In keeping with my weather junkie persona I have to say that I am eagerly tracking Fabian, a class four hurricane aimed straight at the Maritimes of Canada (where I live).

The best information you'll find on the storm is located at the National Hurricane Center's site (USA).

Today was Labour Day here in Canada. While this day isn’t as official as September 21 for ending the summer it is the turning point for summer activity here on Prince Edward Island.

Because I live on a resort in a tourist town I’m exposed to this summer changing phenomenon more drastically than most. It changes so fast it makes you sit on your front steps, look around and sigh. Two nights ago the resort was full (40 units). Tonight we have 16 vacancies. Today the local amusement park was open. Tomorrow it is closed (for the season). This starts the month of shutting down for our little community. In four weeks all of the stores will be closed. The gas station will pump its last gallon and the traffic lights at the intersection will go back to flashing yellow. A few days after the lights change the golf courses will remove their tees and their flags.

I’ve watched this pan out for twelve years and each year it has that same empty feeling. The weirdest part of it all is that I have that dread of going back to school even though I’m not.

As Bluetooth, wifi, and other “freeing” wireless technologies become affordable and widely used we will begin to depend more and more on batteries. The battery life of a laptop is a significant buying point. The same goes for MP3 players, cameras, and computer accessories. While I lust for a Bluetooth mouse I cringe at the thought of the batteries in it running out while on the last level of Half-Life 2. This dilemma got me thinking (a dangerous thing).

We have all seen the marketing hype around kinetic powered watches. The watch captures the energy of it being moved about by your arm. It then uses that stored power to continuously power your watch. Why can’t we do that for a wireless computer mouse?

If the capturing of your hand’s kinetic energy is not a possibility how about a roller(s) or maybe a way to create static electricity?

Are there any engineers willing to enlighten me on the brilliance or stupidity of this idea?

Let the royalties pour in!

This evening I decided to head to my parent’s cottage on the beach for some good times with my sister and her friends. On my way to the cottage I was the first car on the scene of a fairly serious car accident (the cars were still moving when I came up). Here are my thoughts on the event.

A fellow slice, Daniel Burka, has taken the initiative to organize the first ever silverorange Frisbee golf tournament. All proceeds will be donated to Habitat for Humanity.

Date: September 6,2003
Where: Strathgartney Provincial Park (PEI)

While I won't be here for the event, CEOBlues will be sponsoring the award for the team who comes from the farthest away.

Back in March-April-May I had a quarter-life crisis. I realized that as my age was increasing my awesome adventures in life were decreasing. In a desperate attempt to counter this I chose to go to Europe. As I thought more about what I needed I realized that I was generally sick of the news (war coverage, terrorism, etc), cars, people, buildings, etc. Once I figured this out I swiftly realized Europe wasn’t my best bet.

Through some effective urinal advertising I ended up discovering Outward Bound, an outdoor educational organization. I went to their website, ordered their DVD, and promptly signed up for a 21 day Coast Mountain Venture.

One of my roles at silverorange is to acquire new business. The process goes something like this: search out a prospective client, research them, formulate an approach, approach, convince, negotiate, sign, construct, smile.

Because of our focused approach and creative business offerings our sales success is 20-30 times the usual sales percentages. While this seems fantastic it is quite shy of where we would like it to be.

The problem is that no matter how sweet, real, good, or sensible a deal is you still get put into the rolodex category of “sales person do not call back”. Sometimes I feel that even if I was honestly giving away a million dollars I still wouldn’t receive a call back. The reason for this is that companies are bombarded with so much promotional material it is impossible to weed out the real from the fake (some would claim it’s all fake). Most don’t even try.

Here is a list of things I do to make sure that we get taken seriously:

1. Create the criteria of an ideal client.
2. Search out prospective clients that match most of the criteria.
3. Research, Research, Research. Know as much as there is publicly to know about a client before you approach them. This provides two things: First, it provides you with adequate knowledge to decide whether or not you would like to approach them. Second, it allows you to identify the best way to approach the client.
4. Priority FedEx a package to the best person inside the client openly explaining that you’ve researched their company and that you think your services are a match. Indicate that you will be following up with a phone call in a day or two. Be prepared to drop $40-$60 on shipping charges (from Canada to the US). Too expensive? Not at all. It’s what sets you apart. When a client receives a package via FedEx they instinctively know that this wasn’t sent out to a large amount of people.
5. Call.
6. If the secretary won’t let you through directly or the person you are calling is not in request to leave a voice mail.
7. Call back.
8. Be honest. Only sell what you are capable of fulfilling.

It is important to point out that when you approach someone you should honestly believe that if they were to enter into an agreement with you it would be mutually beneficial. The goal is not to increase the list of people you approach but to refine the list. After each attempt (successful or not) go over your criteria and research and identify why they were not convinced, or why you were not a good fit for them. When you’ve finished evaluating add the results to your criteria. As the criteria expands and refines itself you will magically start to be approaching only those clients who will say yes.