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What a great trip. Except for the mind-numbing (in places) drive, everything connected with the Phoenix trip was great. I met loads of talented and really kind folk and we had a wonderful turn-out at the event (standing room only!).

Thanks to ASMP AZ/PHX for their warmth, humor, and outstanding production for the event.

I’m heading out shortly to drive to Phoenix. I’ll be speaking there tomorrow night (the 7th) at ASMP-AZ/PHX. Hope to meet lots of you at the event!

However, the travel means I may not be as able to post as usual. So please forgive me if I’m a bit lax in that area for the next few days. Hard to get an internet connection zipping through Gila Bend, don’t-cha know. 🙂

I head back on Thursday, and will be back at my desk on Friday.

Wanna do something good for your business? Support the Writers Guild strike. Why is that good for your creative business? Because these people are fighting for exact the same thing we do: payments for the value of their work.

The media corporations and producers, etc., don’t want to pay writers for when they sell additional copies of shows on DVD and the internet. These are new uses. Think about how many tv shows you now see for sale on DVD–this never used to happen! And downloads! Anyway, they don’t want to pay them at all for any of these “additional uses” to be truthful, and if they win, you can bet it will be a thousand times harder for a photographer to convince a client that being paid for each usage is fair.  They’ll start to demand more and more be thrown in, under rubriques like “promotion” or “collateral.”

So, if you want to do something great for your business, support the strike. Bring food to the picket lines, write posts about how important these issues are for ALL creatives, don’t cross the picket lines, etc. Helping other creatives fight the same fights we must face is the honorable thing to do.

There is a regular poster on the PDN Forum who hates me. This guy, whom I have never met, is almost scary with his devoted loathing of me. He goes so far as to have in his standard post sig a link to his website followed by “LBDA not welcome” and he even wrote a post where he quoted me, from a completely different forum, as having said his site looks cheap (which, btw, it does–I was writing in response to someone who specifically mentioned this guys site and asking if he had good ideas about marketing) and accused me slandering him, etc. (which I did not–I only said his site looks cheap/low-end).

The only reason for this utter hatred, as far as I can tell, is because I disagree with some of his contentions about the best way to do business.

Yesterday, this guy posted a question/statement on the PDN Forum. Another photographer responded. I responded. The guy deleted the thread (which you can do when you are the original poster) then reposted the thread, but only with his original post and the other photographer’s response. I posted asking why he did that, and he did it again. I pointed out that the purpose of the forum was the exchange of ideas, how I was trying to help, and he deleted the thread entirely and permanently.

What a waste of energy. I feel sorry for this man who spends so much of his time hating me. I don’t hate him. I’m confused by his actions and wonder about his motivation, but I don’t hate him. In fact, I hope he opens his eyes some day to see that the information I offer can actually help him be more successful.

I know people like this. In fact, there are members of my family who would rather fight than learn and who hold onto a position so tightly that they hate anyone who disagrees with them. I used to be like this too, and what a waste of energy that was! It was a wonderful day when I finally learned that by letting go of my anger and hatred those people lost all their (perceived) power over me.

This is a good lesson for your business. When someone tell you something you disagree with, notice that you disagree and look at it dispassionately. Are there some valid points in the argument, on both sides? Can you find common ground? Can you learn something maybe from what this person is telling you, even if you don’t really want to hear it?

You can’t grow unless you challenge your thoughts and beliefs at least a bit.

The title of this post sounds harsh, but the spirit isn’t. Take a breath and play along…

The fact is, a lot of you sit around talking about your marketing, making plans to make plans, thinking about projects you might do, reading one more book or getting one more opinion, doing all sorts of things…

…but not doing your marketing.

These various tasks are all subtle techniques to distract yourself from the tasks you already know you need to do. Who reading this doesn’t know s/he should have a great website? How about sending mailers regularly? And having a great book? You all already know this stuff. But you get bogged down in the details.

This bogging is legitimized by the sentence: I don’t want to do anything until I have everything (or most things) ready because I don’t want to make a mistake.

The truth is, this ready will, for most of you, never, ever happen. By the time you get to your book you’ll have shot other things you’ll want on your website, and the mailers you made 4 months ago won’t make you happy tomorrow so you’ll want to re-do them and by the time you get those the way you want, you won’t be happy with your book again, and, and, ad infinitem.

The second truth is any mistake you might make by actually doing something marketing-esque will probably do little to no harm in the long run. Unless you fall and hit your head and come up with and execute the idea of literally walking up to your targets and spitting in their faces to get their attention while wearing a pink tutu on your head and a smile and nothing else but your black hi-top Chuck Taylors, the “catastrophic” mistake you are worrying about won’t stay in your targets’ heads any longer than what they had for lunch last Tuesday did.

In other words, doing something is better than doing nothing, even when that nothing is cloaked as “planning.”

