No matter how we cross paths, the result is always the same. Nothing happens.

Who am I meeting? Business owners that – by outward appearance – seem to want to grow their business.  I find them all over.  Chamber meetings, conferences, classes, meetups, you name it.  They are there to learn about growing their business.

But they don’t take the steps to actually grow it.

I’m sure you’ve heard the saying- There are three types of people: Those that watch things happen, those that make things happen and those that say “What happened?”.  I call them Wishers, Fishers and Dishers.

The Fishers

From time to time a meet a fisher – a small biz owner (usually a one-person biz) that would like their business to grow.  Usually they are timid, afraid, and only want their business to grow in very small increments, under the right circumstances, with only the right clients.

The fishers are after very specific fish.  They spend a lot of time fishing and not nearly enough time building.  Fishers may simply not have the energy to grow bigger, but I think it’s usually a lack of confidence in what they do.  Or a fear of growing.  Sometimes they hand out flyers, maybe spend a few bucks here and there on a random marketing campaign (an ad in a local paper, postcards or maybe sponsoring a small local event) but they never really take the steps to start the process of dominating their industry.  They have the fishing pole hooked, baited and ready to go but they never seem to cast the line and catch a big one.  Or any one.

The Wishers

Most often I meet wishers – people who wish their business would grow.  They attend chamber meetings, conferences and all that other stuff.   They take a lot of time to pull in small revenue and small clients, mostly by accident.  The Wishers spend a lot of time wondering why their competitors are doing well.  They see great ideas but never act on them.  They find niches just begging to be marketed to and they don’t do anything about it.

The Wishers are the worst.  There are wishers in your industry, just wishing their days away – and unfortunately they are your competition.  Even worse – if a customer meets them first, and gets a bad impression (which they most likely will), they’ve probably made your job a little harder.  They leave a bad stain on the industry, no matter what it is.

I’m not a fan of wishers, because they only have themselves in mind.  They’re there for themselves and that’s usually it.  They’re pretty easy to spot and I avoid them at all costs.

The Dishers

Meeting a business owner that is excited about what they’re doing is awesome.  They’re amped about what’s going on with their business, how they’re moving forward and how their revenue is growing.  It’s instantly recognizable.  They have a confidence about them – they don’t back off on their pricing, they don’t beg for your business, and they don’t spend a ton of time sweating the small stuff.  These people are fun to be around and are genuinely interested in listening to their customer feedback so they can grow and evolve their business with the times.

I like to call them Dishers because they are always dishing out, pushing forward, learning new things and testing the edges of their business savvy.

I rarely meet a disher, but when I do I lock on and learn.  Their energy is awesome and their passion always rubs off.

Dish it out, baby!

I’ll be honest with ya – if you’re a wisher or a fisher, maybe you’re in the wrong industry.  If you aren’t excited about what your business is doing and where it’s going, maybe you should quit.

Or maybe you should fire it up.  Quit going to meetings just because it’s the robotic thing to do.  Go to help others grow. Share your experiences, tips and give away free advice.  Be a Go-Giver.  Get off your duff and go make something happen today that’s actually going to change your bottom line, even if it’s six months from now.

Dish it out.

Then I’ve got other clients who are afraid to grow.  Their niche in the Saint Louis are is WIDE OPEN, and they see what Internet Marketing can do for their business, and they are afraid.  They aren’t afraid to spend the money, they’re afraid that their business will grow and they’ll have to “do more things” like hire people, etc.

And then I’ve got a few clients who own their niche.  They are excited about where their website is taking them.  They are attending industry conferences and shows, constantly prowling for the next vendor that shows signs of Internet awareness (so they can partner up and dominate even more). These clients are online day and night, learning about their industry, teaching themselves SEO basics (so they can spot opportunity) and they aren’t afraid to email me with questions and bounce ideas off of me.

Those are the clients we all love to have.  They aren’t here to joke around.  They are here to do business, make money, and dominate their niche.  They see the potential in their business online.  They see new niches that branch off and strengthen their core, and they dominate them too.

Check out what Gary Vaynerchuk has to say about using the Internet as your business platform and then let me know how I can help you get there.

For some reason though, today I thought I’d just check one out.  The email was just like the others.

From: Jerry Dennison
Subject: your website
Date: January 21, 2009

We can put your site at the top of a search engines listings. If this is something you might be interested in, send me a reply with the web addresses you want to promote and the best way to contact you with some options.

Sincerely,

Jerry Dennison
Big Block Search

So I thought I’d do a little research on Jerry’s website, and his claims to get me to the top of the search engines.  Which is cool, because I really want to rank for the term ‘SEO’.  I’m sure if anyone can do it, Jerry can.

First stop, BigBlockSearch.com.  It’s a pretty generic website, most likely it is the same landing page as all the other SEO-spam emails I get.  There’s a form that I can fill out to find out more information.  No information about the company, no other pages.  There is a little blurb on the page about Christmas approaching.  I guess they mean Christmas ’09.  Man, this company is on the leading edge!

There’s two contact us links on the page, both going to linda@.  Hey wait, where’s Jerry?

So I fill out the form (Get a free review of your website!) for one of my newer websites, along with the message ‘not sure what you can do but we need more traffic’.  I don’t want to leave a phone number, so I leave it blank.  Whoops.

Guess I should filled that out.  Interestingly, the title bar says Unable to Send E-Mail – CoffeeCup Form Builder. Ah, coffeecup.  FrontPage’s cousin.

