growth is smart growth…as is smart reductions.

A good friend of mine nearly lost his company 2 years ago. They were doing more business than they ever dreamed and had more money flowing in to the company than ever before. The problem they had was sustaining what they had grown to. More was not exactly more. It wasn’t until they went through the organization and did some timely pruning that they were actually able to grow in a healthy manner.

Starbucks realized that this year. They had added more stores to hopefully increase their profit shares. The problem was that it wasn’t smart growth. More stores didnt exactly equal more profits. They had to cut back in order to see more profitability.

As you are growing it’s important to ask the question…can we do this? It’s equally important to ask…should we do this? Growing an organization to a certain size isn’t the hard part….sustaining it is. It’s funny how growth can actually cost you your organization if you aren’t careful.

So I ask again…is more always more?

Unfortunately I wasn’t home last night so I missed both McCains acceptance speech as well as the NFL kickoff game (which sounds like it was kind of dull).

I caught up on the Republican National Convention last night thanks to Larry King. After viewing the footage and hearing portions of the speech I think The Republican party is in trouble on this election.

1 - I noticed the arena was not completely full….arena…not stadium. Obama had a completely full stadium in Denver for his acceptance speech while the Republican convention was in a much smaller arena and was not full.

2 - When Obama came out the other night it took him nearly 10 minutes to quiet the crowd so he could give his speech. The crowd last night was far from rowdy…and in fact had mixed boos within it.

3 - Whoever did the set design and video content for the set at the convention should be fired. We live in a media and technology age folks. Used properly it can really enhance your presentation and image, done poorly (like last night) can really hurt you. The LED screen behind John was set in blue at times which made Senator McCain look even older. When there was a red background behind him it looked much better on camera. It looked like the set designer and content folks gave SOME consideration to those in the room last night, but hardly any consideration to the people watching on tv (which was the largest audience).

4 - After watching the 2 conventions it sure seems as though the Obama movement appears to have a lot more traction and popularity. An oversized crowd worked up as loud as a football game compared to a much smaller less full arena sure paints different pictures.

5 - In watching Larry King I was actually very impressed that the Obama supporters that they had on last night didn’t spend time blasting McCain. They were actually complimentary while able to share differing view points. It was almost as if they felt the Republican convention went as well as they wanted it to. Obamas camp seems very poised and very confident.
I am sure the democratic convention wasn’t exactly tipping their hand as to what they were going to reveal, but they left the Republicans looking small, desperate, and in search of help (and no I am not going to talk on here about who I think should be the next president or why).

I was speaking with a peer who was telling me about a situation with a client. The client is going back to the well of a few gimicks that worked well for them a few years ago, but has since changed its personnel, its customer base, and its overall approach and brand. The problem is, in this case, that what worked several years ago will likely have a resounding thud this time around.

Most everyone is in the middle of tough times economy and having to get creative with budgets, programs, staffing, etc….being from a sports background I have always taken the approach of going back to the basics. Go back to the grass roots things that made things work in the beginning. The problem is too many organizations think its about a program or a gimick that brought them success, what they don’t realize is that it was something deeper that made them successful and the gimick or the program just accentuated what was already there.

Gimicks WILL NOT help you pull out of tough times…in fact, if done poorly, can sink you further in to a fast moving quick sand. Don’t get me wrong…I am in favor of doing a few catchy things here and there, but I have seen up close and personal what happens when it becomes all gimmicks and no substance. Just be careful about going back to the well too often…it can dry up quick.

I read this on Seth Godins blog. Great article!

I often visit with a client and they want to know what type of speaker they should buy, what console to use, what lights they should be purchasing, etc… The first things you need, no matter what type of organization you are, are passion and architecture. The tools always take care of themselves.

This looms huge during times of a slow economy. I can’t tell you how many people I have seen spend bad money after bad all because they are looking at tools first instead of passion and architecture.

We have all heard the latest buzz in marketing…branding. It’s not your tag line. It’s not your logo. Simply put your brand is your promise. As an organization you are making promises to your customers every day. Most of the time organizations are unaware of this. The tricky part is that your brand is not what YOU say it is…it’s what THEY say it is. If enough people believe a certain thing about an organization then it likely becomes part of your brand. Many companies try to control their brand, but to have the most success you should seek to influence your brand. Make sure that the things you are going to promise as an organization are going to be delivered. Another way to think of it is this, brand management is less about marketing and more about relationship management. Imagine telling an individual how important your relationship with them is, but then you never call and you never spend any time together. What the other person would feel is that it’s not really important to them. In essence the promise is broken. What Starbucks, they tell us every day that their brand essence is all about a great coffee experience. If they spent the next year investing in sandwiches and cold drinks or got rid of all the things that we have all come to know as a great coffee experience, the music, the atmosphere, the baristas who know our name, etc…..what would we begin believing about Starbucks? Sure they are open to new ideas and products, but at the end of the day they are ALL about a great coffee experience. As an organization what are you all about? Are you keeping your promise?

Matt Card, of Clark Pro Media, is a good friend of mine from Atlanta. He is also one of the more brilliant business strategists I know. He told me once that organizations will succeed by being strategic or being accidental. In times of of recession you find out real quick who is strategic and who is accidental.

One thing that stands out about strategic organizations is that they usually have a strong sense of who they are and what is important to them. Knowing who you are and what’s important is huge…it’s a great filter to run things through when things are tough.

Starbucks is ALL about a great coffee experience. If you have been keeping up with them in recent months you know that they are being very purposeful in their decision making about what to add and what to take away. Some of the things they are taking away such as some of their menu items might be good things and communicate a good coffee experience, but not quite a great coffee experience.

Another couple friends of mine work for a creative agency. They were telling me about a client who has paid for a certain amount of hours of work, but because the client doesn’t have a true sense of who they are they are spending the agency’s time and their own money having the agency chase different objectives every couple of weeks. At the end of the day they have the funds to allow this, but what happens when things get tighter for them. A true sense of mission, purpose, and intentionality will go a long way to helping make best use of resources.

Know who you are, why things are important to you, and be intentional about implementing the right things to separate you from the good and put you in line with the great otherwise you are waiting for an accident to happen…which could be good or bad, but why chance it?

Through out my career while working for other companies, ever time I would walk in for my first week on the job I would be issued my laptop (usually a Dell) which was loaded up with outlook, word, excel, etc… I am unaware of the costs these days, but I know at the time one company was spending on average of $200 per computer for licenses. I believe we had somewhere around 250 computers. You can see how that adds up.

In todays IT environment there are more options. While there are some things that are “must haves” there are also some ways to get creative. Each situation is a bit different so you will have to evaluate the needs of your organization. For example, instead of using Microsoft Outlook maybe look at using Gmail for everyone in your company. It works….and it’s free. Google also offers calendars that can be shared and are free. Do you currently have large server space dedicated to email and calendars? Since Google is web based there is no longer a need for email servers for your company. 

Can you re-think what your tech needs are on a daily basis? I know most companies are pretty anti MAC…sometimes with good reason, but sometimes not. I know IT guys who spend most of their day running around to fix PC problems. I know very few IT guys who have MACs deployed that spend much time having to fix them. If there are areas where MAC’s can be deployed take a look at it. You might find your IT folks have less to do which would allow you to move them or rethink that department.

There are a ton of options in this area. In todays economy it’s good to rethink some things. It could end up saving you a lot of money and time.