Writers' Community!

Log in / Sign up

Home » Writer's Blogs » David-Amerland Online Business Success David Amerland (14) David Amerland Help My SEO Ethan Weitz Charters Offers a New Model For Socially Responsible Commercial Business Posted Monday, February 26, 2007 (2 years 271 days ago.) Viewed 145 times. In the commercial world certain things tend to be simple. When you are offering a service your efforts revolve around ways which tend to maximise the return for the effort involved. So far so good. Companies and organisations however do not operate in a vacuum. Their activities are part of a highly interconnected network of relationships which link their clients, the economy, social responsibility and the state of the immediate market environment they operate in. This means that rather than acting as a vacuum cleaner effect whereby companies and corporations suck-up money and give out a product or service in return, in order to succeed they have to operate within a framework that also guarantees the welfare of their prospective clients and helps increase the size of the communities they are active in because it then increases their potential customer base. All this works well if you take the bottom-line driven approach which is not far removed from the robber-baron mentality. In the 21 st century we are a little more enlightened. We know that no company can truly operate for long in a vacuum and we hold as examples those corporations which also become leaders in terms of environmentally friendly activities or socially responsible drives. In Southern Carlifornia a small, highly-focused boat charter company by the name of Ethan Weitz Charters has managed to become not just a leader in terms of socially responsible behaviour but also an example of how a commercial model, in order to be successful, does not have to operate outside the precepts of social responsibility. Indeed Ethan Weitz Charters, founded by Ethan Weitz, a US Coast Guard Captain, have managed to become commercially successful in an incredibly competitive arena by foregoing the most potentially lucrative customers: individuals and corporate organisations and by focussing on providing a competitive, specialised service exclusively to charitable organizations, schools, hospitals, religious fellowships, and underprivileged children on a pro-bono basis. This unusual approach has its foundation in company Founder’s, Ethan Weitz’s. personal philosophy: “There are many ways to give back to society," says Ethan Weitz, about his company’s unusual approach to operating. “Money is not always the best guideline for success, it is one of them I guess, but what also can be used as a gauge is the positive impact you manage to have in the world you care about." Ethan Weitz’s deep conviction of a personal duty to help those around him comes from a deep faith in himself and America. “Living in the western world, living in America, is a position of deep privilege," he says, “it is something which I do not forget, I never allow myself to forget which is why Ethan Weitz Chartered Tours never works with individuals." Irrespective of how far a company goes or how big it gets its guiding principles are usually rooted firmly in the personal beliefs of its founder. This has been as true of large corporations as it is of smaller ones and Ethan Weitz Charters is no exception. The principle, in each case, is relatively simple. It is what allows companies to achieve more than individuals. It creates a halo effect out of success and it allows companies to enrich the societies they operate in. Given the fact that its impact is so positive and the effects so beneficial the questions has to be why is not applied by more companies? Why is Ethan Weitz Charters rare enough to stand out? And why are not more companies following through? A lot could be down to publicity or inclination or the way we, as consumers and public, idolise successful companies and their achievements. Either way, for a better society and a more socially aware and responsible world we need to be willing to give greater credit to companies like Ethan Weitz Charters and individuals like Ethan Weitz himself. Permalink         Comments (0) When Avatars Came to Earth Posted Monday, February 26, 2007 (2 years 271 days ago.) Viewed 44 times. If we go by the Vedic scriptures Avatars descended on Earth some 5,000 years ago as the incarnation of Vishnu upon the Earth and took on corporeal form to perform specific tasks. The Vedic definition of an avatar (derived from the Sanskrit word: avatara or avataram) refers to the bodily incarnation of a higher being into a lower realm of existence for a very specific purpose. The word avatar, translated from the Sanskrit literally means ‘descent or transference’ and it signifies the passage into another (usually lower) dimension which pretty much is what we are the moment we enter the digital domain. Far from being few and far between, avatars have proliferated with the advent of computing and the widespread use of the internet to become the digital versions of our mental shelves. Amerland Enterprises Blog section, showed that the more control we have over the way we fashion an avatar the more likely it is going to end up looking a lot like us. The key word here is control. The digital realm we enter is both more responsive and more limited than our own. We enter it to carry out specific tasks, whether it is to play in an interactive multi-user game environment, post entries in a Forum or take part in an online interaction through Yahoo! IM, ICQ, Skype or MSN Messenger. In this respect we are no different than the gods of the Vedic pantheon. We lose much of the freedom of our higher realm for the purpose of acquiring specific abilities in a more restricted but far more wide ranging digital one. A fly in this digital ointment of cybergods entering a realm are the restrictions imposed on