The little things – Sebastien Tremblay

Some people think starting their own business is easy. Well, it’s not. I heard many of my friends over the years saying that they plan on starting their own company someday. Some might succeed, others might not. First, you need to be convinced that you will be successful and that you will do anything to achieve that goal. That means sacrifices. Second, you need a plan and short-terms goals. Because nobody is going to tell you what to do. You are all alone. No one’s there to show you the way. No one will tell you if you’re doing right or doing wrong. You have to make your own choices. You have to make your own mistakes. Third, by making those mistakes, you have to learn. And you have to do it really fast because you are your own boss and your own paycheck.

Entrepreneurship is not a job. It’s a way of living. You have to know that it’s not a “9-to-5″ way of living. And the rules won’t change because you want it to. Your competitors are living that way. How about starting your own life ?

Social media is great for so many things. We like sharing, commenting and learning so much stuff. There is a lot of information. We know everything as-it-happens, in real time.

The problem we have right now is credibility. Living in real time, it is extremely hard to know what is true and what is false.  Before, when we learned the news through newspapers, the information was validated and everyone was trying to make sure the informations were  accurate. This is no longer the case.  We have experts and people who think they are experts. What makes you trust someone? How do you verify what is true and what is not ? You can’t. Or at least, it’s really hard, so most people do not check. Thousand of tweets every minute, thousand of people saying different things, whatever they want.

When disasters occurs, people want to feed on information. They want to know everything as-it-happens.  People are more emotional and might believe something not accurate.

In this real-time era, always remember to double check, and remember there is two sides to every story.

How many times have you disappointed your customers last month? For those customers, this will probably be the last they will remember from you, because people do not expect bad experiences from you. They expect the best.

For example, when was the last time you were out of stock ? I remember, when I was young, going to the video store. They never had the movie I wanted to see because they only had three copies of it. They had waiting lists and special on other movies, but not what I wanted. Last month, Netflix launched in Canada, which allows you to stream the movies you want, anytime you want for 7,99$ a month. You can also rent movies on iTunes and probably soon on YouTube. So it seems that all those customers’frustrations and disappointments end up in a new opportunity. Now, the video store is gone : a big player at the time, Blockbuster, is just about to close.

Entrepreneur learn that a good business comes from a need. Revolution are started just like that. It only comes from a single disappointment, a single « we are sorry, we don’t have that ». Stop being sorry and start acting now. How much more extra effort are you ready to invest for your customers ? It’s one little thing that my video store should have learned now.

I remember the first time I hit a “100″ on a social network. I really felt important. It was on Facebook and I could finally celebrate my 100th friend. For most people, numbers are an indicator of how popular they are. This has always been true. They compare their salary, the size of their house and (why not) the number of kids they have. It seems that having a big house means you are more successful. But does it really work that way ? Appearances are deceptive. This big house you admire belongs to the bank. And, unsurprisingly, will never really be paid.

So what about social networks ? Does having 4 500 friends on Facebook really make you an important facebooker ? No, it’s just numbers. It does not mean that you know all those friends. It does not even mean that you have any kind of interaction with these people. It’s just a number. What really matter is how many of your friends are commenting on your wall and how many are coming to your birthday. That is what you should count. How many of your Twitter followers really care about you ? Just consider how many replied to your last tweet or retweeted it. Social analytics are not about numbers, they are about interactions.

Next time you lose a friend on Facebook or a follower on Twitter, ask yourself this question : what is the impact ? Is it one less attendee for my next party ? One less reply ? Or just a number going down ? How many friends do you really have on social networks ?

There are many things I dislike about teamwork at school, but there is at least one thing I like : I can see how people work and what tools they use. Today, people do not have time to meet, so most of the work is usually done outside school, so we need to learn to collaborate virtually.

The first step is “the email game”. I see it as a game, because we spend so much time playing and responding to each other. Everyone seems to have its own strategy : no response, short response (i.e. : “OK”), endless response, new threat, etc. However, in the end, we never really know who win and who lose. The problem is we also lose so much time. Remember : email is a communication tool, not a sharing tool.

For example, when we work on a project, every time someone update its part, we receive a copy by email. If two people work at the same time on the same version of a document, then the email system fail.  You might also hear : “My file is too heavy, I can’t send it by email”, which gives me headaches every time.

What can be done ? There is no perfect solution. But, productivity should be enhanced by using web-services like Drop.io, where you can upload attachments (up to 100MB) or Google Docs, where everyone can share and work on the same documents. If you like real-time collaboration, you will definitely enjoy Google Wave. The key is to think about sharing and collaborating, instead of simply communicating. How about having only one document to work on, instead of multiplying the parts every time you send a email ? It is a little thing that should make you work differently, but make your teamwork’s life easier.