Rich Christiansen – Parallel Entrepreneur, Entrepreneurial Expert

Each year during the holiday season,  one of the events that I look forward to as much as anything is reviewing our Kiva account. Kiva is a micro lending site which funds entrepreneurs in 3rd world countries.  The average loan amount is crazy low.  We are talking less than $150.  The default donation is $25.

I began this Kiva tradition over seven years ago and it is a BLAST!  We initially donated $500 and hand selected entrepreneurs through the world that needed a micro loan.  It shows you their business,  pictures, details, their plan, and payback schedule.

 Even though this was not the purpose or intent when I did this small investment,  these Kiva loans to 3rd world entrepreneurs has out performed my “real” investments.   How funny is that and what does it tell us about where we should really be putting our money?

One of my colleagues has an eleven year old son named Patrick.  I was delighted when I heard that this young man’s goal was to raise $50,000 for Kiva by reading 2,500 pages in one month.  He is calling this a Kivathon.

We are in!     My family just committed $1,000. 

 I challenge you to Kiva with Patrick.

I promise you,  not only will it do some good,  but your will find yourself leaving the website 2 hours after you were suppose to have been in bed.

I hope you enjoy this video and the adventure down Kiva lane.  Here is the link:

http://kivathon.blogspot.com/

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This weekend was simply a dream come true.  One of the young men that I am actively involved with -   Tenzing Norbu Sherpa arrived in the USA from Nepal. I consider Tenzing like a son.  My wife and I had the opportunity to raise his older sister Nawang Sera as our daughter from the time she was 15 years old.
The past  6 years I have been working with this amazing young man.  Each year he has read a book and done a full report for me in order to maintain his scholarship.    Some of the books we have had him read and report on are, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Teens,  Ways To Be, and yes of course  Bootstrap Business.

 I have had a rigorous set of rules in place for Tenzing which would qualify him for continued education.  A few of these rules include:

-  No use of drugs or alchohol

-  Honesty in his interactions with those around him

- Service to those in need (which is everywhere by the way)

-  Having the courage to question the teachers and not just believe everything that they present to him

-  Respect for women and treat them as his equal

  Yesterday  Tenzing experienced  for the first time in his life,  a ride in a car, a ride in an airplane, a ride on a train,  eating a hamburger,  drinking water from a tap,  drinking soda from a open soda fountain, and a hundred other things that we take advantage of each day.  

As we took Tenzing to have a hamburger, he was so eager to order and went to the counter and said  ” I will have a hamburger please”.   They said, “what kind of hamburger?”   He said “just a hamburger”.   It was then pointed out that there were many different options available to him.  At that point  with great delight, he ordered the Jalapeno  Burger from Carl’s Jr.   He was so captivated by the choices and I pointed out  that now his life begins and everything will be an opportunity.

No more scarcity Tenzing

I invite you to meet Tenzing Norbu in the video below.   I hope you catch the vision and enjoy this young man.

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 It is a biting cold morning today in New York City.

As I bustled with the other New Yorkers to my 10:00 AM at at 1221 Avenue of the Americas in mid-town, I experienced a combination of nerves and excitement.

I gulped as I  looked up at the 51 stories.

I thought to myself, this is what it feels like to be a young  woman going to Prom for the first time.

I had a moment of dejuivue as I looked down the block at the “Rock”   and realized that Ron Porter and I some 3 years ago had brazenly charged into 45 Rockefeller Plaza,  met with a little company named Warner  Music, and this had indeed been the starting point for  Bootstrap Business. 

How interesting that this had come full circle.

My meeting was on the 45th floor  with Mary Glenn who is the Associate Publisher for Business books at McGraw HIll.

I look forward to this next adventure and commit that I will give you my very best,  I will hold nothing back, and I will enable you to win and succeed.

Lets Zig Zag to Success.

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What is the deal with Black Friday anyways?    What causes any sane individual to look forward to getting up at 3am and stand in the freezing cold to save $15 on a flat screen TV? 

Being an official representative of the NON shoppers in the USA, I have asked myself these questions every Thanksgiving day for the past 45 years.   Well this year I figured out the answers to these questions and yes,  I share my findings with you at the end of this post.

I just completed the book Culture Codes by Clotaire Rapaille.  This was a book given to me as a gift from Michael Fishman who I blogged on several weeks ago. Tell Them What They Don’t Know and Can’t Tell You

Clotaire is on retainer with 50 of the Inc 100 companies in the USA.  His primary focus is through a discovery process that reveals the triggers or “on code” word phrases that are consistent culturally with consumers buying behaviors.

What Mr. Rapaille proposes is that early in our youth, typically before the age of eight years old, we emotionally imprint a strong cultural reaction to certain key events.   These events are triggered by the right side of our brains; the creative, free form, emotional side of our brains.  As we become adults we use logic and the left side of our brain to justify and put frosting on the decisions we make.   However  The book “The Culture Code” goes through a series of examples and coding process that shows that most human behavior is  driven by these strong emotional reactions from or cultures which we then back and justify with logic.

I was captivated as I read Clotaire’s theories on the USA being an adolescent culture and our behavior in all ways typifies this.  Although I believed it, I was surprised to see someone so boldly write about “reptilian brains” and how we have to market to this while appeasing the logical man.  

One of the key things that Rapaille does is run a control group through a 3 hour exercise that basically breaks them down to the point he discovers what the true underlying drivers are in certain behaviors.  Based on the behavior he is exploring, he then punctuates the culture with a specific code.    With out ruining the book for you, as a primer,  let me give you a few of the “Culture Codes” for several of our behaviors in the USA.

The code for Beauty is  -  Mans Salvation

The code for Fat is  -  Checking Out

The code for Shopping is -  Reconnecting With Life

If you are attempting to market or promote a product or service,  this book is a MUST read.  It is similar to the marketing message of Roy H Williams – the Wizard of Ads.  Which by the way, The Wizard Academy is another must attend training for serious marketers. 

OK, I promised it and now I will deliver.  Why is there such a strong polarized reaction between Black Friday Shoppers and those that think these individuals have lost their marbles?

I have answered this already in the post.

It is the positive or negative cultural imprinting that occurred when we were young.  In other words, did we feel satisfied and have a special bonding moment with one of our parents while shopping for the best deal?  Was this an event the family looked forward to and made a big  deal about when we were young?  If not, most likely you did not form the culture code to Black Friday shopping.   In summary all of those Black Friday shoppers are “Reconnecting With Life” after eating too much turkey as much as they are saving $15 and standing in line in the freezing cold.

So where does this lead us in our businesses?   Simple:

1.     Figure out what is driving the emotional reaction (culture code)

2.     Sell to this emotional point

3.     Provide logic supporting points to appease the adult brain

If you uderstand this principle, you will sell the stockings off your product or service!

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