our identities by the permutations of existing avatars. It’s kinda hard to be digitally unique when the limited choice of avatars available makes you look like a few million other online users. Amerland Enterprises is a web and graphic design studio that pushes the envelope of online work and its designers have felt this lack of choice keenly. Its designers got together to offer a free avatar creation or avatar customization service to online users on a no-strings attached basis. “We thought it would be the cool thing to do and because we didn’t want it to be part of work we made it possible through the donation of our spare time," says Steve who is one of the designers there and also actively contributes to the site’s Forum. The service is free. Users send in a picture of themselves or a royalty free graphic they want to use and describe with as much detail as possible what they would like to see and the designers do it on an availability basis. “We try to turn it round within a day or two. If we are really busy it might be a week but some we have done in our lunch hour on the same day we received them!" says Steve. You can find out details of the service here. It is totally free, confidential and we delete all files and email addresses after we are done so there really is no catch. “We really believe in this," says Steve, “so we are prepared to put the time and effort in. If we get really thousands and thousands of requests we might have to rethink the way we handle it so we manage the flow." The sure thing is that as the new cybergods we’d be able to, again, choose how we look as we descend into a new realm with a specific purpose in mind. Permalink         Comments (0) Promote Your Business: Start Your Own Newspaper Posted Sunday, July 23, 2006 (3 years 124 days ago.) Viewed 140 times. Good PR is harder to get than ever these days. There are many good reasons for this and the proliferation of PR agencies and one-man bands play only a small part. The real culprit is technology. In the good ol’ days (if they ever existed) getting some really cool press coverage depended on two things: A. Having a product to sell or announcement to make which would fall into the category of newsworthy items. B. The relationship that existed between the PR agent and the beleaguered editor of the publication targeted. Within that matrix it was relatively easy to get good press coverage. You provided the product and chose the right PR Agency and they did the rest. Not so today. Each editor of each publication in every corner of the planet is laboring under tight deadlines, low costs, hardly any time at all and so many press releases and product placement offers hitting the newsdesk that they could easily fill most landfills in the country. Why? Well, the shrinking of newspaper and magazine staff for one has seen a glut of PR Agencies springing up everywhere. You’d expect that. Journalists have to make a living through writing and their contacts and Public Relations offers a relatively easy route to a full fridge at the end of the month. For professionals who struggle with deadlines and challenging subjects on a daily basis, knocking up copy that makes some new type of “green wallpaper" sound the hottest thing to have been invented since sliced bread is a relatively easy task. Selling it successfully is, these days, relatively harder and because journalists (and PR Agencies) operate under tremendous strictures of time, they reach for the ubiquitous, easy, hi-tech solution that has spoiled the market for everyone: some automated mailer software that will “blast a Press Release on the desk of every magazine and newspaper editor in the country". So they write, charged their clients, click, send and pray that the sheer percentage of numbers will do the trick. Joined in their prayers by just about everyone else in the industry it means that a press release, these days, will see the light of day only if one of two things are happening: A. The PR journalist has a personal relationship with the editor in question (it happens, though not frequently), or B. The editor in question puts together a survey cobbled from the mountain of press releases overflowing the newsdesk and features a product alongside that of its competitors. What has all this got to do with starting your own newspaper? Well, a lot actually. If you really want to control your PR, impress your customers, add gravitas to your business and open doors wherever you go, starting your own newspaper is the way to do it. I know the prospect sounds daunting. A newspaper requires a name, office space, equipment, an editor, subs, a graphic design desk, photoresearchers, journalists, publicity, a circulation manager, printers and someone to make the coffee. The latest foray into national paper publishing in the UK, The Sportsman, burnt 15 million British pounds in just three months and failed to find a circulation, an audience or pretty much anything at all. Greenslade’s comments make for somber reading. So why am I suggesting it at all? Well, because it’s feasible, for one and makes sound business sense for another and, handled right, does not need to burn up a truckload of money the way The Sportsman did. If we leave cats and skinning alone for a mo (old clichés should be locked away sometimes, particularly if they upset animal lovers), there’s always more than one way to do something. If you launch a newspaper to just make yourself feel good, then maybe the first step is to find a reliable printer you can trust who can get his hands on some really good quality printing plates because printing your own currency is the easiest way to fund it. But if you are thinking of launching a newspaper to promote your business, gain exposure, increase the reach and power of your networking efforts, open negotiating doors, impress customers, sell more products or services and make some money while doing