Yes, it is best to have a full-on plan and to execute that plan, but if the only plan you can actual DO is:

Make great website (see livebooks)
Send email promos once a month (see Agency Access)

Then do that plan–it’s better than beating yourself up for not doing more.

If you’re having “one of those days” sometimes a bit of perspective can help. Try this on:
In the San Diego fires, two photographers lost their homes and pretty much everything they had in them. Guys essentially just like you. At least one of them may not have been sufficiently insured; but, even with insurance the total loss and process of rebuilding their lives will be tiresome at best.
And yet they will get through this. The community is already seeking ways of helping where they can and pointing to other avenues of assistance. And, like the other fire victims, they will heal.

Your own problems are real and they may be frustrating and painful. Remember that these two guys will overcome their losses, and you can overcome your difficulties too. Seek help from others and let others help when they can. Open yourself up to not doing everything yourself. And remember to see the good things in your life even while you struggle with the not-so-good. Keep perspective.

I had someone recently ask why don’t targets ever (practically) return calls or emails. He went on to say how he found it rude. He’s not alone and, frankly, it is rude, but it is also the norm.

In the targets’ defense, lots of these people are so crazy-busy as to make the average photographer look like a lazy slob (and that’s saying a ton since photogs are often very busy!). They quite literally cannot take the 2 minutes it would take to reply–especially since some of them get 25-50 (or more) emails and calls a day.

Many of them actually mean to reply, but not only do they not have time, they have learned that once they open that door, even a crack, some photographers body-slam their way in. In the case of emails, it may work like this:

Photog: I’ve got a new portfolio and would love to show it. When can I come by?

Target: I’m really busy, maybe in a couple of weeks.

Photog: When exactly? Let’s set something up! How about next Thursday at 10am? Or would 1pm be better?

At this point the target is thinking “Damn, I didn’t want to be rude but I never should have said anything. Now I can’t shake this photographer and I don’t have time to deal with it anyway…” This can lead to some seriously bad feelings.

By the way, a better original response from the photographer would have been “No problem–I’ll be in touch in a couple of weeks to see if the timing is better. Thanks!”

In many cases, a lack of response to an email/call may mean the target is just having a bad day and thus isn’t responding to anything unnecessary. By tomorrow, s/he will have forgotten about you (the forgetting may take as little as 15 minutes, to be honest) so you don’t get a response at all. This isn’t personal–your email/call simply isn’t important to that target at that time. In this case, try again in a week or so.

In all these cases, I am referring to specific, personalized emails and calls you are sending–not just the email promos you send en masse. You should never expect someone to call to say “Hey–I got your promo!” That’s unreasonable. But it is reasonable to expect to get a reply to an email like “Hey Betty–We talked a couple of months ago and you asked to see my new book when it’s ready. Well, it’s ready. Let’s set up something. I have lots of flexibility next week to come by. When might be good for you?”

Reasonable, but even these emails often get no response. Next time that happens to you, take a deep breath, try again, and if you get no response after a month, stop emailing/calling that contact for a few months (keep sending promos, though).

When it drives you nuts, just remind yourself “Maybe s/he’s having a bad day.”

There’s a new free Creative Lube podcast available. You can get it on iTunes or via this feed.

All of us know (some of us are) the guy/woman who says, “In my day, we had to be able to do a bit of everything” or “I’ve been doing this for X years, and it’s always been…”Here’s your wake-up call: now is not then. Now is different from any time in the past. Now is accelerating at a pace unknowable in the past. Tomorrow it will be different, too. And the day after that.Watch this video created to raise awareness of the educational needs of kids today and in the near future. It’s 8 minutes long, but totally worth the time. The information is applicable not only to education, but to any business and especially those in the creative industries.Communications technologies have changed our world and how we do business. Local is dead as a market circle (everything is global now) for the creative industries and buyers will choose the best fit for their needs. Good enough isn’t.If you are doing the same old and your business is flat or declining, now is the time to wake up and fulfill your creative destiny. In the process, you will revive your business too.Do you want to sit and complain and make mediocre creative, or make great work and have a successful business? Your choice.

We’re lucky. We live in-between the two main fires (there are several smaller ones, too) so things here are only smoky and ash is falling lightly. We’re very lucky.

Almost 300,000 acres have burned, probably 1000 houses burned so far (the government doesn’t have a good count yet), and over 300,000 people have evacuated as of 7am this morning. Unfortunately, the fires are still out of control and burning more and more with each passing hour.

We’ve lost a bunch of power lines, really important ones, so now our power is restricted. We’ve also been asked not to drive and not to use our cells. Obviously this restricts doing business a bit so things will still be slow for me here.

Thanks to all of you who have posted/emailed kind thoughts. Mentally send them to the masses of people affected here and in all of Southern California. There are many distressed people (and animals) who can use help. Consider donating to the American Red Cross as well.

Thanks again for your patience, understanding, and kindness during this odd and difficult time. I look forward to normalcy. 🙂