MARK YOUR CALENDARS: Monday, August 18th, Noon (CST)
The Marketing Twins are offering a FREE marketing coaching program, sponsored by Duct Tape Marketing, Monday, August 18th, Noon (CDT). Randy is Fort Worth’s only Duct Tape Marketing Authorized Coach. This FREE conference call is an interview between John Jantsch, founder of Duct Tape Marketing and Stephen M.R. Covey, the son of Dr. Stephen R. Covey, the author of 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Covey is the author of The Speed of Trust. Covey will speak on the importance of leadership, trust and authenticity between you and your customers.

We will be sending out another announcement as the date gets closer on how to register but go ahead and mark your calendars now to reserve the time in your busy day.

If you missed it, learn more about doing GREATER THINGS by linking over to our latest blog posts on how small businesses can be involved in charitable giving. (PART I and PART II)

Did you miss the article about the politician who let’s his supporters make their own campaign signs, giving them the opportunity to tell the world why they are voting for him? There’s application for small business. Are we willing to let other people be our advocates – do we trust them enough to speak on our behalf? Gone are the days of tightly controlled messages. In the open source world of the internet, we must embrace the idea that the world is already talking – but are they talking about you?

Want to do GREATER THINGS today? Help an orphanage in Africa by August 15th!

This is a continuation of our series on giving, stewardship and charitable giving (go to Part 1 here).

Today, we want to highlight some of the organizations with whom we work. You can read more about these organizations at our stewardship and charitable giving page on our website.

At the end of each quarter, The Marketing Twins at 1429 Creative give a portion of our quarterly sales to one of the 3 charities listed below.

Christ’s Haven for Children (Keller, TX)
Christ’s Haven for Children provides a warm, loving, Christian environment in which children in need of basic care can grow physically, emotionally, and spiritually to become productive citizens in society. The Marketing Twins at 1429 Creative offered a monetary donation at the end of 1Q08. To accompany the financial gift, we offered the organization 5 hours of FREE marketing support that they can use whenever they need it.

Our Father’s Children – Royal Family Kids Camp (Hurst, TX)

The mission of of OFC is “reaching out to abused and neglected children – bringing hope to the future, one child at a time.”  Under the umbrella of OFC is a unique opportunity for kids who are desperate for HOPE!  The week-long camps called “Royal Family Kids Camps” are wonderful opportunities to touch the lives of kids who have been ravaged by horrific environments.  Donny, the other Marketing Twin, has been involved in RKFC for a decade – he has participated in the camps each summer for a majority of those years.  Last month, Donny and I took a day away and spent the afternoon assisting the camp throw huge birthday party for all these kids – for most of them, it was the only birthday party they had ever experienced!  Dancing, cake, swimming, bounce houses, rock climbing walls – it was a blast, and even more fun to see the faces of the kids light up when they got their special gift box with their name on it!  These are unique and important occasions and we are eager to continue supporting Our Father’s Children and RKFC!

Village of Hope Orphanage
(Benin, West Africa)

For almost a decade, my wife and I were training for and serving as missionaries in Benin, West Africa.  In addition to making a number of great lifelong friends (on another post, I’ll have to share about how we adopted our 4th child from Benin), we became good friends with a local orphanage and its director.  They are a local organization with little or no outside support – they are a private institution that needs help!  When you visit the Village of Hope (the kids called it “Villope”!), you hear the heart-wrenching stories of kids who have been sent to the orphanage because their parents have HIV or have died of AIDS.  And a number of the kids have been rescued from child trafficking efforts to take the kids into enslavement of the cocoa fields in other parts of West Africa.

My wife and I will be returning to Benin to visit in late August.  We will be visiting many friends but will also spend some time at the Village of Hope.  We have launched a campaign to raise $3000 to assist the orphanage with money to feed two meals a day to the 75+ kids and help them enclose their kitchen.  Right now the kitchen is a traditional outdoor African kitchen nestled under a thin sheet of rusty tin near a mango tree.  While functional for most African families, to feed 75 people in these conditions (especially during the rainy season) is an overwhelming challenge.  We have set up a website where you can view pictures of the kids at the orphanage.  Please consider as well joining us in reaching our goal of $3,000.  We are over half-way there because of the generosity of friends and clients of ours!  You can donate online at www.BeninKids.com.

We are thankful that you have allowed us to share some of what’s important to us.  These are the greater things that we all need to be doing (you choose what causes resonate the most with you).  It’s more than just about profits, making money and building bigger businesses.  Those are the means by which you can impact your local community and the world.

At the end of the day it feels good to give back. It feels good knowing we make a difference in the life of a child.
We use our resources to positively impact our world. And to us…
that’s doing GREATER THINGS!

-Randy

PS – Would you seriously consider a small online donation ($25) to support the Village of Hope in West Africa?  The children would be so grateful.

