What we learned in San Francisco 2014

Sometimes you get the fortune to see crazy up close.  San Francisco, for all its quirks, isn't fully crazy.  But it tries.

However as Tennessee Williams once said, "America has three cities - New York, New Orleans and San Francisco.  Everything else is just Iowa."  So despite its craziness it is one of our jewels.

The challenge however is to see beyond the Full Moon Channeling sessions (Cancelled or otherwise) to see where the value is.

Been to the waterfront recently?  Completely different than it was 5 to 10 years ago.

Been to Japantown recently? Completely vibrant

The Mission, Downtown, the Marina... all these areas are alive and growing.  People are enjoying what this jewel has to offer. But that is not to say everywhere is booming.  Like many great cities, just a few steps over you will find run down areas... like the Tenderloin.

So what makes one area successful and another... less so?  The answer is proper planning and coordination.

Now we don't mean city planner planning - although that helps - we mean having a plan for what makes that area special, and focusing on promoting it.  Working together with businesses and industry to help foster successful attraction.  Having government step in to help where it can.  And watching it grow.

Oh, and then NOT introducing a tax on investment to accomplish those things...

PAC fundraising - its all in the details

So this was the view from my office window today...

And in case you ever get the opportunity, take the Amtrak from LA to San Diego.  It is one of the most beautiful rides in the world.

And... assuming you can actually concentrate on something other than the serene view, it has wifi the entire way and is the best two and a half hours worth of work you can have while commuting.

But today's plan wasn't to enjoy the view... even if I did... it was to build a fundraising plan for a PAC.

Doing so, a couple items became clear -

1. PAC fundraising isn't difficult, but it is very detail oriented
2. Planning a fundraising effort takes meticulous attention to detail
3. You CAN wing a plan, but then you'll only get a clipping of what you otherwise would
4. The more people you involve, the better it will go
5. If you want people involved, you have to give them everything they could need to be successful

Your PAC deserves a good plan, and only a good plan will work.

Sweet Home Chicago...

Did you know that Chicago has more architecture styles, and more bridges over rivers than any other city in America?

The bridges thing is fairly self evident.  What isn't as evident is the architecture styles.

If you ever get the chance, take the architecture tour.  It is amazing that the city has been so supportive of different architectural styles, especially with so many cities trying to "maintain character" and disallowing anything original because it doesn't fit with the buildings around it.

Yes, you preserve a look, but what you end up with is homogenous and vanilla.

Many groups do the same thing with their political efforts.  "This is how we do things."

That's really great and all, but you are missing an opportunity.  Because politics isn't a one-size-fits-all proposition.  You need diversity in your approach, in your efforts, and in your execution.

Otherwise you end up with homogenous and vanilla.

Know why that's a danger?  Your opposition knows EXACTLY what you are going to do.  Which means they know your playbook and can manipulate it to their advantage.

Sometimes you have to switch things up.  Do something people are familiar with, and change it to be your own.

Maybe that's why some of the Chicago institutions -

• Giordano's
• Gino's East
• Lou Malnati's

switch up the order of ingredients on their pizza...

Vegas Changes Everything

 Las Vegas is a great town - beyond all the hype and that horrible cliche that everyone keeps repeating about what happens there... Vegas is a great place to visit, work and live.

That said it seems that anytime a conference comes to town, you see otherwise reasonable people act... well... unreasonably.

Nothing turns a group of  conventioneers into a group of... well whatever that is above... quite like Vegas.

It also has the debilitating ability to make the stack on the left seem insignificant by being the stack on the right.  Same money, different feeling.

Which serves as a point to consider.  Everything is about perspective.

How you do things affects your outlook. 

Same can be said about how others view what you are doing.  So looking at your government affairs efforts, what are other people seeing in what you are doing?

Are you reasonable, or unreasonable?

Is what you are doing making you look like you are spending significant amounts in your efforts, or insignificant?

What are you doing to be effective in new and different ways to make people keep coming back?
 

Some people just can't help themselves

Today I was reflecting on what went wrong with a client we had.

They needed help communicating the value of their PAC and government affairs efforts to their members.  More importantly, they needed help connecting the two.

They had been trying for years and kept running into the same stumbling blocks and wanted help getting around them.

We worked hard to get them there.  Providing more options at every turn.  However the same stumbling blocks they ran into, they refused to let us work around.

• No researching their membership
• No studying past analytics
• No support for messages going out
• No commitment to message issues
• When we built them a communication piece - they wouldn't use it
• No explanation of why

So what did we do wrong?  Hard to say honestly.  I am sure we could have worked harder to accomplish their goals for them, however at some point you have to ask yourself if it is possible to ever help someone who wont help themselves.

Take a look at your own plans.  Are you willing to try new things?  Or are you going to throw up your own road blocks?