The Very Real Business of FANTASY Football

The NFL football season is once again just around the corner. No more sitting through Baseball Tonight day after day just to get your sports fix for SPORT with a game that drags on for hours with little or no contact. Fantasy Football is also back baby. I am sure many of you have already had or are having your fantasy football draft in the next couple of weeks. What once started as an online hobby for some serious sports fanatics has turned into, by some analysts estimates, over a $1 Billlllllllliiiooooon dollar industry in our country alone. This figure of course does not even touch the under the table pools and bets( you all know what I’m talking about here) that are made on a typical fantasy football season.

According to a recent story in Time, the average player pays $73 to join a football league. Most sites, such as those run by ESPN, Yahoo!, and the NFL, offer players basic fantasy football services for free. These services let you create and customize your own league or join a public league as well as track scores for you. They charge for extra services like Yahoo!’s StatTracker which lets you follow your players’ performances in real time.  The NFL Sunday ticket package on DirecTv which will cost you 5 payments at $59.99 for the entire season allows you to enter your fantasy players into its hard-drive – whenever a player on your fantasy team makes a play it will shoot an update across the top of your TV screen; although, you probably already knew about the play because you got a text update on your iPhone and you have your league pulled up on your laptop with up-to-the-minute stats.

Outside these basic fantasy services, a whole host of ancillary businesses are capitalizing off of fantasy football fever in new and creative ways. Fantasysportsinsurance.com offers insurance that allows you to recoup entry fees if a key player suffers a season ending injury, and for $14.95 fantasydispute.com will help you settle disputes that arise within your league. Fantasysportstropies.com offers players the option to buy a $10 victory wreath for the league’s winner or, if you prefer, a $325 full-sized brass football trophy for those that take their fantasies seriously.

Of course, there are those who do not share the fantasy football fan’s enthusiasm. Employers stand out in this category. According to Time, they suffer in the form of lost productivity to the tune of $9 billion a year. I would surmise that the bulk of this productivity is lost on Tuesday mornings when all match-ups have been settled and scores totaled from the previous Monday Night football game to round out the fantasy football weekend.

Then there are the significant others. As the (mostly) male fantasy football enthusiasts spend more time engrossed in team related activities(drafts,trades,message boards, research, waivers, injury reports, sleeper players, under rated and over looked defenses and special teams),  it undoubtedly means less time spent with their (mostly) female companions, a fact that has spawned the seasonal term “fantasy football widow,”(I wish I could claim this term because I think it is hilarious, but I found it while doing research for this blog post) and a Web site — Womenagainstfantasysports.com (aka WAFS). The site offers up tips for ruining your man’s draft as well as identifying when his fantasy activities have crossed over into addiction. Founded by three fantasy football widows, WAFS was created to “ridicule, mourn and lament the loss of their partners who spend an inordinate amount of time online consuming player data” – ha ridiculous, right?

With all this being said, get your draft magazines ready, call up DirecTv, create a fortress in your cubicle, talk some trash on your message boards, get even with your bookie, and get ready to dominate your league…

Have a great week.

Walking a tight rope

When building solid business relationships, it’s always important not to let much time lapse without following up the first contact. Within 24-48 hours, send your prospect an e-mail expressing your pleasure in communicating with him/her. I believe that at this point in communications it is still too early, though, to send business literature or make any move toward sales promotion.

Follow up early, but don’t push beyond the prospect’s comfort level. Once the prospect has expressed an interest in your products or services, provide information about them, but don’t force it on your potential contact/client. Continue presenting your products or services on a somewhat regular basis, but avoid the hard sell. Focus on fulfilling the prospects needs and interests by being as informative and available as possible. Your goal should be to keep your prospect aware of your business without annoying him/her. I use this blog and my weekly e-mail blast to keep in touch with my entire contact list (which spans from my best friends to my best friends parents and everyone in between). 

Remember, to secure the long-term loyalty of your prospect and convert him/her into a customer, you must first build a relationship, and that relationship must develop through the visibility, credibility and profitability stages. It may take a while, but if you’ve selected and briefed your sources well, you’ll speed up the process. Building solid relationships with your immediate contact list then expanding out from this circle of friends has helped my networking web tremendously.

Always, always, always remember to follow up with people, in any situation, at the very least 24-48 hours. Whenever I meet someone I try to get a business card, then I will immediately add them to my e-mail contact list as a way to keep them up to date with my business and these blog posts. There’s a reason people commonly say that the fortune is in the follow up . . . when you follow up quickly with people, your reputation will benefit, your business will benefit, and eventually your wallet will benefit as well.

To TWEET, to blog, or both?

Twitter is popular because it is easy.  It is easy to setup, easy to copy-paste links into, and easy to write 140 character TWEETS.  But, having your own blog remains the strongest platform if you’re serious about sharing ideas and having a continued dialog with the world.  Blogging is the antithesis of easy, however it is far more rewarding.