So I hit the back button, fill out all fields, and hit Submit again.  Funny thing, I get the same result.  So apparently they aren’t relying on the website to generate many leads, or their site just happens to be down when I visit.  Either way, it doesn’t look like my chances are good for my one-word ranking.  Darnit.

Next stop: WHOIS.  According to them, the site was just registered in December of 2008, its not even a month old.  Yet, it says that the site is climbing the Alexa rankings like mad, and that it gets over 3000 visitors a month.  Wow, really?

The domain is privately registered, so that’s a dead end.  The server is located in China, and when I click through to the 2 other websites hosted on this server, they both come back as Chinese sites.  WHOIS gives them an SEO score of 68% (I know it doesn’t mean much, but still, shouldn’t it be 100%?)

Next stop: archive.org.  It’s a long shot, but what the heck.  Sure enough though, no info.

Last stop: Google.  Maybe they’ll have some info for me.  I really want these guys to help me rank.

Hey, I’m in luck! My buddy jerry is listed here, linda is mentioned here, and here too.  There are some other mentions, but they are all about the same.

Darnit, it looks like my rankings are still far off.

So the big question still lingers, what is the purpose of all of this?  They obviously aren’t getting much business from it.  3000+ visitors? I don’t believe that.  Especially when their forms don’t work.

My only theory is that they are simply using it as a ruse to gather email addresses for other spam-related mailings.  The SEO stuff is just a ruse to get business owners to fill out the form for their email address.

I should also mention here that I could have emailed “Linda” for more info, but I decided that was probably a bad idea. I’m really hoping I’m wrong, and that Jerry (or Linda) will get me to the top of the search engines soon (sarcasm).

What’s your theory?

Sure, the down economy is taking its toll on businesses, but there are plenty of businesses that are succeeding, and quite well, in these times.

What happened to ‘Will it Play in Peoria’?  Great bit.

What happened to the thirty second quick questions to the (usually) 2-person expert panel?

What happened to the ‘Million Dollar Idea’?  I really enjoyed not only seeing the new products, but listening to actual wholesale buyers and such.  They had great advice and tips.

The show nowadays seems to be “We gotta help these people”, with every night’s show featuring call-ins of one sob story after another.  The more negative and sad the story, the more they promote it.  Talk about uninspirational…

I’ve actually taken the show off my DVR, and I’ve unsubscribed to the phone text messages too.  They weren’t anything as advertised (tips and quick info about small business).  All they were were advertisements about the next show.

I’m not sure who’s idea it was to change the format from what was wildly popular (and inspirational), but they certainly didn’t have a Big idea.

Applicants do not need to live in the Saint Louis area, but must be actively online and respond to email/IM in timely manner. All work will be done virtually.

What you must have…

• A serious interest in web design
• Knowledge of web editing software (Dreamweaver preferred)
• Working knowledge of PhotoShop
• Knowledge and understanding of Search tactics
• An interest in marketing and social media
• Honesty, integrity and a willingness to learn

What we offer…
This is not a paid position, however there are many benefits:

• The chance to develop your talents and portfolio.
• Experience that will look great on your resume. Our web site has an excellent reputation, and potential employers will be impressed.
• A progressive management style that allows you to take on a great deal of responsibility and provides a supportive, stimulating and fun interactive environment.
• Letters of reference for future job opportunities.
• The opportunity to gain significant knowledge in the Internet Marketing field

Possible assignments include…

• Build new pages for various industry web sites.
• Assist in the development of new websites.
• Offer input and assistance with new design ideas for these sites.
• Potential revenue sharing on
• Create landing pages for SEO campaigns
• Participate in split testing

How to Apply…

Send your resume, the URL of at least one web site that shows your editing skills (be specific about the role you played in developing the site, versus what was done by others) and a cover letter that answers the following questions:

• What are your career goals and how would this internship help you achieve them? What do you hope to gain from this internship?
• What kind of coursework and/or experience do you have that would make you a valuable intern?
• In what areas are you most interested in attaining experience through this internship?

From the applications, we will select interviewees. Deadline for applications is November 28, 2009.

Mail cover letter/resume to:

Lighthouse Technologies
1243 Water Tower Place
Suite 180
Arnold, MO 63010

You may also email us your resume to sales@techlh.com. Please use the subject line INTERN JOB. We will reply with a confirmation of receipt.

If you want to really impress me, email your items then follow up via direct message at twitter or Yahoo! IM. ID at both of those locations is ‘techlh’

As time progressed, and I started getting clients, I’d need to be a bit more creative, so I’d simply look for another website in the clients’ industry (but in a different part of the country) and basically swipe their code.  Then I’d modify the words and whiz-bang a website.  I did this both because it was cheap and I wouldn’t haven’t to pay a designer – meaning more profit.

Over time, I realized the err of my ways and started creating original websites, which I should have been doing all along.  I came across Template Monster and several others, and soon I was creating ‘original’ template websites.  Sure, they still looked like a few other similar sites on the web, but at least they weren’t just plain stolen.

Well, after that phase, I discovered sites like 99designs and I’ve never gone back.  Having people fight over the creation of your design, and being able to specify the budget is just awesome.

As you can see over time I’ve progressed with my web design.  Problem is, there are “web designers” who have been doing this for years, but still can’t figure out how to modify a table or create thumbnails.  And don’t even think about getting me started on PHP or perl.  They’re clueless.

If you want to be a great designer, keep up with the latest info.  Take the time to understand the industry. Teach yourself. Buy books. Understand.

If you can’t, or don’t have time, then you’re doing a great disservice to “true” designers, and IMO you’re in the wrong industry.