I’m sure I’ve learned more lessons than these in the past year, but as I look back on 2006, here are the one’s that stand out.

If you’ve got a business system in place that works, don’t change it because a new client doesn’t like it. Most of the frustrations, head banging, and poorly managed expectations of clients this year have come from when we deviated from our "flyte plan," the system we use to help clients develop effective Web sites and successful Internet marketing campaigns.

We’ve been through the development process almost 300 times in our existence, and we’re continually refining the flyte plan to build better Web sites. There’s a reason we ask for content before design, and a reason we have so many sign-offs along the way.

We do it because we want the client to make loads of money.

Now, before you say we need to be more flexible, read on….

If you do decide to abandon your system because of the needs of a client, replace that system with an agreed upon new system that works for both you and the client. This was the true lesson I learned this year. There are times that–for whatever reason–your way of doing things won’t work for a particular client. The perceived value of this client may get you to change your processes.

That’s OK.

What’s not OK is just taking the job without a new plan in place. You need to get with your client and determine a new system that does work, for both you and them. I’m not a big fan of business phrases like "proactive" or "paradigm," but you need to find that win-win situation.

Spend more money on training your staff. I’m not sure why I was so conservative when it came to sending co-workers to classes or having them take classes online, but it was a mistake. We started having our developers take CSS classes this year online, and although the feedback on that class was mixed, you can’t grow as a company unless your co-workers are increasing their knowledge base and keeping challenged.

Listen to your gut. This is a lesson I learned years ago, but I’m constantly reminded of how true it is. If your gut tells you to do something or to avoid someone, LISTEN TO IT! A mistake you make when listening to your gut isn’t a mistake, it’s a learning opportunity. You’ll never go wrong by listening to that little voice inside of you.

Mistakes are good. No, scratch that. They’re essential. If you’re not making mistakes, you’re too conservative and you’ll never grow. Your competitors will catch and surpass you and your customers will move on to better solutions. If you manage people don’t get angry if they make mistakes. Just make sure they learn from them. I’ve made too many mistakes in my life to be angry when someone else makes one.

However, you can get angry if they make the same mistake twice. That means they just weren’t paying attention.

Marketing rules. I almost followed that up with "advertising drools." Thankfully I didn’t, but there’s a big difference between marketing and advertising. Your business may require advertising, but there’s plenty of low-cost marketing options out there that are much more effective than a half-page ad in the local paper.

I found that teaching a class at the local university, writing this blog, doing speeches and starting an Internet marketing blog at MaineToday.com brought me more business than I could have gotten through traditional advertising. Plus, I wasn’t hampered by the limited space in a printed ad or the 30 seconds in a traditional TV spot.

Like I said, there’s probably a hundred other lessons I could have added here, but these are the wounds that are still fresh. What lessons did you learn this year?

Rich Brooks
Lessons Learned

Remember when travel agents were an essential piece of any vacation? When you only had a few choices  when you needed a print job? Remember when only real estate agents could access MLS information?

All these industries changes with the Internet, and a lot of their core services became commodities.

Yet, there are travel agents, printers and realtors (example 1, example 2) who thrive in this brave new world.

Even without the Internet, certain products and services have become commodities in the eyes of consumers, such as PCs. Even in Web development there are plenty of DIY plans offered by companies like GoDaddy, Network Solutions and Yahoo that flyte can’t compete with on price. Heck, I spend more on gas coming to work in the morning than some of these plans cost for a month.

Even without computer programs that can create Web sites for the
HTML-challenged, we compete with thousands of people who are working
out of the garage who don’t have the overhead that we do and can
develop sites for much cheaper. And don’t get me started about Web developers in developing parts of the world. It is a flat world, after all.

So how can we–or you–continue to thrive in a world where everything becomes a commodity? Where computer programs can drive down the cost or perceived value of anything we can create?

I’m not sure I have the answer, but I feel it may come from offering more on the service side. Treat things that have become commodities as commodities and pile on value-added services until they spill off the plate.

You really need to be realistic and acknowledge that things are changing around you. Although that can be difficult, you won’t be able to make the strategic changes necessary to survive and grow unless you are honest with yourself.

You can also move into more of a consultative role with your clients. If there are no margins on your widget or the market has driven down the worth of your service, you can still find a role helping people make the most of your widget or service.

With flyte, we’ve made a concerted effort not to just build Web sites, but to create Web strategies (with the Web site as the hub) that help businesses grow. We stress search engine optimization, email marketing, blogs, podcasts, and everything else that makes the Web site a bigger piece of a company’s sales and marketing plan.

We find clients who see the value in this approach and we partner with them. This also helps us weed out prospects who don’t see the benefit of what we offer and will never be happy paying for it.

What’s your value-added proposition? What can you do to separate yourself from your competitors who don’t yet see the writing on the wall?

Now that’s something to think about for the new year.

Rich Brooks
Value-Added Widget Provider

I just finished reading Small Giants: Companies That Choose to Be Great Instead of Big by Bo Burlingham, editor-at-large of Inc. Magazine.

It’s a good companion piece to Good to Great by Jim Collins, a fascinating book on giant companies and how they changed from being…well, good into great companies. I actually put down Good to Great to read Small Giants, in part because I read mostly at bed time and Good to Great got me so fired up I found myself sometimes putting down the book and going downstairs to write for an hour or two.

Not good for my beauty sleep.

But this post is about Small Giants, not big ones. It’s not exactly fair to compare this book to Good to Great, but it’s hard not to. Unlike G2G, Small Giants doesn’t have the 20 researchers looking at years of returns and comparing it to similar companies in the same industry. More, Small Giants is a series of interesting anecdotes about the companies and the entrepreneurs who create them.

All of the companies profiled made a decision not to grow at a certain point. In fact, some of them actually scaled back. In a country where we’re told grow or die, these companies provide an interesting counter-argument.

There are some truly interesting companies profiled in the book, from Anchor Brewing to Clif Bar to Ani DiFranco’s Righteous Babe Records.

What’s great about this book–and great about entrepreneurship in general–is there’s no one way to do anything, no one route to success. One of the companies profiled is CitiStorage, run by Inc. columnist Norm Brodsky. I enjoy Brodsky’s column, but I often disagree with his policies and beliefts: there’s no point to marketing? Don’t hire family members of employees when your wife works in your company? However, you can’t argue with his success.

The only downside of this book is that it’s not as organized as I may have liked. G2G tells tight stories about the companies it profiles, while the connection between some of Small Giants stories seems tenuous.

However, that’s a small complaint for a book that most entrepreneurs will find inspirational, compelling, and a must-read.

Rich Brooks
Standing on the Shoulders of Small Giants