Google’s ever-expanding empire has added another branch: subsidiary Google Energy has been granted an order by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to buy and sell energy at market rates.
Does this mean Google is set to become your power company? Not yet — instead, Google wants more control over the high energy costs of its many data centers, and also aims to become carbon neutral. A Google spokesperson told CNET: “Right now, we can’t buy affordable, utility-scale, renewable energy in our markets. We want to buy the highest quality, most affordable renewable energy wherever we can and use the green credits.”
Google has been working toward energy autonomy for years. Green power, nuclear discussions, geo thermal and more.
Google has become a major user of power, and a powerful force in the world.
Way back in the world before computers and cell phones, one of my favorite funny lines from TV was WKRP salesman Herb Tarlek assuring a client that everything work out OK
Del, goshdarnit I’ve got to go, but if you need anything, anything at all, I’ll be in my car somewhere.
Back then, if you didn’t stick around to see what happened, you really didn’t know.
Are you still using 1980’s Technology for Phone Calls?
Now that we have voice mail, cell phones and instant messaging, we don’t have to be tied down to a location. Herb Tarlek can leave the remote broadcast in the hands of Dr. Johnny Fever and the crew, keep the phone on and get more done.
There’s a lot of places where we need to be. Many relationships that can grow stronger when you show up with more connections and more business, we end up with more of these opportunities.
Yet, many end up sitting at a meeting with their phone or computer tuned into someplace else. After all, it still takes time to check in to voice mail, email, Twitter and wherever else people are trying to reach you.
Rethinking the Multiple Points of Contact Theory
I’ve talked to many a busy person who comes up with one way or another to manage all these contact points. If you have an assistant screening, you can get down to one point of contact, but that isolates you.. sometimes good, sometimes bad.
Others drop one medium for another. This week, I’ve seeing announcements that a new service is great and a user suggesting that no on try to reach them on the old one “cause I won’t be checking in”
That may work for some, but I’m convinced that the future of marketing, business and living is to Listen and Love.. I want to know when people are reaching out to me, filter out the noise and respond to real human to let them know I care, and what I can do to help.
I think the answer is a universal in box. Google has several initiative in place for this, Google Buzz in our Gmail accounts, search for just about everything, and Google Voice to replace voice mail.
Here’s how it works:
Most of my calls end up going to voice mail, with Google Voice, they are instantly transcribed and available to view and respond to… right in my Gmail account.
While I’m getting a lot less calls as people learn to reach me via email, buzz, Twitter or blog post comments, there are still a few that pick up the phone every time they think of it. With a universal in box, I can respond quickly.. often sending back an email before I get off the conference call I’m on or while waiting in line at one of those 3 minute intersections here in Vegas.
You can import contacts and forward numbers, so Voice can be integrated with just about any other system you’ve been using. It’s free. Some suggest Google is using the massive data points gained from transcribing messages to improve voice recognition and search algorithms. So I suppose you don’t want you billion dollar secrets left on a Voice Mail message (even if it’s a old fashion answering machine)
Last I checked, Google Voice was still BETA, but it pretty easy to get an invite and may well be open for all now.
I do hope you don’t think I’m a wacko for the headline today. (there are so many other reasons that you might use that label though).
It’s just time I share a few thoughts on the futility of paying them much heed.
Here’s a list of a few of the misconceptions we get listening to economists
The recession is bad, worse, staring, over (all their numbers lag)
There is a record number of unemployed (many more employed that a few decades back)
what the President says will affect the economy (only if you are a day trader)
Wacko enough for you? I’m just getting started.
OK.. to be fair, I don’t have enough data on any of the above to claim that I know any better than and economist In my defense, I don’t make a living telling you I do.
Here’s a wonderful film about Marilyn Waring, a woman who chose not to assume that the economist knew what they were talking about. Not some wacko.. a very nice lady.
I just started posting testimonials an recommendations to this blog site.
Picked a good day, here’s another a few hours after the first :)(
I have a great deal of respect for Warren Whitlock. He is one of the "good guys". Brilliant and ready to share his information, and very nice to deal with. I highly recommend that you take advantage of any opportunity that you have to read his material in books, tweets, or listen to him on the radio.
I was one of the guest speakers at the launch of the International Association of Aspiring Authors party held by Jess Kennedy Williams.
Jess sent this email about my participation:
Hi Warren,
You were great on the call last night. Thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to join us. You were a big hit, and I have a feeling you will be hearing from my members.
I appreciate you and what you do. I look forward to working with you again soon.
Thanks so much! Jess
Jess Kennedy Williams Founder and Executive Director International Association of Aspiring Authors ~ The Only Association Catering to the Specific Needs of the Aspiring Author www.AssociationofAspiringAuthors.com
You can listen to the recorded event here. I am the concluding book marketing expert speaker.
I just edited some comments on my Twitter Handbook blog (where we update reader of “Twitter Revolution: How Social Media and Mobile Marketing is Changing the Way We Do Business & Market Online”) and found this
Substantially, the post is really the sweetest on this worthy topic. I agree with your conclusions and will eagerly look forward to your incoming updates. Saying thanks will not just be sufficient, for the exceptional lucidity in your writing. I will directly grab your rss feed to stay privy of any updates. Gratifying work and much success in your business enterprize!
