JESS3 / The State of The Internet from JESS3 on Vimeo.

Poreto’s Principle

e.g.  In a company, 20% of the staff do 80% of the work.  In a garden 20% of pea pods hold 80% of the peas.  At a party 20% of the people will eat 80% of the cake.

When it comes to building effective websites for business and individuals, I’ve discovered the equation looks like this.  80% of the site is built in 20% of the time.  It’s the remaining 20% that takes an additional 80% of the time.  And it’s this 20% that seriously sets one website apart from another.

Now, having said that, I think there is a market for the simple sites that are built in 20% of the time. Quick, simple, no tweaks, straight off the template – what we might call a ‘business card style’ or ’simple web presence’.  It’ s not built to win stacks of business, wow clients or engage their minds and senses.  A simple place where information can be found.  I build these sometimes because it’s all the client wants – and having said that, they tend to look pretty good and clients are most impressed getting what they do for about $1400.

Move up from that and you get something totally different. You get hours upon hours of tweaking, changing, support and testing.  You get my Brainspace – the remaining 80%.  You get the wow factor, you get the engagement, you get something that will win business and convert browsers to buyers… it goes without saying that you’re going to pay at least double for the privilege and it’s more of a journey than an event.  .e.g. stevepenny.org marooochycarsound.com.au

I’m sure you can see this at work in your business.   And there are times when all people want is the 80%.  Case-in-point are the Virgin and Jetstar models of air travel.  You want to get from A-B with no extras,  no refund and no apologies for under $100? Great!  But don’t pay peanuts and expect the moon – if you do, you might find yourself upset and starring in a TV program about whinging idiots at airports!

We need to decide who we want to cater for, what pushes our buttons and what the market is demanding – sometimes we may be able to offer both a First Class and Economy Class option.

You may be a First Class type person and pleased to deal with the high end market and you’ll work on improving your effectiveness. You may be happy to do a set task for a set amount and move onto the next one,  so you’ll sit in the Economy market and you’ll work on improving your efficiency.

So when it comes to a 80/20 business model.  Be the ‘80′ or the ‘20′ or offer both’.   Just don’t be the ‘/’  .  It confuses everyone!

It looks quite amazing and should price at under $1000AUD

If you  can’t see the video click here

There is a heap more info on it here

(Guess it’s a good time to start building apps – all the iPhone apps will work on it too!)

I get the feeling that the Sunshine Coast economy is picking up and businesses are making the most of the “New Beginnings” that a fresh calendar year brings. A lot of my clients are bringing fresh ideas and concepts to me. It’s great!

As my web design and graphics business “Brainspace” comes into the new year, we have already started branching out into some new areas.  What I am most excited about is creating iPhone Apps.

I’ve just completed one for Pastor Steve Penny who is using the iPhone App to allow people a ’single click’ into his life and ministry as he travels the globe speaking to churches and leaders.

From his App you can:
Read his Blog
Read his Twitter
Listen to sermons
Watch video sermons
View his Bio, Photos, Links and more

The App has been so popular that it overloaded the server that hosted the media files yesterday! (All good now)

Feel free to check it out via the link below or search for ‘Steve Penny’ on your iphone App store. Let us know if YOU or someone you know would like an App or website built as well!

If you don’t mind, I’m naming next year 2010sen.

I’ll be working across the break excluding the public holidays so please don’t hesitate in contacting me with any requests.

This is posted from my iPhone using the great Wordpress 2 app. The smile is courtesy of my daughter.

Dave Tensen

A local real estate publication recently published a feature article on the National Broadband Network which I think is a great thing.  If you’ve ever had to go back to dial up internet or use a slow connection, you’ll notice that most sites and online applications don’t compensate for slow speeds, and I truly believe it will get faster, better, cheaper and again, we’ll be relying on it more and more for everyday thing.

When I lived in Tokyo the internet access to our place was very very fast.  We paid around $100 per month and through our little phone linewe got High Speed Unlimited Internet, Unlimited Nataional Calls, Foxtel (yes through the phone line) and it was awesome.  In the next decade I don’t doubt that we’ll get use to video calls and conferencing – for business, personal, social and more.  We’ll get use to TV via the net. We’ll get use to zero load time of internet sites on our PC’s.  We’ll get use to cloud computing (software that is internet based). We’ll rely on mobile computing even more.

20 years ago, if I told my parents that I’m going to be a web developer they would have said, “Great… What the heck is that?”  My kids will probably be moving into roles that only exist in the dreams of creators and will be sparked by the incredible speed of technology and the internet.  Personally, I think if Australia doesn’t get on board with rolling out something of world standard (and then make it affordable), our kids will miss out and we’ll miss out on possibly growing old and being part of their lives – albeit via HD webcam links to their flatscreen in their lounge rooms from the other side of the world!

It’s not going away folks.  And that’s why I love what I do and see an increasingly great future in building websites and web based solutions.

These may not apply to you but I’d thought I’d share them anyway.

1.  It’s extremely important to discern the difference between Responsibility and Concern.

I have a weakness that is also a source of great strength and joy – I love to help people.  Whether it’s personally, financially, in business, practically, creatively, timely – I love to help people and know myself well enough to know where I can make life better and easier for others… It’s how I’m wired. It’s part of my lineage. I can’t help myself but WANT to help. And herein lies the importance of this mantra.

‘That concerns me, but it’s really not my responsibility.’

