We started last Saturday at Kings Crossing Winery.  They have a small winery and vineyard.  100% of their wines are made from Iowa grown grapes, apples and honey.  It’s not a big place, but I’m starting to notice many of the wineries in Iowa are that way.  We enjoyed the tasting, company and music.

Next on our stop was Prairie Crossing Winery . It’s family owned and operated and their wines were also good!  Adam played a couple of songs here, and booked a Mother’s Day Concert.

I am not a wine expert.  I know that I prefer a dry red, and in Iowa – that’s not common.  It’s been my good luck to find some good tasting dry, red wines in Iowa.  Many of the wines are sweeter in Iowa.  It’s been my even better luck to be able to work with Adam Lee.  He’s a musician through and through and a damn good one at that.  Adam also is personable and knows how to get a great performance.

Next on our wine stop was Wabash Wine Company.  We had a table right in front of the performer (Adam) and we drank their St. Patrick’s Sangria.  The crowd in the place was pretty rowdy (see picture) and Adam did a fine job of performing and entertaining.  It’s a skill to be able to control a rowdy crowd!

All throughout the day we wandered the country side and took pictures of Adam for his bio, website, media kit and personal use.  It was wonderful exploring old locations to take new pictures in!

Have a listen to Adam perform an original piece of us called Market Street.

Here’s another song by Adam, called Harvest of Love.

Partnerships are a great way to get things done.  I’m working with a group here in Franklin County that include a seed company, a small business owner, a bed and breakfast owner, a member of the soybean association, a marketing company (me), and a winery owner. We meeting every couple of weeks to discuss what we as residents and businesses in the county can do to grow our businesses and attract more consumers.

I spoke with Shannon Latham, of Latham-Hi Tech Seeds in Alexander, Iowa.  She’s a member of our partnership team. 

Shannon, I know you are involved in the Girl Scouts with your daughter.  How do you see the Girl Scouts helping to build up our community?

 One way is to tap into local organizations that are working along a similar path.  Interestingly enough, the new Girl Scout handbook (at least for Junior Scouts) says you can “make a walking tour for your community.”  The Girls Guide reads:

If people appreciate places, they will want to take care of them! Find out about the history of some buildings in your community.  Put together a pamphlet that tells what you’ve learned, along with a map that locates the buildings. Give your pamphlet to friends or to your town’s visitor’s bureau.

As the Junior Girl Scout leader for West Fork, I’d gladly have my troop help on fulfilling this requirement for Sheffield.  I’d even be glad to contact fellow Girl Scout leaders in other communities within Greater Franklin County.  That’s one way to make a difference.

Another option Girl Scouts have to earn the Girl Scout Way badge is to “improve part of your community.”  The guidelines read:

Get permission from the person in charge of a park to leave it better than you found it.  Maybe your Junior group can “adopt” the park for a season and pick up trash, sort recyclables or weed and water plants every week.

I believe one could interpret “park” loosely to include Harriman-Nielsen (which provides a great opportunity for cross-generational leadership) or the Old Stone House.  Recruit one troop to adopt a specific historical place and help maintain it for a season. Then when these groups hold events, the Scouts’ families are more apt to come and invite others to join them at the event because they feel some ownership toward it.

The really great thing about this is that it doesn’t cost money!

I truly believe our Tourism Committee or Promotions/Marketing Committee of the Chamber can serve as a catalyst for involvement countywide by a larger group of people, working toward one united goal of inviting people to their “home county.”  It also accomplishes the goal of increasing awareness of local residents to the number of opportunities available to them right here in Franklin County.

Shannon – talk to me about partnerships and collaboration.

Another idea to foster collaboration is to give members a reason to work together. I realized that small business owners need examples of how they can come together and apply for Tourism Grants.  Donnis and the Country Heritage B&B could partner with Town’s End winery to provide a “Sweetheart Deal” for folks traveling to Franklin County during the month of February.  They could put together a “one-priced package deal” that would provide them with ideas (and coupons) for local specialty shops; dinner for two at Ridgestone; wine tasting on Saturday at Town’s End and boat rental.

Another idea is to put together a “Christmas in Franklin County” package.  Somehow we need to help bring together Franklin County business owners to create a “package dealers” that could include:

• One targeting families: Carlson Christmas tree where kids can feed the animals and run through the trees.  Even if a family isn’t able to transport a whole tree, they could buy greenery and wreaths), Cocoa with Santa at Cornerstone Cottage Kids, etc.
• One targeting couples: Make your wreath at Carlson’s Christmas Tree Farm, wine tasting at Town’s End, tickets to see “A Christmas Carol” (I realize this would require reserving a few tickets specifically for this purpose because otherwise it will sell out), etc.

