The Business Brief
February 2019
An Old-Fashioned Love Story
Romance Knows No Medium
These days, it’s rare to hear stories involving love letters. Romance, though, doesn’t know a medium — only that it wants to be found. While our story began to take off in the late 60s, it actually began many years before. The relationship between my wife’s family and my own goes all the way back to 1944. My father and her father were both injured fighting in the South Pacific. While he was recuperating, her dad met her mom, and around the same time, my dad (also named Tom Walker) met my mom. Back then, the ladies would go to the Sun Valley USO dances, hoping to strike up conversations with the soldiers and sailors that sometimes blossomed into something more. I met my wife, Donna, when we were kids because our dads already knew each other. We ran intermittently in the same circles — but with her being a bit younger and our attention on other things, we never connected or came close to going on a date. I had been away at boarding school during our high school years, but when I got back home from Georgetown University in June 1967, I started to reintroduce myself to the local community. One of my first moves was to date a girl who turned out to be a friend of my future wife, but the dates were strictly casual anyway. She and I only went out a couple of times, and nothing romantic materialized, but it did play a significant role in the courting of
my spouse: When I asked Donna out for the first time, she said, “No.” She thought I was in a relationship with her friend! Once we got past that hurdle, we had an instant connection. We really hit it off, going out as many times as two people could before Thanksgiving Day, 1967, which was the day I was ordered to report for basic training. When I got to Fort Knox, she and I realized that something had sparked between us — neither one of us was ready to say goodbye. Phone calls were prohibited during the early stages of military training, but we managed to keep the conversations going by writing letters as often as we could. For the first month or so, we each waited for the mail on our respective ends every day. One day, I had an unexpected opportunity for a two-week leave over Christmas. Every night, we went out, maximizing every available second. Before I left to go back to Fort Knox, I asked her to marry me. I finished advanced individual training in April of 1968, and we were married shortly thereafter. Fifty-one years later, we’re happily married and still excited about Valentine’s Day. People always ask me, “What’s the secret to making it last?” I give them the same answer every time: “My wife is really tolerant of my faults.” It helps that I still can look at her now and see the same gorgeous woman I married
all those years ago. There’s a song by Jimmy Soul that says, “Never make a pretty woman your wife,” but I couldn’t disagree more. Having an attractive spouse who captivates you is special. Not to mention, people love to be around her. She’s got that gift of gab. I like to joke with friends that she’s not someone you’d want to sit next to on an airplane. Plus, she’s a cosmetologist, so I haven’t had to pay for a haircut in 51 years. My love story might differ from yours, but this Valentine’s Day, I hope everyone can take time to remember those who are closest to you. It doesn’t have to be romantic love, either. My daughters and grandchildren make my life a better place, and I can’t begin to describe how full they make my experience.
–Tom Walker
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Hyperlocal Advertising for the Broad Modern Business Marketing Starts Right Next Door
The Reason Employees Are Quitting in Droves
According to a survey conducted by Randstad, 60 percent of American employees either quit or strongly considered quitting their jobs last year. That’s a number that should terrify any business owner. However, instead of panicking, consider this record-breaking moment in U.S. employment history an invitation to take a long, hard look at your organization. Are members of your team waiting for the perfect moment to bail? And if so, why? It’s not because the majority of employees are ruthless careerists or disloyal money-grubbers. If we look at Mental Health America’s 2018 Workplace Health Survey, it mostly boils down to the fact that over half of American employees feel unappreciated, unsupported, and disrespected by management. In fact, 21 percent of respondents said that instead of being paid what they deserve, they’re nickel-and- dimed when raise season arrives, and 77 percent believed that instead of being lifted up for their accomplishments, employees were forced to toil away in the corner, feeling invisible. Sadly, scarcely more than 34 percent of respondents believed they could rely on the support of their managers and colleagues. The numbers paint a disheartening picture of the average workplace. If you’ve been a manager for a long time, it can be difficult to imagine how frustrated an undervalued member of your team can feel and how these feelings can spread throughout your organization, leaving all your employees discontent. It’s imperative to listen and respond to your employees’ concerns. It takes more than instituting an open-door policy and relaxing work requirements — two characteristics of healthy workplaces, as rated by respondents. You need to commit resources to eliminating the problem. Start with the highest-level leaders of your business. Work with them on how to interact with the rest of your team in more human, empathetic, and responsive ways. Training and assessments are a good start, but you may also need to revamp the mentality and core values of your company. In a world where finding a new job is easier than ever, managers cannot afford to ignore the needs of their employees. Evolve and acknowledge the emotions in your workplace or risk losing all that you’ve invested in your top performers.
