business

I’ve been asked to participate as a judge in a business contest, and I’d like to encourage you to enter.

With the economy in crisis, businesses are all looking for ways to not just survive but to take advantage of the times and prosper. There are always those who make fortunes in an economic downturn by thinking outside the box.

Do have a success story? Can you offer creative tips for businesses?

Business.com will reward you $10,000 and a year’s worth of publicity on the Business.com site and partner sites if you win their What Works for Business Contest. There will be nine additional winners who will win $2,000 each and a year’s worth of publicity.

So hurry and get your entry in by Dec. 3. They are looking for a short description of a challenge your business has faced and how you successfully solved it.

The entry can be about any area of business. For example, do you have tips on

• Branding to get above the noise to today’s audience?
• Using social media to engage customers and prospects?
• Proven tips on hiring the best?
• Developing skills successful executives need to lead?
• Adjusting your business plan for today’s market?
• Managing finances to get the most bang for your buck?

These are just a few examples. To find out more and to enter, go to http://whatworks.business.com

Take a look at recent contest entries here.

• The daily New York Times now contains more information that the 17th century man or woman would have encountered in a lifetime.
• In the last 30 years humankind has produced more information than in the previous 5,000.
  
• The total of all printed knowledge doubles every five years. 

Perhaps it’s time to take a lesson from the Balinese. In Balinese culture, people are totally dependent on the community for vital functions, particularly important ceremonial rites. It is what has held the culture in place despite decades of mass tourism. You must belong to and participate in the local banjar (which, for the sake of brevity, I will describe as a very powerful community group to which all in that village* belong) or the banjar will not stand by you when you need it.

For example, cremation ceremonies in Bali require extensive preparations, preparations that can go on for months. Preparations that can take all day and all night for days. They involve building huge sarcophagi that look like detailed animals, making hundreds of offerings and performing dozens of ceremonies. It is impossible to cremate loved ones without the help of the banjar. And without proper cremation, your soul cannot be released. This is just one of the many reasons it is necessary to be a member in good standing of the banjar.

For us it is the same today in business. If we are not a member in good standing in our communities, if we do not support them and share with them, we will be left behind. Cooperaton is more critical than ever, because we can’t do it alone.

*Actually, there may be several banjars in one “village” when the word is used in its wider sense, as it is in Bali, but we will leave that discussion for my travel blog.

Statistical sources: (Wurman, S.A. (1987) Information Anxiety. New York: Doubleday, (Information Overload Causes Stress. (1997, March/April). Reuters Magazine, (Information Overload Causes Stress. (1997, March/April). Reuters Magazine

This is the time when business, marketing and social media bloggers make predictions and lists of what’s hot for the coming year. I want to pass some of my favorite lists to you for consideration while you plan your 2008 web marketing strategy.

• Jeremiah Owyang, a Forrester Analyst in social media gives us his Complete List of the Many Forms of Web Marketing for 2008. You won’t implement initiatives in all these areas, but your strategy should include considering which are right for your company.

• TechCrunch lists 2008: Web 2.0 Companies I Couldn’t Live Without. These are social media companies like Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, Delicious, Digg and many, many more. Don’t know all the companies TechCrunch lists? Time to familiarize yourself, because the social media wave is only going to get bigger. Ride it, don’t drown in it.

• Mashable’s 2008 Predictions touch on NBC’s online strategies, Google’s mobile plans, social media, women and technology, and the increasing status of bloggers. Watch the trends so you can see the opportunities.

• All those marketing conferences and not enough time? See iPlot’s Most Important Marketing Conferences of 2008.

• Facebook is increasingly important for business, and if you’re not there, you should be. (Needless to say, you already have a vibrant presence in LinkedIn.) Check out FaceReview’s 13 Facebook 2008 Predictions.

• See John Battelle’s Search Blog for 2008 predictions in search, media and technology.