These are just a few top-of-mind ideas that would only get better with input from more people.

Our partnership group will be creating many new ways to work together and market each other — what kinds of things could your community do? 

A little more about Shannon Latham:

Shannon Latham is one of the principals of Latham Hi-Tech Seeds and serves as the company’s vice president. She is responsible for the company’s marketing, communications and event planning. Prior to joining the family business in 2005, Shannon operated her own communications business for two years. She also worked for six years as an account executive and public relations specialist for The Meyocks Group in West Des Moines. Other previous work experience includes serving as agricultural program coordinator for the Iowa Department of Agriculture & Land Stewardship where she did public relations for the Beginning Farmer Loan Program and coordinated the Iowa Agricultural Youth Institute (IAYI).  In addition, Shannon served a two-year stint as director of legislative affairs for the Agribusiness Association of Iowa where she coordinated grassroots lobbying efforts.

Shannon earned an MBA from the University of Iowa and a B.S. in Ag Journalism / Public Service & Administration in Agriculture from Iowa State University. Active in civic and professional organizations, Shannon is an active member of the Tourism Committee for the Greater Franklin County Chamber.  She has served as a Girl Scout troop leader since 2007 and as Cub Scout Den Leader since 2009.  She recently finished a three-year term as a Trustee for the Iowa 4-H Foundation, as well as on advisory boards for the Iowa Small Business Development Center and the John Pappajohn Entrepreneurial Center at North Iowa Area Community College. In addition, Shannon has served as president of the Iowa Chapter of National Agri-Marketing Association (NAMA).

What is Broadband?

The term broadband commonly refers to high-speed Internet access that is always on and faster than the traditional dial-up access.

How is broadband different from dial-up service?

• Broadband service provides higher-speed of data transmission. It allows more content to be carried through the transmission “pipeline.”
• Broadband provides access to the highest quality Internet services—streaming media, VoIP (Internet phone), gaming, and interactive services. Many of these current and newly-developing services require the transfer of large amounts of data that may not be technically feasible with dial-up service. Therefore, broadband service may be increasingly necessary to access the full range of services and opportunities that the Internet can offer.
• Broadband is always on. It does not block phone lines and there is no need to reconnect to network after logging off.
• Less delay in transmission of content when using broadband.

Now – how is the growth of broadband in ag areas coming along? 

Depends on who you ask.

Many farmers use smart phones.  They check the markets, tweet their news, update facebook – all while driving a tractor.  (Don’t worry, during harvest season lots of combines are on autopilot until you get to the end of the row.)  Satellites have made it possible to receive information faster than ever before.  We’ve got cell phone towers all over the place.  Having said that – there are still many ‘dead’ areas where phones won’t work.  At all.  Mostly it’s a grove of trees causing the problem, or low lying fields.  Sometimes it’s because you’re too far away from a tower.

I drive to Mason City at least once a week, and I know all three spots along the way where I can’t be on the phone – because I’ll get dropped.  But everyone knows those spots – and you just don’t call people!  We adapt.

There are many people that live in the country that are use providers like Wild Blue.  They are available almost anywhere. ( I could not get them at my family’s farm – because the farm was at the bottom of a hill and they said I would not get service.  Yeah, I don’t get it either.)  They don’t work with VOIP and live interactive gaming – wildblue.com says “latency will have a noticeable effect on performance over the WildBlue network, as it would on any satellite delivered service.”   They also have a fair access policy; if you exceed it they slow you down to a crawl.

Then there’s HughesNet.  They have download allowances ranging between 250 mb and 450 mb.  From their website: To ensure fair Internet access for all HughesNet^® subscribers, Hughes maintains a Fair Access Policy. This policy establishes an equitable balance in Internet access for all HughesNet subscribers. Hughes assigns a download threshold to each service plan that limits the amount of data that may be continuously downloaded within specified time periods. Subscribers who exceed this limit will experience a temporary reduction of speed.

I used them at the farm, because that is all that was available.  It meant no live streaming (ack! No 140 character conferences), no watching Hulu or any tv online – it meant paying very close attention to what I was doing online.  My friend Deb Keller uses them (because she has to) and it’s very frustrating.  “When the kids are home, we can’t all be on our computers.  Because we go over the limit and HughesNet slows us down to slower than dial up.”  That’s right – they intentionally slow your service to a crawl.

