Reading Time: 2 min As a partner in a digital marketing firm, I can appreciate the value of various digital marketing tactics. Search engine optimization, email marketing, digital ads, social media, and many other techniques can do amazing things to help get the word out about your company. Ultimately, though, the best marketing for most consumers is one that […]
Transparency isn’t the same as honesty
Reading Time: < 1 min It’s always felt to me that being transparent was a big part of being honest. It can be, but they aren’t the same thing. In his book “Lost and Founder“, author Rand Fishkin explains it this way: Transparency isn’t the same as honesty. Honesty is saying only things that are true. Many founders and startup […]
The way it starts isn’t how it finishes, and that’s by design
Reading Time: < 1 min Our company will turn 14 later this year, and it’s a far different company than I might have predicted 14 years ago. I didn’t have a specific plan in mind when we started, so I’ve just been enjoying the journey and I’m very happy with how things have turned out. In Adam Savage’s book “Every […]
When you shove away the hostile, you push away the curious
Reading Time: 2 min I talk about this a lot, largely because I struggle with it myself — if someone has beliefs that are completely counter to mine, pushing them away is likely a bad idea for a large number of reasons. A few months ago I shared the idea of not “unfollowing if you disagree”, which can be […]
Wanting to remember something doesn’t help
Reading Time: 1 min I talk about memory quite a lot on here, as it’s a concept that is fascinating to me. I frequently talk about using Anki to improve what I remember, but that’s ultimately just brute-force practice. It’s a good thing, and I use it every single day, but understanding more of the science behind memory is […]
People play differently when they’re keeping score
Reading Time: 2 min “Keeping score” can make a big difference. Growing up, if my friends and were shooting hoops it’d generally be casual and fun, just tossing the ball around and chatting. However, as soon as it became a game of any kind, everything changed. It was still fun, whether it was 2-on-2 or “HORSE” or anything else, […]
Honesty can lead to contradictions
Reading Time: 2 min I write a lot about honesty on here, but being honest doesn’t mean always keeping your beliefs the same. As I wrote more than 10 years ago, it’s a good thing to be willing to change your mind and it’s often the logical thing to do. However, changing your mind can sometimes appear as contradictions […]
The two uses of faces in Anki
Reading Time: 2 min I’ve talked about my use of Anki for years now, and it’s a tool I’ve used on-and-off for nearly a decade and one I’ve used every single day for almost five years. While I use it for a lot of different purposes, one of the early uses was to better remember names and faces. It’s […]
When job hunting, communication is key
Reading Time: 2 min We were recently hiring for a new position at GreenMellen and we interviewed a handful of folks. We’re very thrilled with how it ended up (Amanda is great!), but I noticed something odd along the way. After sorting through the initial pile of resumes, we really had four good candidates, and any of them could […]
The first one
Reading Time: < 1 min Starting a healthy habit can be difficult. It could be a regular workout schedule, eating better, reading frequently, or blogging daily. As with many things, the first one can be the most difficult. My friend Laurie expressed this beautifully earlier this year with her first blog post on January 15. Her first post talks about […]