Greg Hartnett

Now at the midpoint of our conference schedule, I am sitting in the wifi lounge at the Hilton, between sessions. Seemed like a good time to reflect on the status thus far.

The NY Times Travel show at the Javits Center was fantastic. The attendance was phenomenal, and we were able to meet with more than a thousand people. As our first exhibit with the general public, we were able to learn a lot. Conferences aimed at the general public are much different than industry specific shows. A couple of the pearls I took away:

• Get your booth early - waiting can put you in a less than optimal location.
• Joe Public likes free shit. No other way to say it. If it’s free, they’ll take it.
• The herd mentality rules. When you have more than a a few people at your booth, everybody wants to be there. But few people want to approach you if they stand alone.
• Pushy doesn’t work. The guy in the booth across from us was obnoxious. While he was able to talk to a bunch of people, he gave off a really bad energy, and I would imagine that most people left with a bad taste in their mouth.

The SES show puts us in front of industry attendees, and the rules of engagement are different. Most people approaching the booth are more savvy, and need less hand holding (though you do a lot more hand shaking here). I made sure that each of us brought a camera, and I know that we’ll have a bunch of pics coming soon.

Tonight, we are going to a party hosted by Ask.com. Looks really cool, and I can’t wait to play some of the video games they’ll have. If you are going to be there, let’s wage some cyber-war

Tomorrow marks the start of a week long, back-to-back conference tour. Luckily, both are in Manhattan, so the hassle is minimized.

From Friday through Sunday, Hotel Hotline will be exhibiting at the NY Times Travel Show, at the Jacobs Javits Center. It will be the largest conference that I have attended to date. According to the sales rep we have been talking with, they are expecting approximately 30,000 people! With over 5,000 travel professionals (trade show Fri.), and 25,000+ travel enthusiasts (Sat. and Sun.), we should have the opportunity to make a lot of new contacts. We are looking forward to a very fruitful show. Hopefully the weather doesn’t keep everybody home.

Once we break the booth down Sunday night, we’ll put on our BOTW shirts and head over to the Hilton for the beginning of SES NYC. Though not nearly as large as the travel show, this too should prove to be a productive event. This will be our first time exhibiting at SES, and we have pretty high hopes. With attendance expected to be near 3,000, we should be able to meet a lot of new contacts.

This last week has been spent getting the ducks in a row - it’s amazing how many tasks there are to pull off a successful show. Between the costs of exhibiting, accommodations, meals and entertainment, shirts, promotional materials, press kits, and signage, we are looking at a very expensive week. If history is any indicator, it should come back to us in spades.

If you are interested in attending the SES show, we have discount passes available. Check the BOTW Blog for details. NY Times Travel show cost is $10 for the general public. If you happen to attend either one, make sure to stop by out booth. Mention this blog, and I’ll buy you a beer

A little over a month ago, I posed the opportunity to get three free submissions to the BOTW directory. Though I received accolades from some of my peers, the actual participation was a little underwhelming. In hindsight, I am not too surprised. Calling upon industry peers to get involved in a controversial, political matter may be a tall order.

Afraid of alienating customers, most of the people that contacted me graciously passed. I was disappointed, but I learned a lot from the experience. My next effort will prove much more successful.

One person actually did post a sign, at a local university. He was surprised that the sign lasted for almost 10 days. How many people do you think saw it, and took a moment to ponder it’s meaning? My guess is that for the time spent preparing and hanging the sign, the bang for his buck was pretty good. I hope that he takes something away from the experience - hanging the first sign is the biggest step.

From recent reports at Tales of the Freeway Blogger, the movement is really gaining some momentum. People from all over the country are sending in pictures of spotted signs. Moveon.org is even organizing vigils nationwide. The call for impeachment is beginning to get more mainstream.

b5media - the blog network started on the heels of the sale of Weblogs, Inc. b5 provides pretty good reading, and I see some BOTW alumni are currently writing there. I admire Darren Rowse, and read his stuff occasionally. With channels covering Tech, Lifestyle, Entertainment, Science, Hobbies, and Video Games, they have the breadth to write for both the eyeballs, and the money topics. However, I think unless they get some focus, they may meet an untimely end.