Living in town, small or large urban area, you don’t even consider internet speed.  It’s a given.  Sure, sometimes Mediacom has problems – but it’s usually not a big deal.  I’m with Qwest (they have a new name – Century Link) and have no complaints whatsoever.  However, neither of these companies service rural farm areas.  We are told it’s too costly to provide the necessary equipment to get there.

So, yes, we can get higher speed of data transmission.  Most people in rural areas are limited to the quantity of this data transmission because of ‘fair access policies’.  Forget streaming media, VOIP, live gaming and interactive services – those run you out of allowed downloads.  If you live too far away from cell phone towers, you are SOL too.

It’s better … but we aren’t anywhere near equal yet. 

Quick and dirty review: Loved it.  Figured out the whole touching business (you have to touch it to make it work).  Best feature: speaking into the phone instead of having to type or swipe everything.  Worst feature: battery life.

I’m not going to give you all the technical information in this review.  You can Google it (on a Droid, just by speaking).  I will give you what worked and didn’t work for me.

What it offered for me:

• easy to download apps – Facebook, Twitter, Google maps, YouTube, News, Netflix, Navigation were the ones I used frequently.
• touch screen that worked with my big fingers - the screen itself is larger, so it made it easier to touch.  The important thing I had to remember was to use the pad of my finger, not my nail.
• little icons for the people I called the most – I could see their face and just touch it.  Made it so much easier to make a call, less steps.
• Voicemail icon – Showed me how many voicemails I had, and it was a one touch operation to check them.
• Good camera – front and back facing, touch features that were fun and easy to use.
• larger screen – this really helped in reading blogs, Facebook and online information.
• Google search by voice – I simply clicked the microphone and said what I was looking for.  ”coffee shop in Surf City” “Kohls in Winston-Salem” — and it brought up the info I needed.
• Lovely sound - I used Ta Da for notifications and every time I heard it, it made me smile!  My phone ringing sound was Eastern Sky and it was very mellow.  Both sounds were loud enough for this hard of hearing woman.
• Always connected – I never had a problem accessing the internet.

Extra Feature that made a big difference:

Verizon has local, independent stores that are staffed by some of the most amazing people.  Cell Tech in Hampton called me to see how I liked the phone and invited me down to show me some features I was going to love.  Katy Flint spent an hour going over all the features and downloads with me.  When I complained about the battery life, Kimberly showed me the extra battery option they carry – it has three charges on it, fits in your purse easily and solves the carrying around a cord dilemma.

I visited two places in Winston-Salem with my friend who was trying to straighten out her bill.  While she was working  on that, staff showed me some very cool things I could do with the phone.  Using the camera options to create stunning photos, holding the search button down and it would pop up the speaker for the talk to Google feature – just two things I learned on the road.

Neutral features:

4G - I was in North Carolina and they have 4G there (we don’t in Iowa yet).  Frankly, I didn’t notice a difference.

What I didn’t like:

battery life – you would definitely have to carry a cord around with you to recharge.  I use my phone frequently, and I would need to recharge by 2 p.m. (after starting at 7 a.m.).  (see fix for this above)

weight – it was heavier than my Blackberry.

Off and on – it went black too quick for me.  Granted, it was just a little button on the top I had to push to bring it to life and then swipe to open the lock.  I’m used to my BB that stays on.  My guess is there is a setting somewhere that I could change to make it stay on longer.  But then again, that probably drains the battery too.

Cost – to get it and upgrade my plan would cost me over $200, depending on whether I get the 3G or 4G model.

Will I switch from my Blackberry Curve to the Android Bionic?  

Probably.  It’s on my Christmas list!

I received an email from Karen Smith, Verizon — and it addresses a lot of my issues!  The Bionic is looking better and better.  Here’s her response:

I have the Bionic and bought the extended battery which comes with a cover – This is a great help for those who run a lot of applications and are not able to use a vehicle power charger, one of the docking stations or have plugged in. I The new Motorola DROID RAZR has a special APP – Smart Actions APP that helps you customize your phone to save battery life

 In the 3G or 4G smartphone world, staying charged is a constant compared to the battery life of those who have had a Blackberry for awhile. That is because the device is constantly connected and updating.  We recommend downloading Advanced Task Killer free APP for Android to help conserve battery life.

Thinking you might be a candidate to attend one of our Wireless Workshops – however not sure which of our corporate locations would be close enough for you?  Waterloo, Mason City or Ames stores all have wireless workshops free when you have gotten a new device to learn how to use it.  Usually 8-9 a.m. before the store opens, some are on Saturday mornings. Information and registration is available online at  www.verizonwireless.com/workshops. 

*I was not paid for the review, I don’t get to keep the phone either.

If you’re like me, you’re not sure what passion looks like.