The strength in this thought is in the power it gives me to decide where I invest my life, time and resource.  It empowers me to say ‘No’ and not feel guilty.  It helps me sleep at night. It allows me to decide what is important to me and realise that there ARE others who ARE responsible and SHOULD BE held responsible.  And when I DO decide to TAKE UP responsibility by choice, I know I can also LET GO of this also. Because the world will go on without me.

2.  Don’t mistake Self-Care for Selfishness.

Again, this is something that only YOU can rightly judge for yourself. It’s a matter of motivation, convictions and priorities. But for me this involves encouraging  myself and my wife to care for ourselves and not feel guilty about it OR take it too far into the realm of selfishness.

Our family have put a priority on health and relationships, so a couple of morning’s per week my wife gets the kids awake and ready without me because I’m on my bicycle, getting fit, feeling good and enjoying time with others.  On the other hand my wife loves to go to the gym or to dinner with a friend and I’ll be doing the solo thing with the kids.

These are things we do for self-care and we’re easier to live with and deal with because of it.

Author Rick Warren said this, ‘True humility is not thinking less about yourself, but thinking about yourself less.’  I like that… a lot… but it doesn’t mean we should neglect ourselves and personal care needs out of guilt or false humility.

Stress and burnout are killers – avoid them where possible.  You need to take care of yourself, it’s your responsibility.

I’m not sure if you buy into the notion of divine inspiration but occasionally I’ll just ‘GET’ an idea that is genuinely out of my usual realm of thinking that I struggle to take any credit or merit for it.  NO.VEMBER is one of those ideas.

In this age of incredible wealth and technology there are still 1.1 billion people in the world who don’t have access to safe drinking water and there are still around 150 million children that don’t have any access to education.

If you’d like to be part of a movement that works towards changing these facts, you can do something about it in November.  Check out the video below and/or visit http://www.no.vember.org.au

The term “don’t worry be crappy” comes to mind when clients pitch me an exciting idea, opportunity or dream they have to market something online. I say, let’s get SOMETHING going. As Seth Godin, author of “Tribes” wrote this week, ‘Make a decision – It doesn’t have to be a wise decision or a perfect one. Just make one.’

And once the decision is made and the site is launched, THEN we can start to measure and tweak and perfect the design.

You may know that you can now see how people found your website via your traffic counter and tools like Google Analytics. You can see which pages they visited, their points of entry and exit and even the length of time they stayed on your site. Unlike any other form of marketing, a website gives you LIVE, HONEST and TRANSPARENT stats that you can bank on and work from.  Contrast this against your advert on page 1423 of the yellow pages or the advert you run on TV or Radio.  Sure, sales people can give you stats of viewership or listeners but the accuracy of this doesn’t come close to what a website can give you.

Back to speed.

Can a website be launched and built overnight? Yes.
Can it play an integral part of a campaign, cause or product launch? Yes.
Would the general public be happy with an average looking website as long as they can find and interact with what they are looking for? Absolutely

Still don’t agree?
Did the owner of the first car care much about design or was he just grateful he was able to use this contraption?
Or the first mobile phone?
Or the first injection of penicillin?
Or the first phone call overseas?

Now, I’ll just add that if design doesn’t take the product or website further, then you definitely fail and the world misses out.  I’m grateful for my iPhone, Car that goes faster than 10km/h and modern medicine – but I’m grateful that the first mobile phone came out when it did because then design could step in and enhance things.

It’s been said that around 25% of searches done on Google everyday are new searches.  People looking for things that have only just come out, or they’ve only just heard of, or they’ve realised there could be a website for.

So maybe you have an idea, a concept, a campaign or idea you want to test and launch and measure interaction with.  A website might be a good part of the plan – my advice is to be faster to market. Then measure, tweak, change, cut, copy and design around response, traffic and feedback… but don’t wait forever.

Whether you’re employed, self-employed, unemployed or find yourself part of any kind of ploy – your attitude towards what-you-do is paramount.

Have you ever read something and thought, “YES! That’s what I’ve been trying to describe and put my finger on for years”.  I had one of those moments a little while back when I read this article by Tom Peters called A Brand Called You

Life will throw you some curve-balls – or to put it in Aussie Cricket terms, “You never know when you’re gonna be bowled a spinner”.  It’s unpredictable and as I wrote in my last post, we never know where the wind will blow.  The economy and the markets are moving at such a fast pace that wealth is being transferred and opportunities are being created at an alarming pace. I’m sure most people reading this are in a similar position as I am where the last 18 months have created a significant shift and change in their life – whether they wanted it or not.

Tom Peters, John McGrath, Dan Schwabel and many others have written on this highly valuable trend of people seeing themselves as the brand and the product and seeing their employment, jobs, tasks and contracts as ‘gigs‘.  Contrast this against the old model that saw humans as resource and a faceless means to an end like

I recently had coffee a great young guy who I recommended begin to see his employment differently and view it as an opportunity where he could:

• Bring ideas, improvements and increase to the bottom line and in turn Increase His Value
• Learn new skills and in turn Increase his Skillbase
• Deliberately meet new people and in turn Increase his Network
• Try new things whether he favoured them or not and in turn Increase his Experience

King Solomon said it best thousands of years ago – “Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with all your might because you won’t get to when your in the grave.”  You give it your absolute best and do it with all your strength for as long as you see fit or are able. Don’t be another average employee – be outstanding even if your salary doesn’t match what you think you’re worth.

Become indespensable.  Increase productivity.  Bring new skills.  New contacts.  Big contracts.  Do your best.

I believe that with a good shift in thinking and a swift kick of encouragement up the backside, we can all step it up a notch… me included.