I know how difficult it can be to manage a network of blogs. Our foray into the blog network model turned out to be too time consuming for us to manage, and we decided to go the aggregator route with the domains instead. With so much happening in the blogosphere, it is tempting to dip your foot into multiple projects, and see which ones have legs. While we enjoyed the creativity that the blogging project provided, we decided that we would stick to what we know best - the blog directory.

But what’s the gameplan with b5? What’s the revenue model like? How many blogs do they plan on rolling out? How do they plan on scaling up? Where is their purple cow? Most importantly, what’s the exit strategy?

Though they recently announced the launch of two new sports blogs, you have to ask - who cares? Do we need two sports blogs from authors that nobody knows? While I wish them the best of luck, without shaking things up a bit I see them as also-run, at best.

Unfortunately, once again I need to find myself a new look and feel. The template for this blog doesn’t function properly in IE. I switched over to Firefox in Nov ‘04, and have spent very little time surfing in IE. I neglected to make sure that this template was fully compatible with the majority of browsers. D’oh!

So back to the drawing board. Hopefully, I can find something easily that works properly in IE, Firefox, and Safari. I recently abandoned Firefox on my laptop and switched to Safari, and I love the way the blog looks. Alas, I fear that I may be the only person that ever sees it in Safari. I guess that I need to follow what the numbers say, and develop for the masses.

I could just get one of those “Too Cool For IE” badges, but I’m not really that cool…

If you know of anybody that does good work on WP blogs, please let me know. Feel free to drop their name in the comments, or shoot me an email.

How many hats do you wear? Does your position require you to remian focused on one primary responsibility? Or, are you responsible for a variety of duties, for which you have to split your time?

As the owner of two companies, I wear a ton of hats: sales, marketing, finances, business development, human resources, media representative, programmer, etc… As the years have passed, I have become much more comfortable in delegating responsibilities. I have been smart enough to surround myself with good people, and each day I am confident that my key people are “doing the needful“. I have found that by hiring the right people and giving them the amount of space they want, they flourish. Having your people prospering in their positions should enable you to pursue your own taks with your full attention.

For the next few months, I am going to be spending increased time wearing the sales hat. In an effort to significantly boost the revenues of Hotel Hotline, we are going to be going after additional properties to participate in our merchant program. It has proven to be the cornerstone of our model, and we are extremely excited about what this should do to the bottom line.

I will be spearheading the project, with some pretty lofty goals (we are looking to double our properties) It has been a while since I did the sales thing - “smile and dial”. I am thrilled to take the bull by the horns, and I look forward to the challenge.

Fortunately, my role at BOTW has taken more of a management and sales route, and my new responsibilities shouldn’t interfere with my current duties. As I said earlier, when you are surrounded by good people, you can sleep better at night.

There I said it. Get over it.

I love my wife dearly - 365 days a year (well maybe 340 or so). I appreciate her, and I try to show my appreciation as much as I can. I work on seeing things from her point of view, and do my best in trying to be sensitive to her feelings. I even occasionally enjoy being romantic - doing little things to remind her of why she first fell in love with me.

However, this “holiday” really chaps my ass. Every year, I wind up letting down my wife with a half-baked gift, or idea. I resent the cloud of disappointment that hangs around all day.  I just can’t get into it. I hate feeling forced to prove my love on this day, more than any other. What a pain in the ass.

In an attempt to stay more organized, and help keep track of random notes, I installed the newest version of StickyBrain.  I read a decent write-up in the latest edition of MacWorld, and with the free 30 day trial, I figured I’d give it a whirl.

I am also going to install VoodooPad, and compare the two.  I have pretty high expectations from VoodooPad - after using FlySketch, I am a bit smitten with Flying Meat products.

I love to fail. Let that sink in for a second.

While most people enjoy activities or projects that they can complete successfully, I enjoy diving into tasks with a high probability of failure. Do I enjoy wasting my time? Very few things in life are done properly the first time, so it is only through trying, failing, and learning that we can have any chance of success. Through failure, we learn how to succeed.

By building off of your failures, you position yourself for success on future endeavors. The lessons taught through the experience should enable you identify further opportunities. Additionally, it will give you the chance to see how your peers cope with the difficulties of failing. Do they have tantrums, or cave in to their frustrations? Lash out and point the finger? Or do they take the failure in stride, take accountability (if applicable), and move on?