all this, then there is a way to do it which does not cost the Earth. In fact, with so many high-quality, experienced freelance journalists and editors knocking about praying that their expertly written, electronically filed press releases get through to an editor who will use them, finding the right people for the job should be easy. Easier still if you go to someone who already has a network of such people in place, can bring sound expertise to bear on the project, can advise you whether it will work or not and can assess its full potential without looking to the bottom line of their own account first. This is called a value-led transaction. They value you as a prospect but recognize that things will only work out if they give honest, up-front advice that will cement the tone of your mutually beneficial working relationship. If you have found the right company (and hopefully you’ve talked to us at Amerland Enterprises about this) they will give you a FREE report outlining the advantages and pitfalls of launching a newspaper, a good expectation of the costs (because they are largely predictable) and a reasonable assessment, based on their own research and experience, of the performance you should expect. It’s rarely that someone starts a newspaper never expecting to make money. There are a number of ways your own newspaper will help you do this: • It will sell your products and services • It will open doors for you in government and professional organizations • It will lead to new, creative partnerships (more on this later) • It will give you a vehicle for your own thoughts and ideas • It will allow you to sell advertising • It will catapult you into the ranks of a media mogul Selling your products and services is the easiest thing to talk about. You could, for instance, take out double-page adverts in your paper or, better still, run a double-page editorial advert. Provided you give free copies to all your customers, not just for them, but also to give their customers as a value-added service, you have just created a massive sales force working for your business for free. Owning a newspaper automatically opens doors. As the owner of means to propagate messages to the reading public you will find that professional organizations and government services will want to cultivate your friendship. You will be put on guest lists, mailing lists and even interview lists by other journalists. A newspaper is the perfect vehicle for starting up creative business partnerships. Give it away for free, for example, to all the tourist hotels in your area and offer them reduced advertising or even free advertising and see if you can then link up with them to promote your business or services. Offer reduced advertising in it to all your clients. Use it as a vehicle to sell complementary products or services from businesses outside your own. The list of possibilities here is limited only by your own ability to negotiate a creative business deal. Use the newspaper as a platform (but not a pulpit) for your thoughts and ideas. As a business professional you re in tune with your market. You know the challenges, its developments, what makes it tick. You probably have theories, untested ideas, suggestions. Used wisely, a newspaper platform, can turn you into a media star in your own circle. Make money from advertising. This is a no-brainer. Depending on how you circulate your newspaper you can make it work directly for you by generating ad revenue. This can be from small-scale ads designed to fill the ‘Classifieds’ section to full-page ads given to practically anyone you care to approach. Last but not least you will, through the ‘magic’ of having your own newspaper be classed as a media mogul. Someone who has clout in the world of mass media, able to highlight specific developments, give profile to specific business and attend glitzy events. All this, of course, is just a pared-down version of the advantages and possibilities offered through the owning of your own newspaper. The reality of it, properly handled, can catapult your business into the stratosphere, enable you to take advantage of possibilities which would have slipped past your fingers and help you have a far greater impact upon the business world than you would normally have thought possible. Because starting your own newspaper is a feasible idea it doesn’t mean you should go ahead and start it (though we’d love it if all our clients did just that!). Talk to us first. Tell us what you hope to achieve, why you think it will work for you and we’ll be happy to give you a FREE, obligation-free assessment outlining not just the possibilities but also the pitfalls. That will give you a good overall picture of the way newspaper publishing works. Permalink         Comments (0)

Archives: November 2009 M T W T F S S 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30           « Oct     Previous Posts: Ethan Weitz Charters Offers a New Model For Socially Responsible Commercial Business When Avatars Came to Earth Is Publishing Still Good Business? The nature of Genius Win Business By Being Smart About the Content of Your Message Harness the Power of the Web To Maximise the Reach of Your Business The Product and the Cost: How and Why? Why the Girl In the Picture Is Not a Blonde All Posts by David Amerland Related Posts: How a Chevrolet Dealer Shows Off Our Grand Old Flag All Year Long Do Not Judge Me!! A Different Way to Live Show Care and Consideration for Others. How to Have Extra Cash by Going Green Rich? Poor? (Anything But Middle Class!) Strands of Frogs' Eggs: Nobel Voices from GA, MS, NC, DC, Iran and Kenya Light Up Your Life!

Home  |  Page Two  |  FAQ's  |  Contact  |  Terms of Service  |  Article Submission Guidelines  |  Questions & Answers  |  Privacy  |  Mission / About
Copyright © 1999-2009 SearchWarp.com, All Rights Reserved - SearchWarp.com is an IcoLogic, Inc. Company