PART 1 of 2:

Does your organization or small business give to charity? Do you have a special cause that is important to you? An LA times article points that charitable giving is “on a roll” in small business. But are you participating?

There are a number of reasons to give charitably. First of all, I think we can assume that most people and small businesses who give charitably do so out of genuine concern and care. Sure, there are those who do it for exploitation or egotistical reasons. If you are a Kingdom business, you know the dilemma – do you give charitably and even share your vision with others, or do you wrestle with letting your left hand know what your right hand is doing (Mt 6:3 from the Bible)?

David Frey, in a recent post on his website, says this:

Many savvy small businesses are affiliating themselves with charities to market their businesses. Not only is it a primary means for developing a powerful network but also it helps others in the process. People like to associate themselves with businesses that support causes, which help disadvantaged people in a meaningful way.

At 1429 Creative, the Marketing Twins refer to our stewardship vision as doing “GREATER THINGS”. On our stewardship page on our company’s site, we like to encourage small businesses to do such things in a variety of ways:

• Sharing your success to impact your community and the world.
• Rallying your team behind a passion greater than your organization itself.
• Differentiating your organization by focusing on selfless acts of community service.
• Generously giving back of your resources so others can move forward.

If you are genuine in your concern for the charities or causes that you support, I don’t think you need to worry about your customers thinking you are arrogantly bragging. We live in a generous nation (maybe not generous enough, but still, we’re by-and-large a giving culture when we see real needs). I believe when you act responsibly with what you have received, your customers and prospective customers will appreciate your willingness to use your resources to benefit others. Just don’t give to that end: don’t give to impress. Give out of your heart and a generous spirit and you will receive the proper recognition as a secondary benefit (the first benefit comes from giving and helping others). Tax deductions are another side benefit, but I would implore you to make sure that’s not your primary reason. You will not receive the true benefit and blessing of your giving if that is your primary motivation. Your generosity won’t inspire anyone and your customers will see right through it (authenticity speaks volumes!). Give to give. Give to participate more responsibly in your local community and the world. Doing GREATER THINGS is not equivalent to GETTING TAX DEDUCTIONS.

Stay tuned in a couple of days and I will outline what the Marketing Twins are doing at 1429 Creative in the way of GREATER THINGS.

Give generously,

-Randy

GO TO PART 2: 

* In the comments, let’s hear YOUR practical ideas on giving. What are YOU doing in your corporate giving? Is your small business or organization giving to a certain cause? Remember, it’s not always about money. You could be giving your TIME as well to various projects. This is not boasting; it is an opportunity to learn how to give better. Please offer a link to any sites that you think speak positively to small businesses about giving.

1429 Creative is a faith-based creative team in Fort Worth, Texas.

Are you a Do-It-Yourself kind of person? In your business or organization, do you like to have your hands in all areas of business (accounting, payroll, benefits, taxes, banking, etc…)? Are you the DIY type who feels capable of handling these things? Some of us are, some are not. And even if we WANT to do so, sometimes we simply lack the time to do it ourselves. Or we must admit that sometimes our expertise is just short of being effective with our time, so we’d be better off outsourcing or paying someone else to do it for us.

As marketing coaches, we enjoy helping people on all points on the spectrum. Some just need the right tools and a little training. Others want to outsource their marketing completely. But the majority would like to have full control yet enjoy the opportunity to learn how to do it themselves and do it in the most effective way possible. They just need to be able to go somewhere to find the right tools, the right plans and even obtain a little counsel from someone trained to help. (isn’t this how we approach our runs to the local home improvement store?)

Well good news! There is a systematic approach and it really is the only marketing approach that makes sense. You have payroll systems, a clear plan for your employees’ benefits, and you have probably sought out the counsel of CPA in developing a systematic way to budget and pay your taxes. Most small business owners outsource these functions not because they CAN’T do them themselves. With all the tools out there nowadays, small business owners are equipped to be DIY’ers! But the Do-It-Yourself approach says that you have time for all these functions and the expertise to do them right. If you don’t have the time for paying taxes or lack the know-how to properly prepare them, do you just float along without assistance or plan, crossing your fingers and hoping for the best??? Mostly likely not unless you’d love an audit.

A marketing colleague of mine and fellow Duct Tape Marketing Authorized Coach is quoted in a recent press release:

“We have found that many small business owners are spending way too much of their time doing things that are not part of their expertise,” said Troy Braithwaite. “If they are not experts in marketing and accounting, then it is not cost effective for them to be doing these things. Many small business owners don’t realize how valuable their time is and how affordable and effective it is to have marketing and accounting experts on their team.”

Troy is right. There is a systematic approach that works. It’s practical for any business. It’s simple to use and flexible. And it’s affordable. As Fort Worth’s only Authorized Duct Tape Marketing Coach, how can I help make you more effective?

-Randy

1429 Creative is a faith-based creative team in Fort Worth, Texas.