Equally important is identifying and accepting the failure as early as possible. Don’t be afraid to look at a project, and call it a loser. As business leaders, we are bound to strike-out upon occasion. Accepting your failure, and adapting accordingly, is the mark of a successful project leader.

The key is to not get emotionally attached, or let your pride get in the way of accepting that the project failed. It’s like buying stock - regardless of how much research you do, eventually you are bound to buy a loser. The successful investor, like the successful leader, identifies the losers quickly, and allocates resources accordingly.

So, don’t be afraid to fail. Bite off a project that everybody else if afraid to touch, and throw your soul into it. You just may surprise yourself.

I was checking referrals for my blog, and noticed that I was getting some traffic to my Spammer CEO post. Interestingly, my blog is now pulling (#1) for a query on “matt heaton” bluehost. I found that pretty amusing, and decided to try to drive some additional traffic to the post. So I hopped on over to Digg, and submitted my article. I hit a few of my friends with the post submission, and got a few diggs. I also got a couple of comments. One which reads:

Is he kinda like the people who spam their blog links on Digg?

What’s proper protocol with Digg? Do you ever submit some of your own articles, or do you only submit articles from other sources? In my zeal for traffic, did I commit a Digg faux pas??

Timeless pearls of wisdom regarding the war mongers. Though originally written over 40 years ago, the words ring just as true today. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Come you masters of war
You that build all the guns
You that build the death planes
You that build the big bombs
You that hide behind walls
You that hide behind desks
I just want you to know
I can see through your masks

You that never done nothin’
But build to destroy
You play with my world
Like it’s your little toy
You put a gun in my hand
And you hide from my eyes
And you turn and run farther
When the fast bullets fly

Like Judas of old
You lie and deceive
A world war can be won
You want me to believe
But I see through your eyes
And I see through your brain
Like I see through the water
That runs down my drain

You fasten the triggers
For the others to fire
Then you set back and watch
When the death count gets higher
You hide in your mansion
As young people’s blood
Flows out of their bodies
And is buried in the mud

You’ve thrown the worst fear
That can ever be hurled
Fear to bring children
Into the world
For threatening my baby
Unborn and unnamed
You ain’t worth the blood
That runs in your veins

How much do I know
To talk out of turn
You might say that I’m young
You might say I’m unlearned
But there’s one thing I know
Though I’m younger than you
Even Jesus would never
Forgive what you do

Let me ask you one question
Is your money that good
Will it buy you forgiveness
Do you think that it could
I think you will find
When your death takes its toll
All the money you made
Will never buy back your soul

And I hope that you die
And your death’ll come soon
I will follow your casket
In the pale afternoon
And I’ll watch while you’re lowered
Down to your deathbed
And I’ll stand o’er your grave
‘Til I’m sure that you’re dead

Over the course of the last year, we have experimented with our share of hosts. Hosting has really become a commodity, and I tend to choose the host depending upon what type of site I plan on running.

I have found Bluehost to be a fantastic solution for hosting my blogs. If you are going to use Wordpress as your blogging platform, Bluehost makes it very simple to get your blog up and running. The pricing is competitive, and the service has always proven reliable. I have a dozen or so domains hosted there, and planned on using them for additional sites in the future.

A couple of hours ago, I received the following email 4 times from Bluehost CEO, Matt Heaton:

Dear Bluehost.com Member

This is Matt Heaton with Bluehost.com. I am writing to you on a somewhat personal issue. Many users have asked me how bluehost.com came to be, and a little about my own background. I have sinced created my own blog (Hosted on bluehost of course) to discuss the genesis of bluehost and to write about some of the issues affecting the hosting industry in general.

I feel a little trepidation when it comes to writing about myself, so if you have no interest in this blog please forgive me for intruding in your inbox If you do have time though I would be interested in your thoughts regarding my blog.

The URL for my blog is:

Spammer CEO

Another issue I was hoping members of bluehost could help us with is a “Recommendation List”. I would very much like to put together a list of sites along with a positive comment about your experience with bluehost. If you feel that your experience with Bluehost has been exceptional we would appreciate a small one paragraph statement about your experience along with your domain name. We will compile this list of domains/comments and link to it from the main site (A page rank of 8 ).