This has got to be the best jumbo pile of nothingness I’ve read in a long time.
I was tempted to leave on the blog.. it says so little with so much 🙂
I’ve been experimenting with a couple of tools that bridge databases to make it easier to reach friends and contacts where they want to be reached.
We’ll have an update on this weeks Social Media Radio Show.. including some stats on what social networks have the best connections and how one site promises to get 43% of your email list to open an email (unheard of on some mailing lists today).
With Facebook opening profiles to the search engines by default, this is going to get easier. I think that soon we’ll be able to talk directly to a contact in exactly the way they want to hear from us.. Text, Tweet, Post or Email. In the mean time, let’s make it easier to show where we want to be reached.
BusinessCard2 is trying to do that. I just updated my entry. You can get your own there free.
I got an email one morning from a networking contact I met on LinkedIn asking about getting followers on Twitter.
He asked:
I have a question. Currently I have about 15k twitter followers adding about 250 per day, how the heck did you get to 50k+? Have you been able to monetize your followers in anyway? Connect in multiple ways?
That’s actually 3 questions.. so I thought I should answer them all here to help others who ask.
My reply:
Funny you asked about Twitter in an email after I reached out to you on Twitter yesterday with didn’t get a response there. No worries. I’ve found it’s best to listen to my market wherever they want to talk and respond to help if I can. I’d say you are in Stage 2 the Three Stages or Twitter Acceptance Your question about monetizing was a dead giveaway. I took a quick look at your profile and it’s obvious that you are trying to broadcast on Twitter. Not a single conversation on the first page.
The secret to Get Followers on Twitter (or anywhere) is to LISTEN and LOVE.
LISTEN: Read others Tweets. Learn what your market wants and get it for them.
LOVE: Respond to questions, refer people to resources.. especially ones that aren’t your own sales process and say thank you whenever you can.
Stage 3 conversations are where the fun lies. Have fun helping people and you will be attractive or “Follow Worthy” as we talk about in Twitter Revolution You may be getting advice that some system will get you more followers and automate marketing on Twitter. Many of them don’t work, even the ones that do will make you look like a 20th century marketer and could get you labeled as a spammer. The “followers” number posted on a profile is not the best indicator of whether someone is helping other. It is one indicator of activity. Other indicators would be
The number of conversations you have
The time you have recommended a good link that doesn’t point to a self serving sales page
How often someone says “thanks for the help”
The use of the retweet functions (RT) to share others tweets.
A few “famous off Twitter” people build up a following regardless of whether they engage the public. Most of use won’t see any value from Twitter until we engage in listening and love (caring). “People don’t care how much you know until the know how much you care” — Stephen R Covey There are many examples of sales through Twitter. Dell attributes $6.5 million to posting deals. Dell can do that, they are a multi billion dollar company. Zappos is a better example of a company that gets “listen and love” The CEO tweets as @Zappos and most of the office staff does too. You may see a special offer, but mostly they are listening to their customers talk about shoes and joining conversations to add value, help and spread love and good energy.
The Secret of High Follower Counts
They don’t do much for click through results. More connection give you more opportunities to listen and love and more conversations result in real people, real relationships and real business. However, when I post a link with tracking data.. the results are about the same as when I had 1/10 the followers. Twitter is not a broadcast medium. The revolution in sales and marketing is just starting. With the technology we have now, there is no reason to ever try to pitch someone that is not anxious to hear from you. Rather, we teach our clients monitor the Tweet stream for conversations and questions of those that are looking for a solution (Listen), then where appropriate, join in the conversation answer a question give advice without any expectation of making a sales pitch (LOVE). You can focus on helping people in your target market, or just help in general. People will be attracted to you when you GIVE.. it’s the Law of Reciprocity (you can get anything you want if you help enough others get what they want).. we want to do business with givers.. people that we know, like and trust. Asking for a sale too soon kills that process. Fortunately, the technology today allows us to meet and network, get to know people and build a trust relationship fast. A good salesman knows that marketing is a process and hones his skill. Today, the skill that we all need to learn is “listen and love” .. it’s a lot more fun than cold calling, much more productive and will transform us into better people. Why waste time selling to someone that doesn’t want to buy.. there are millions looking for whatever you have.. just go help them!
![herbtarlek[1]](http://warrenwhitlock.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/herbtarlek1.jpg "herbtarlek[1]")
Now that we have voice mail, cell phones and instant messaging, we don’t have to be tied down to a location. Herb Tarlek can leave the remote broadcast in the hands of Dr. Johnny Fever and the crew, keep the phone on and get more done.
![6450147095_8d2354099e_b[1]](http://profitablesocialmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/6450147095_8d2354099e_b1.jpg?b9a2cc "6450147095_8d2354099e_b[1]")
![tony_CEO[1]](http://profitablesocialmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/tony_CEO1.gif?b9a2cc "tony_CEO[1]")