I’m not saying Twitter isn’t a useful and interesting service, because it certainly is.  But it does not negate the real opportunity that is actually made more useful by the popularity of microblogging:  having your own blog.

Tweeting but not blogging?  You’re missing out.  Here are 11 reasons I believe blogging is the ultimate platform to getting your message out to your readers (you can tweet about your blog to get more hits…).

1.  Blogging demonstrates true commitment and passion to your industry that you really can’t fake long-term.  Most won’t be able to sustain it over long periods of time with frequency, but those who do so are rewarded in spades and stand out from the crowd.

2.  Old articles are valuable and still read years later, given infinite life by the engines.  Old Tweets live in archive purgatory where a majority will never be seen again.

3.  Remember, you’re essentially contributing to someone else’s network on Twitter – certainly there are returns, but make no mistake they profit from your attention.  I know you might not have a problem with that because you gain something too, but it’s good to be conscious of that fact.

4.  A compelling link in a blog entry will be clicked; links in Twitter are noise that in aggregate make up signal, but the reality is links in your stream aren’t the same as a post with a compelling link.

5.  Secret everyone knows:  most of Twitter is just linking to blogs and content on the open web.  Being the end product people are actually interested in and focus their attention on is where your ideas will be studied carefully, not in the mayhem of TWEETS of Twitter.

6.  You own your work in a self-hosted blog and are in total control over how it is presented.

7.  Plugins (youtube viedeos, charts, graphs, etc.) let you add pretty much anything you want, can even integrate microblogging within your blog itself.

8.  Flexibility with layout.

9.  140 characters is often more than necessary – but also it is often less than necessary.

10. Everyone on Twitter is looking for the next big thing or most interesting piece of content to link to.  Wouldn’t you rather be the big thing than merely another person pointing at it?

11. Careful of how much time you devote to Twitter instead of contributing to your own blog channel.  Spend the most time nurturing that – time spent in Twitter comes at the opportunity cost of fresh content to your blog.  You can use Twitter and other micro networks to draw subscribers and interest, but the premier value is in working on your own material in a unique space.

 Don’t get me wrong, I do like Twitter.  I’ve even taken the time to draft insights from using it as I think it’s a great service, however the biggest opportunity is still to develop a successful self-hosted blog.  This advice isn’t new – but I just got the feeling this week that it needs to be restated.  I know it’s not as “sexy” anymore but it is still far more valuable and should not be discounted merely because the early adopters have shiny new object syndrome.

What if your home got a virus?

Turn on your iPhone and see who is at the door? Change your home security options on the road? Turn down the thermostat when on vacation or at work? Entertainment options in the home that store and manage digital media is commonplace(DirecTV, Tivo, DVR, Apple TV, etc.) . We can download movies from the Internet on a television and play our favorite songs stored on our computers to listen on a stereo system around the house. Moving beyond entertainment, and exploring future options, companies like Microsoft built a concept home with a countertop screen in the kitchen that can suggest recipes based on the ingredients in the refrigerator. CES Award winning iControl Networks has taken a leap forward in home control to partner with home security companies, Internet service providers and telco firms to capture the next generation of home protection and connectivity for their clients to offer to the consumer, the end users. The iControl hub plugs into the home network to connect wirelessly to security panels, IP cameras, sensors and Z-wave devices – lighting, door locks, thermostats for advanced functionality by adding broadband and cellular communications to central monitoring systems. The IControl’s software is designed to act as a control panel for a smart home that can be accessed through the Web, either using a PC or a smart phone. That changes a security system from something that alerts home owners when someone tries to break in to a system that puts people in control to stay connected to their home and family. To provide these services, the telcos, security companies and Internet services providers are eager to provide new applications to add to their revenue stream.

 

 

The Smartest Home in the world?

Bill Gates allegedly spent somewhere around 100 million implementing smart-home tech features into his swanky homestead in Washington State just over 2 years ago. The system in Gates’ home tracks every person in the house. Lights turn on and off as you traverse across the palace and enter different rooms. Temperatures will automatically adjust and security systems will automatically turn on and off. The system gets “smarter” as it learns specific “users” preferences while in the home.

Will the comforts enjoyed by the famous cartoon “The Jetsons” soon become mainstream in homes around the world?

Google Voice – a phone # for the rest of your life….????

Welcome back ladies and gents! Please excuse my blogging absence for the past couple of weeks. I am now going to blog a new post every Tuesday. So, please check back weekly on  Tuesdays for fresh content to lighten up your hectic day.

Another fascinating development by search goliath GOOOOOOOGLE.com caught my eye in a magaizne I receive monthly. The new technology is called “Google Voice” – it is still in the beta testing right now, so only a handful of people have been granted access to this program(I signed up, but I am still waiting to get the invite).