Please email your comments directly to me for inclusion at matt@bluehost.com

Thanks for your time!

Matt Heaton / President-CEO / Bluehost.com

I guess Matt simply could not resist the urge to share the earth-shattering news that he had started a blog. I imagine that all the users of Bluehost received this email.

I immediately hit the blog, posted a comment, and grabbed a screenshot - and I am glad that I did, as Matt didn’t approve my comment. Nobody likes being called out on spamming.

Additionally, I was amused to see his appeal for testimonials, promising a link from his site - “A page rank of 8 “, Mr. Heaton is quick to point out. Puhleeeze…

Two cardinal rules broken here, by a CEO, nonetheless:

(1) Spamming your customer base to announce your blog. While it is nice to see more and more people and companies entering the blogosphere, you don’t need to hit your entire user base multiple times announcing it - especially when the blog is brand new. Big deal.

(2) Openly using your pagerank in an attempt to garner goodwill, and praise from your userbase. Here’s a hint: anybody that cares about your pagerank, will know your pagerank. You don’t need to hit people in the face with a brick to get their attention.

Bluehost stock price down big.

*Update - Since writing this, I have received an additional three copies of the same email. Through his spam efforts, Matt has been able accrue almost 300 comments on his initial post.

Earlier this week, we decided to take one of our projects a new route. For the last eight months, we have employed approximately 65 freelance authors to create content on a daily basis. The management of the authors turned into almost a full-time job, and the revenue stream simply did not justify the expense of the content. As such, we decided to make the blogs aggregators of best-of-class material, using technology to capture and display articles from leaders of industry.

Unfortunately, the task of cutting the troops loose fell on my shoulders. Firing people is definitely my least favorite part of being the boss, but the chore needed to be done nonetheless. So, Wednesday morning, I sent off the following group email:

Hello Bloggers:

This marks my final correspondence to you as a group. We have decided to take the blogs a different route, and author participation will no longer be required.

BOTW has always been more of a technology company than a content company, and in an effort to move the BOTW Media project in line with our other efforts, we have decided to change the blogs to aggregate best of class material from third-party sources. As such, we will no longer need our own authors.

We will calculate posts for each author, and send out final checks within the next week. I do thank each and every one of you for your participation - I truly enjoyed creating some interesting material, and it was a pleasure working with this group.

If you have any questions, or if there is anything that I can do for you in your future endeavors, please do not hesitate in contacting me.

I know that this email came out of the blue for most of the authors. Additionally, I am aware that more than a handful of the people involved were pretty happy about the gig, and would probably disappointed by this news. I received replies from a couple dozen of the authors, mostly expressing surprise, and wishing us good luck in the future. However, one email struck me as ill-thought:

I have to say that e-mail came out of nowhere gentlemen, although when I saw what was going on with the movie blog yesterday, I imagined something was up. This is extremely disappointing news as a second source of income and a place to call my sports writing home, considering that just a couple of weeks ago I thought I was going to be taking on a larger role. That makes this doubly disappointing. Are you trading content for advertising? A little forewarning would have been nice, but I’d be naïve to think that would be appropriate in today’s cynical business world, and haphazard and fading Internet advertising community. I’d be interested in any meaningful side work that may become available, and I don’t mean being paid nickels to write the same bloated descriptions of movie sites. Thanks, I suppose, for the opportunity.

Compare that email with the following:

Thanks for letting us know, Greg. It’s been fun.

I was actually kind of surprised BOTW hadn’t been doing the RSS-feed-to-blog thing earlier. I’ve been thinking of using something similar in my own blog to supplement my articles, and I managed to cobble a script together from spare parts a while back. Maybe I should dig that thing up… it’s a great way to automatically add content.

I just grabbed copies of all the articles I’d written for BOTW and saved them for my own personal “clips” file. I won’t re-post them anywhere, as they belong to BOTW now. However, if you ever take those articles offline and no longer need them, please let me know so I might use them elsewhere.

Thanks again for the opportunity. Good luck with all your endeavors with BOTW.

Should we need writers in the future, who do you think we will decide to reach out to?

Writing when angry is never advised. Any fool can lash out - and most fools do. Nothing good can ever come out of writing in anger. Next time you are angry and want to vent, write what you want to say, save it, and come back to it 24 hours later. Have a look at what you wrote. Now that you have a clearer state of mind, do you still want to send that letter? I’d bet not.