Whether you’re the CEO of a major tech-savvy corporation or a freelancer, your eyes should be set on your next marketing move in this digital age. While spinning signs on sidewalks and flying banners from the backs of airplanes may be considered staples of public outreach to some, the tides are shifting to more targeted ways of reaching your future clientele. Virtually any business can benefit from utilizing hyperlocal advertising and its many strategic facets. Hyperlocal advertising refers to the process of hyper- specific or niche marketing campaigns implemented for a certain focus area. This can manifest in many comprehensive forms, depending on the specific needs of the business. A local mom and pop restaurant may choose to take advantage of hyperlocal advertising by sending ads to potential customers within a 5-mile radius during the hours they are most likely to be hungry, on their lunch breaks, or when they are otherwise free to stop in for a bite to eat. Alternatively, a major car dealership in a metropolitan area could target their potential audience by running ads during local professional sports games. So how does this work for YOUR business? It all depends on your desired campaign for your targeted region. Assuming you’re well-informed about your current demographics or the demographics you’re hoping to reach, there are several methods to effectively implement hyperlocal advertising tactics. By using GPS and IP addresses, you'll be able to target ads to specific cities, streets, and even buildings by inputting their coordinates. After you’ve narrowed it down, you can choose which areas work best for your goals. A mechanic shop expanding to a new city may cast a wider net, while a high-end jeweler may target areas with higher incomes. With hyperlocal strategies, your advertisements can be catered on a variety of digital platforms, like social media, streaming services, and apps. These new-age technologies will give you more exposure and patronage for your ever- expanding business!
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Why Your Business Needs to Implement Two-Factor Authentication Now, Not Later
HAVE A Laugh Here’s where two-factor authentication (2FA) comes in. 2FA forces users to input more than one field of identification to access their account. If you’ve ever used your PIN at an ATM, you’ve already used 2FA, but many other forms exist. When logging into your email, Google can send an alert to your phone that includes a login number, which you type on your PC to gain access to your account. Banks often couple passwords with one of your security questions. Whatever the tactic, it’s much sturdier than your average password. It’s still not foolproof, but it’s an excellent first-line defense against hackers. A survey by Paychex recently found that 68 percent of small business leaders remain unworried about their digital security. If you need proof, you can just look at the passwords they and their employees use. According to SecureAuth, a staggering 81 percent of Americans use the same passwords for multiple accounts, the majority of which are unimaginative old standbys like “1234567,” “qwerty,” and “password.” These trends, compounded by the fact that passwords generally aren’t very airtight, turn the typical login and password combination into a paper shield for hackers. Even stronger passwords that include multiple uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers, and other characters often only take a few hours to crack with an advanced brute-force tool. Once they’re cracked, they’re often posted on the darknet or sold to the highest bidder.
However, implementing 2FA into your own business isn’t the easiest proposition. You’ll either need to create a custom solution — a big headache that may not be worth it for your small business — or hire a technical company suited for the job. This doesn’t have to be expensive. It’s worth noting, though, that whenever you bring in an outside party, it’s a potential failure point for your cybersecurity. It’s vital to vet them properly and ensure they practice what they preach. 2FA can’t be the beginning and end of your cybersecurity strategy, but consider it a large first step toward protecting your livelihood. Trust us — when the digital wolves come knocking at your door, you’ll be glad you installed the door in the first place.
PUZZLE
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Inside This Edition
1.
51 Years and Counting
2.
Why Employees Are Quitting in Droves
Better Targeted Ads for Your Local Customers
3.
2FA Is Essential to Business Security
Have a Laugh
4.
How to Create a Culture of Love
Create a Culture of Love in Your Company 2 Tactics That Will Create Loyal Employees Company growth is the top priority for many entrepreneurs. If a business stagnates, it will eventually fail. However, when leaders focus solely on finding the best ways to reach new customers, they often overlook an integral part of running a cohesive company. While an operational-minded approach will do wonders for the efficiency of your business, behind every company’s success are the employees who made it possible. That’s why this Valentine's Day is the perfect time to create a culture of love in your company. FAMILY One of the best things you can do is invest in what matters most to your employees: their families. A familiar problem for many business owners is that their families can fall by the wayside amid the complications of running an organization. Your employees can also face this struggle. The chaos of trying to raise children while balancing a career and a personal life is a significant stressor. As the leader of your company, you can help ease these burdens. A date night for an anniversary, spontaneous time off, or even added vacation
time are all simple gestures that go a long way to create a company culture where your employees feel loved. AUTONOMY A dangerous pitfall for many entrepreneurs is developing a detachment between their own work life and the work lives of their team members. During the growth of the business, owners can fall into the age-old employee-boss mindset, and that hierarchy often creates a rigid environment. The moment an employee starts to look at their manager as a boss is also when they start to see their work as a job rather than a career they’re excited about. Trust and autonomy are essential to developing a productive professional relationship, and offering your employees remote work, flexible schedules, and the freedom to take control of their workdays are great ways to establish reciprocal relationships and foster entrepreneurial mindsets. Try some of these tactics at your company this February to create a culture of love where your employees and customers thrive.
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