The first thought that comes to mind is all that old romantic stuff — kissing and smooching and carrying on. Yeah – that’s not what we are talking about here.

Take a minute and think.  What is it you love to do?  Why do you love to do it?  You’ll know if you’re passionate about it because it creates an energy you can feel.  You walk just a hair or two off the ground, you smile a lot, you are right there in the moment having a great time.

The next thing we are told is to do what we are passionate about and the money will follow.  Huh, I don’t know about all of that.  I think you have to work at it, study it, remember it, try it again after you fail a couple of times — just keep doing it.  Get really good at it.

If you find yourself after a long, exhausting day of work on the J.O.B. arriving at home and you are all excited about what you are doing at home — that’s a passion, baby.   If you save your money all year so you can go do something you love doing – that’s a passion.  What books are you reading?  Are they books about what you love to do?  Passion.  It shows up in many places and many ways — we just are not trained to see it. Look for it — train your eyes and mind to see it.

Now comes the hard part – after you’ve gotten good at it, how do you make a living at it?  Same way you eat an elephant – one bite at a time.  What are others in your passion field doing to earn money?  Study them.  Read about them.  Reach out to them if you can and ask a lot of questions.

And you know what?  Maybe you’ll never make a living at it.  Maybe it will remain a hobby.  And my friends, that’s okay too.  Because you’ll still be doing something you are passionate about.

I met Michelle Stamper in North Carolina.  She’s 39 years old and a FedEx driver.  She is passionate about auctioneering.  She goes to auctions for fun.  She saved her money and went to auctioneer school.  Now she’s licensed and stepping out into her chosen passion.  Did it happen overnight?  Nope.  But she kept at it, she studied, she had fun and she’s good at it.  One day we will be calling her Colonel!

Need an auctioneer in North Carolina or surrounding states?  Call Michelle at 1 336.480.7540

It’s nice to hear things differently once and awhile.

Many of us are involved with customers in one way or another.  If you work retail, you see them all day (hopefully).  If you work as a freelancer of any sort, your clients are your customers.  If you volunteer at the local chamber, the people who enter the door are your customers.  

Mike Wagner from White Rabbit Group is rather an expert on Creating Great Customer Experience.  Mike is a dynamic speaker and I had the opportunity to hear him speak at the Central Iowa Tourism quarterly meeting.  Following are some great ways to help your organization create a great customer experience gleaned from hearing Mike speak. 

Managing Customer Focus is harder than it sounds.  It becomes hard when you try to do it day to day.  Your instinct is to be autocratic.  However your staff can’t just be doing what they’re told.  You need to make the interaction participatory.  There are three dominant styles of managment.  They are:

Patriarchal Management: I own you, you work for me. This style operates on fear – and people will only work as hard as they must.  There is no extra, no care, no fun in this style.

Paternalistic Management: We’ll take great care of you.  People become teenagers and bosses become parents.  We all know how well that works!

Participatory Management: We’ll both take ownership and deliver great customer experience.   When your staff feels it can be a part of something, it creates a wonderful experience for everyone involved.

What is at the center of your organization?  Employees, mission statement, products?  Nope – those are all self centered.  The correct answer should be Right Customer Experience.

Now determine who your right customer is.  Define what a successful customer experience looks like.  Spend some time on this exercise.  Who do you want buying from you?  Who do you want using your services?  How would that look?

Once you’ve done that – you can now create the Right Customer Experience.

The idea is to create a chemical memory.  You want your customer to have an actual change in their brain –so they never forget the valued experience.   So how do you create this chemical memory?

Difference: Design it into the experience.  Surprise people, don’t do the same as everyone else.  Life is really like high school, the different people get noticed.  If you are doing the same thing everyone else is – people are not going to remember you.  You don’t want to fall into the crap bucket – that’s where everyone who is doing the same thing goes into.  You want to be different.  Find ways to be different.

Relevance: Must be different and relevant at the same time.  It means you are touching a deeply felt need.  Become radically committed to the study of answers.   Find out what people want – and give it to them.  Study trends, listen to what people are telling you.  Make sure your product, service, conversation is relevant to what they want.

Three books Mike recomended you read are:

Orbiting the Giant Hairball by Gordon MacKenzie

 Game Storming by Dave Grey

Emotional Design by Donald Norman

Mike can be found on twitter @bigwags.  Websites are www.whiterabbitgroup.com or www.michaelcwagner.com

I was given a Motorola Xoom to use for the week prior to the event.  I’m a heavy pc user.  I write in Word, use spreadsheets in Excel, download pictures and create photo albums, surf the internet, tweet and share on Facebook.  When I’m on the road I travel with my Dell Inspiron laptop – and it’s no light machine.  And I’m on the road – a lot.