How many of you out there have a personal cell phone, work cell, work number, home number, car phone number etc. etc.?? The point I am trying to make here is that many of us have too many digits to keep our lives in order. Google Voice attempts to simplify this process for its users by allowing a person to have only ONE phone number.

Google Voice allows you to classify all of your contacts into different categories (friends, family, work buddies, annoying people you don’t want to talk to etc.). You can then program all of your different numbers into your Google Voice number database.

Then, the real magic of this program kicks in. For example, if your friends are calling, you can program Google Voice to ring you on your cell phone only. If your family is calling, Google Voice will patch the call through to all of your #’s in your Google Voice database.

Get a new cell # ?? All you need to do is update the Google Voice database. You do not have to text your entire contact list,constantly update your FaceBook status, or create a Facebook group ( to the tune of “HELP, I lost all my #’s!@!~#@!#”)  to notify them of your change in digits.

Got a stalker or annoying neighbor?? Set their # up to go straight to your VoiceMail Box. Some people would also refer to this action as hitting the “F*** you” button (aka the Reject Button). Now, you can let Google Voice do the dirty work for you, so you can go about your day uninterrupted.

You can also check your voicemail from any one of your number’s registered with Google Voice. Or, you can simply log into your Google Voice account to listen to or read text-transcribed voice messages!

 

Check out a short video here…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H1kciERUucs

 

See you all next Tuesday.

Happy 4th of July!

Notable births, deaths, events, and other random things that have occurred on this very historic day:

• July 4th is the 185th calendar day in every year – we have 180 days left – weird
• In 1827, slavery was abolished in New York State
• In 1845, henry David Thoreau left for his 2 year journey into the wildnerness
• In 1886, the French offer the United States the Statue of Liberty
• Ulyssess S. Grant birthday
• Ann Landers’ birthday
• George Steinbrenner’s birthday
• Malia Ann Obama (President Obama’s eldest daughter) celebrates her birthday
• Thomas Jefferson and James Monroe both passed away on this day
• Joseph Goddard was born on this day – check out his blog in my links on the right side of the page

I am sure many other great things have happened on arguably the most badass holiday of the year. Post comments to anything you think should have made this list.

 

Have a great 4th of July Weekend!

 

See you all next week,

Sam Sawyer

Kap-pow!$!$!

How many of you out there have ever thought about inventing some sort of product? With Billy Mays passing away the other day, I figured a blog entry about little gimmicky products that make millions on infomericals could be appropriate for today’s blog entry.

Another reason I wanted to share my thoughts with you today about inventions comes from the fact that I have “invented” a product. I didn’t actually take the product all the way to the marketing/production stage, but I did apply for and receive a provisional patent 2 years ago. Some of my close friends and family know about this product which was dubbed “The Snooze Butler”. The Snooze Butler was essentially an alarm clock on steroids – if you are actually interested in hearing about the idea, please just send me an e-mail.

After going through this very tough, intricate, and confusing patenting process, I now have an utmost respect for the people who come up with the products that actually make it wall the way to QVC or other home shopping networks. You may think “oh who would ever buy that stupid Shamwow!?!? or why the hell do I need a little onion chopper?”, but contrary to what you may assume, these people are making some serious money with these gimmicky ideas. Since this time in my life, I constantly think about ideas and inventions. Instead of getting excited at what I sometimes think is the next thing that will make a quick million, I sit down and do considerable research on the internet (b/c unless the product is truly visionary or extremely unique, I have found that someone out there in our universe has thought of something similar to your idea). This is the reason only a select number of people in our society make millions of dollars off of product inventions!

 

I love sitting around and brainstorming with people about what the next “big thing” is going to be. Shoot me your ideas about a business model or a product invention, I would love to hear about it!

Live. Learn. Improve.

My blog post today has nothing to do with real estate or technology. It simply has to do with a little slogan that can be applied to all areas of a person’s life: “Live. Learn. Improve.”  These 3 words are so simple, but I feel like the short slogan can keep you focused when times are good or bad. As any person who has not been living in a cave or in the middle of the woods knows, the United States economy is in one of the worst periods in our country’s history. Many people are facing some tough times right now, and the faint of heart and mind  in today’s business market may not surive this recession(financially). I strongly believe that the people who take this time to learn about new things in their field or the people who try new ways to implement a new business practice will be riding high when the recession tides flow back to sea.

Voids and inefficiencies in all markets also become transparent at such a trying time in any industry. This period is also a great opportunity for entrepreneurs to develop new business practices and models that will be the future of our country’s business landscape.

In my opinion, this period is also a great time to invest in the stock market. If you have some time to save and invest money before you retire, you should see some great things happen over the next decade or so in long term investments. The United States may be tested and taken down at times, but we still are the most dominant superpower in the world – I feel like some people forget that sometimes.