Over the last few years, I have grown more and more interested in the teachings of Buddhism - Tibetan Buddhism, in particular. Philosophically it is very appealing, and in balance with my ideas on pacifism, compassion, human rights, and happiness.

While contemplating the concept of Mindfulness, I spent some time thinking about the information that I consume on a daily basis. The information that we ingest feeds our minds in much the same way that the food we eat nourishes our bodies. Our minds, like our bodies, rely on proper nutrition, and without it, neither will perform optimally.

So, in an effort to track what it is that I am feeding my brain, I have decided to track all most of the things that I read on a daily basis. The majority of the contents will consist of what I read online, and I will only post what I think is worthwhile. Unfortunately, a fair portion of my time online is spent perusing through dribble, so I will not bother posting that. Nor will I track the books that I am reading - those will go in the Books archive.

Additionally, this will enable me to keep my main blog less cluttered, allowing me to focus on keeping more detailed thoughts and ideas here, while posting short quips on the other blog. We’ll see how that plays out…

The reading project can be found at what I have entitled Shaping my Mind Feed my Brain.

I started a new book last night, Dale Carnegie’s classic, How to Win Friends & Influence People. At the risk of jumping the gun, after only reading the first two chapters, I feel the book had paid for itself already. Self-help, and business knowledge put aside, the $7.99 I paid for the book was more than worth it to read the wisdom extolled on page 15, when Carnegie prompts the reader to remember the words of W. Livingston Larned.

Almost 100 years ago, Larned wrote of the anguish of a father who loses focus. Father Forgets, reprinted here, for your perusal:

Listen, son: I am saying this as you lie asleep, one little paw crumpled under your cheek and the blond curls stickily wet on your damp forehead. I have stolen into your room alone. Just a few minutes ago, as I sat reading my paper in the library, a stifling wave of remorse swept over me. Guiltily I came to your bedside.

There are the things I was thinking, son: I had been cross to you. I scolded you as you were dressing for school because you gave your face merely a dab with a towel. I took you to task for not cleaning your shoes. I called out angrily when you threw some of your things on the floor.

At breakfast I found fault, too. You spilled things. You gulped down your food. You put your elbows on the table. You spread butter too thick on your bread. And as you started off to play and I made for my train, you turned and waved a hand and called, “Goodbye, Daddy!” and I frowned, and said in reply, “Hold your shoulders back!”

Then it began all over again in the late afternoon. As I came up the road I spied you, down on your knees, playing marbles. There were holes in your stockings. I humiliated you before your boyfriends by marching you ahead of me to the house. Stockings were expensive — and if you had to buy them you would be more careful! Imagine that, son, from a father!

Do you remember, later, when I was reading in the library, how you came in timidly, with a sort of hurt look in your eyes? When I glanced up over my paper, impatient at the interruption, you hesitated at the door. “What is it you want?” I snapped.

You said nothing, but ran across in one tempestuous plunge, and threw your arms around my neck and kissed me, and your small arms tightened with an affection that God had set blooming in your heart and which even neglect could not wither. And then you were gone, pattering up the stairs.

Well, son, it was shortly afterwards that my paper slipped from my hands and a terrible sickening fear came over me. What has habit been doing to me? The habit of finding fault, of reprimanding — this was my reward to you for being a boy. It was not that I did not love you; it was that I expected too much of youth. I was measuring you by the yardstick of my own years.

And there was so much that was good and fine and true in your character. The little heart of you was as big as the dawn itself over the wide hills. This was shown by your spontaneous impulse to rush in and kiss me good night. Nothing else matters tonight, son. I have come to your bedside in the darkness, and I have knelt there, ashamed!

It is a feeble atonement; I know you would not understand these things if I told them to you during your waking hours. But tomorrow I will be a real daddy! I will chum with you, and suffer when you suffer, and laugh when you laugh. I will bite my tongue when impatient words come. I will keep saying as if it were a ritual: “He is nothing but a boy — a little boy!”

I am afraid I have visualized you as a man. Yet as I see you now, son, crumpled and weary in your cot, I see that you are still a baby. Yesterday you were in your mother’s arms, your head on her shoulder. I have asked too much, too much.