This is a review written by a 55 year old woman, with not much technological information in it.  I’ll tell what worked for me – and what didn’t.  If you need the specs, visit the website http://www.motorola.com/staticfiles/Consumers/xoom-android-tablet/us-en/overview.html

Thursday evening I had a class to teach at Charles City on how to create a facebook fan page.  The overhead projector hooked up to my laptop – and I was at the front of the room.  The problem was my students were at computers along the side of the room and I needed to see what they were doing.  I’m walking with a cane and it was difficult running back and forth.  I pulled out the Xoom, opened up Facebook – and sat down behind my 4 students.  It was perfect. I could follow along with what they were doing and the portability of the Xoom made that possible.  One point for the Xoom!

Saturday Keri Holmes and I headed to Des Moines, 90 miles away.  I gave the Xoom to Keri to use while I drove.  Keri works in the cell phone industry and is more familiar with technology on the go than I am.  The nicest feature for her was the constant contact to the internet.  Verizon’s plan is affordable, and it worked in the North Central area of Iowa.  There’s a lot of farm land, few towers, and small towns – often indicators that the internet won’t work there.  We had no problem with connection the entire time we used the Xoom.   Another point for the Xoom!

While at the hotel, I didn’t want to take out my clunker laptop, hook it all up, and burn my lap up while surfing the internet.  I opted for the Xoom instead.  I was easily able to sign into facebook and twitter and connect with friends and family.  I couldn’t access my email, the browser wouldn’t let me into my paid version of Yahoo – but I didn’t ask for help either.  I just assumed it was the Xoom.  Wrong.  There is a way to view the full version of the browser, I just didn’t see it immediately and assumed it didn’t work.  Operator error!  Surfing the internet while stretched out in bed was a nice luxury.  Another point for the Xoom.

There were some drawbacks that created slight problems for me.  Glare on the screen while outside was not cool.  The Xoom was heavier than I expected – but still not as heavy as my laptop.  I couldn’t access Word and Excel, although I imagine I could have found out how to load that on the Xoom.  I suck at touch screen applications – and the entire machine is run by touch screen!  I’m told with time you get better.  I will believe that.  When I first started to use a mouse with a computer (yes, I’m that old) I couldn’t make the damn thing work for me.  Now – it’s second nature.  I use a Blackberry (Verizon plan) for my cell phone – simply because it’s not touch screen.  The slot for SD card – wasn’t for a SD card.  So I didn’t figure out how to load pictures onto the Xoom using my SD card.  That definitely is a big problem.  I’m told a camera adapter is coming that will work in the sync spot on the Xoom (see already, confused!).  However, I can take pictures and videos with the Xoom and edit the movies with a built in app.  That’s nice.   Videos fill up the entire screen, making it much easier to view.  And there is a front and rear camera – take pics and Skype.

Overall, I think the Xoom is a good alternative to use when doing ‘light work’ – surfing, taking pics, and reading books. I would use it for sitting on the couch and catching up late at night with my friends.  I could see taking it on road trips with my mom.  Maybe even to take notes at conferences and meetings.  It’s definitely designed to be an addition to your technical arsenal.  For me, I would not use it for my big gun.  It won’t be the tool I use to get my work done – writing, reviewing, editing pictures, creating websites.  But I sure would use it to relieve my aching back and knees when I need to be mobile.

The results proved to be interesting.

Number 1 was a blog I wrote for a group writing project sponsored by www.middlezonemusings.com  I talked about Alzheimers.  That was back in March.  In May my dad went into the nursing home because he has Alzheimers.  It’s been a journey for my family that I won’t recommend to anyone.

Number 2 was the information for the Historical Tour of Homes we had this month.  I think it’s a clue for me that local people are looking at my blog.  It was a great tour!

Number 3 was the blog post about our Winter Wine Walk.  It was the first time we had a wine walk in our community, and over 140 people attended.  Now I know there’s some local folks reading my blog.

Number 4 is my Portfolio page, surprisingly.  I think bloggers fall into the habit of ignoring that page.  We write it and throw it up there.  I’ve recently updated by Portfolio page and have scheduled to update it every 3 months.  People are reading it!

Number 5 is a guest post from Christine Kane – You teach people how to treat you.  Christine ends the article with this sentence:

This article won’t be popular among your co-workers and friends. That’s because we’re taught to “be nice” more than we are taught to “be big.”

Where in life are you being nice instead of being big?  I’m taking a look at that right now!