I wake up everyday open to meeting new people and searching for new opportunites. You must live your life at 100%, learn from your actions and the actions of other people who influence you, then IMPROVE. If you “f*ck up” sometimes, you just need to roll with the punches and bounce back. It is very unlikely to succeed on the first try every time. Some of the greatest leaders in our country today would be nobodies if they had not learned from their initial defeat.

Fred Smith, the CEO of Federal Express, would not be who he is today had he had not learned from being defeated. Being a native Memphian, the story of Fred Smith has been ingrained in my mind my entire life. For those who have not heard about the remarkable story of Fred Smith, please continue reading.

Mr. Smith was asked to write a paper in an upper level economics class at Yale University. The assignment dealt with coming up with a new idea for a business. Smith outlined his idea for FedEx as a overnight package delivery service in this assignment. Mr. Smith received a C on the paper. As you well know, a C is “just getting by”. Mr. Smith was not slowed by this below average grade.

In 1970, Smith purchased the controlling interest in an aircraft maintenance company, Ark Aviation Sales, and by 1971 turned its focus to trading used jets. On June 18, 1971, Smith founded Federal Express.  In 1973, the company began offering service to 25 cities, and it began with small packages and documents and a fleet of 14 Falcon 20 (DA-20) jets. His focus was on developing an integrated air-ground system, which had never been done before. Smith based his development of  FedEx on the business idea of a shipment version of a bank clearing house where one bank clearing house was located in the middle of the representative banks and all their representatives(the packages) would be sent to the central location(the sorting hubs and airports) to exchange materials.

Mr. Smith is a prime example of the Live. Learn. Improve. lifestyle. “Live. Learn. Improve.” can be applied to all area’s of one life, it is not limited to strictly business practices. So next time you are down in the dumps or riding sky high, remember – there is always a time and a place to Live your life. Learn something new about yourself. Improve your business or lifestyle.

Have a good weekend.

Sam

The Up and Coming Game Changer

With the new iPhone 3g S set to debut on Friday, I figured it was appropriate to blog about an iPhone app that is laying down some serious treads in the real estate world. Trulia.com  – a real estate search database – has developed an iPhone app that many of you may have probably used before when searching for homes in your area (if not, search for the Trulia app in the App store). The GPS capabilities of the iPhone device coupled with the search methods developed by Trulia and implemented in the Trulia application allow users to drive down a street and get up to the minute data on a property that is for sale. The GPS enabled iPhone pinpoints your exact location then syncs with active listings on Trulia.com. The result is an at your fingertips, up to the minute description of houses for sale on your exact block and around your neighborhood.

The days of people cracking open the Sunday real estate section are slowly becoming a past time. I have noticed at my Open Houses that potential clients will show up with some info on the house that they printed off the INTERNET (they are not showing up with a newspaper and highlighter and their hand). I would be willing to bet that most of you reading this blog post, no matter what age you are, have started a search for real estate on the Internet before you consulted a local newspaper. People my age may check out apartments, people a few years older may be checking a starter home neighborhood with some promise for a good return, and other older readers who have purchased multiple properties most likely check out million dollar properties or vacation homes on line.

In my opinion, Trulia is one of most user-friendly, practical real apps for the everyday person checking out some houses in your neighborhood. You can get a good idea of PRICES in your area with this app, but I would suggest consulting your local agent to get a more informative CMA (Comparative Market Analysis) if you are considering putting your house on the market.

 

Good friends make great memories…

             After some reflection about my time at SMU, I can honestly say that the greatest thing I gained at SMU were great friends. Some people may take great friends and people for granted, but the people I have met at SMU will be some of my greatest friends for life.  Although SMU is situated in the heart of Texas, I have friends from all over the country and even some friends from other countries. A lot of people do not like to venture out of their comfort zone when leaving high school. I came to SMU in 2005 with 3 other close friends from Memphis, TN. We are still great friends today, and  all 4 of us have made some great friends and connections while attending SMU. One of my buddies, Andrew Robinson, has accepted a job with KPMG that starts in October. My other 2 good friends, Richard White and Josh Hall, will both be attending the graduate program in accounting at the Cox School of Business.

Since graduating, a lot of my good friends have ventured to other places besides Dallas. Some have accepted some awesome jobs in this tough economy, some will be attending business grad school, other will be going to law school, and some people are still trying to figure out what they are going to do. I am very proud to have such great friends and connections, and I have no doubt that a lot of these people will make a great impact on a local and national level.

A little personal motto of mine is : ” It is the people, not a place or any special event, that can make something truly memorable”. I hope you all are as blessed as I am to have such great friends. I encourage to keep in touch with old friends and make new friends everyday. No matter what happens in life, your friends will be there the whole way to see you through it.

“The ornament of a house is the friends who frequent it.” – Ralph Waldo emerson