First, I saw the opportunity for collaboration.

The day Google announced its Fiber for Communities project, the Blue Sky team was busy working on the BTOP grant that USFP was applying for. Our proposal was to connect four underserved counties in our area (Polk, Highlands, Hardee and Desoto) with a 250 mile sonnet 10Gb/sec ring that will bring these underserved communities Lambda Rail and additional dark fiber. Yesterday we made the final submission and should know if we go to due diligence by the fall. Also, I knew that the City of Lakeland has fiber to every street light in the city and that it is around 300 miles in length.  So I shot of an email to those involved in hopes of getting the ball rolling.

Second, I saw the opportunity to, as the popular phrase goes, bridge the digital divide. I know some out there might not see the internet as a basic right, I may agree, but I do believe it has become a basic utility. A requirement to be a part of modern society. Just like electricity and water. I see the opportunity to enable  schools to deliver relevant education to the home, and to us technology that they normally are unable to because of the lack of access that many students simply don’t have. Its this lack of access that i believe will continue the and compound the cycle of poverty, simply because broadband access elevates the entire society with it, and strands the rest without it. Now I know my conservative friends are starting to get riled up, and thinking “Pull yourselves up by your bootstraps”; but I contend that  you simple can not improve your own situation without broadband access in today’s global economy. The U.S. access to broadband has now slipped from 3rd to 5th in the world, and as reported:

“The nations that have actually progressed the most since the WEF began this survey back in 2002 are actually two surprising ones: China, and India. China, despite the numerous international concerns about the freedom of its Net systems, has leaped from 64th position to 37th, and India has moved from 54th to 43rd rank: This demonstrates incredible commitment by these (relatively) poorer nations to push their Net technology forwards, and highlights how little internal progress the U.S. has made.”

Simple put broadband access is the first step to enable our poorest children to change their status in life, to get them off government programs, and to prepare them to achieve in the global economy.

So why Catalyst for Innovation? Well it has become a mantra for me, in my faith, family, work and play. Its through this mantra that I want to pursue my life (not just career) track of being a builder of communities. Not just Cities or Towns, but people groups. Lots and lots of people groups.

Thanks for taking the time to read, and check out http://ConnectLakeland.com, because Google was just the start our community has a vision and I am going to make sure we reach it.

Let me know your thoughts, I really would love to hear them.

This was a simple site that I made to practice some new css and jquery skills. Its a work in progress as I find time.

Check it out.

I might try and see if I can get help turning this into a wordpress theme.

You can check it out by going to http://BusinessVoiceInc.com

You can check it out by going to Catalyst.LakelandChamber.com

Special thanks to Matthew Wengerd and Cipher Integrations , without their help this project would be on the cutting room floor.

]]> http://aaronjbates.com/2009/06/catalyst-lakelandchamber-com/feed/ 0 http://aaronjbates.com/2009/03/twitter-weekly-updates-for-2009-03-07/ http://aaronjbates.com/2009/03/twitter-weekly-updates-for-2009-03-07/#comments Sun, 08 Mar 2009 06:59:59 +0000 Aaron J Bates http://aaronjbates.com/2009/03/twitter-weekly-updates-for-2009-03-07/

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So I wanted to dig in a little bit:

The power of social media comes from the ability to access  your current & potential clients. It is basic networking, just like the Chamber’s events (Business After Hours, Business & Breakfast, & Schmooze a’Palooza). Most companies do save time for such events, and in the same manner one should do so with these Social Media tools. I heard one of the members say, I don’t want my employees wasting time telling everyone what they are doing on Facebook, and he’s right. What they should be doing is finding out what people online are saying about his company, if they  are saying anything at all.  Now if your listening to them, and they know it, then you must begin to engage. Why? Because we are living in a New Economy, customers are going to let their beliefs be known, whether you like it or not, and they are beginning to expect that engagement. That is why I included the Radian6 quote in the presentation. For those of you who weren’t there it was from the Radian 6 About us page:

 A brand is now defined as the sum of all conversations taking place amongst users and it’s happening regardless of whether you are part of these conversations or not. 

These conversations become the power of the social media platform. Seth Godin (a noted marketing genius) wrote a book called Tribes . The basic premise is taking a group of people with shared intrests and leveraging their power as a “Tribe”, through marketing and particularly word of mouth.  All tribes need a leader, and that is why companies must be a part of the conversation, if not leading it.  So that the Tribes are for them, not for someone else and hopefully not against. If your intrested in a review of “Tribes”, try here. He is basically leveraging leaderhsip and the power of the people to succesfully market products, whether that product is a person, thing, or company.

Now I certainly realize that several of our Board Members have a regional or city brand, so I understand the hesitancy regarding this media transition, and frankly a new way of thinking.  Though some of our Member companies have a more wider appeal, and others a wider understanding. I know intially, it does seem like a waste of time, but that is why you must have a plan of engagement. I will get back to that in a bit.

First though I want to dive back into this transition, which is a lot like moving from the telegraph to the telephone. As Godin phrased it on his blog:

Here’s why people liked the telegraph: It was universal, inexpensive, asynchronous and it left a paper trail.

The telephone offered not one of these four attributes. It was far from universal, and if someone didn’t have a phone, you couldn’t call them. It was expensive, even before someone called you. It was synchronous–if you weren’t home, no call got made. And of course, there was no paper trail.

Now people don’t want a paper trail they want a  digital one, and that is substantiated by the declines in all national advertising revenues except online. (Sorry I couldn’t recall the referance to this). Social Media is the same way and will be universal just like the phone is today, and the telegraph used to be. Why you ask? Because of the genreal acceptance that social media platforms, like Facebook, are seeing. Facebook’s fastest growing demographic are those 30 years and over, and over half of Facebook’s users are out of college. You can see several more statistics on the Facebook Press Release. With this level of  ’adult’ acceptance, users will be looking to their social tools to give and receive information.  Facebook has more than 175 million users is looking to hit 200 million before the end of the year. That’s 2/3 rds of the population of the United States. That is huge. Companies will have direct access to customers, clients, users and partners, with-in minutes. That is the power I referenced earlier. Communication is key to every companies success, and having the ability to reach your customers quickly, and inexpensively is critical, especially for small business. 

There have been numerous examples of how customers are being surprised by companies, after customers have quipped about the  ineffectiveness of  Comcast or bad the bad customer service of Tivo   and then their problems are being handled much faster as they go public through these social media outlets. With these resolutions being handled via social media customers are begining to expect that treatment in all aspects of their life. 

This expectation has already begun to weed out companies who aren’t engaging their customers. This is quite evident by the fact that the  Search Engine Door Slowly Closing on Small Business. In this post Scott Campbell states:

the majority of small businesses continue to avoid, seemingly waiting for something
to happen that will help them better understand and harness this technology

This is vital in this knowledge based economy.  We should all take care to think about these factors that impact us. Since this is quite long already, in a later post I will dive into forming plans and taking that first step.

I hope to post about a variety of issues, concerns, and a variety of other awesomeness. All the way from Lakeland, FL. I hope to engage the local community about the way I see my community and how I plan to ‘Keep Moving Forward’.

I hope that I will begin to organize the many crazy thoughts that run through my brain and I ask we try to take this journey together. Much love to my wife, who will probably be the only one to read this.  Love to you all.