Hello, can I speak with Mrs. Business Owner? This is the Young Pros calling.

Hi, my name is Chris and I am with a group here in town called Young Professionals. Each month we meet at a different venue in Corvallis. We'd like to come to your venue next month for our event. We have about 300 or so on our email list and we routinely get 30-65 young pros at each of our events, just to give you an idea of what to expect.

We don't ask for much, in fact all you have to do is feed us something and give us a special deal on drinks so we feel loved. You can woo us as much as you want though. If you'd like to hang out with us during the event, test new menu items on us, have us taste new drinks, or otherwise treat us like VIP's we likely won't forget it, and will find ourselves compelled to spend more money at your venue in the future. We'd probably bring friends and we'll likely write about it on Twitter and Facebook for hundreds to see.

Please however, don't treat us like an afterthought. Don't make us feel awkward as we arrive- don't make us explain why we're here or make us ask you where everyone is at. Make us feel like you've been waiting for us, like you've been looking forward to it. Treat us like a date. We're here to get to know you and to put money in your pocket, tonight and in the future- if you play your cards right.

Please take advantage of us while we're here. We expect we'll get sold- you've earned the right by hosting us. It's okay to passionately tell us about your favorite new menu items and remind us why you started your restaurant or store. We expect you'll ask us to come back, and if you give us a coupon to help us remember, that's okay too.

My Daily Web Top 10

After more than a year of really engaging online, I've settled on a handful of tools and sites that I'm referencing every single day, some of them many times a day. I'm always keeping my eye out for new tech and content, but here's the current ones:




1) Hootsuite- a super simple dashboard for my twitter activities.
2) Facebook- becoming a more significant communication tool for my Agency.
3) Gmail- still the best and most easily searched email platform.
4) Google Alerts- This is where I "listen" to what people are saying about important topics to me.
5) Amazon.com- shopping and researching galore
6) SethGodin.com - Godin is a great daily read for fresh insights on the new business paradigm.
7) Anywho.com - a great search tool for phone numbers.
9) HARO- HelpAReporter.com - Looking out for PR opportunities for my friends and clients (and myself)
10) WeLoveCorvallis.com - a local blog where people who love Corvallis gather to candidly discuss important topics/questions.

Any tools or sites I should check out that you use daily (or hourly) ?

Crusted Banana Pancakes- An epic kitchen encounter.

Chocolate goes with pancakes right? And coconut, well that's a no-brainer. That's what I thought this morning when this epic kitchen encounter took place.

Here's the recipe along with a couple photos :

1 1/4 cups sifted wheat flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 tablespoon sugar
Dash of salt
1 beaten egg
1 cup milk - you can sub in 50% half and half if you feel like it
3 (or 4) tablespoons butter- real unsalted butter. Never sub in margarine or other fake spreads.
1 1/2 fresh, but ripe bananas cut into slices (or chunks if your 4 yr old is helping)



Now for the interesting stuff:
Raw organic unsweetened coconut flakes - fine, not big flakes (Notice the recycled Adam's PB jar. You can buy this stuff in bulk at the Co-op)
Green and Black's dark baking cocoa- or whatever brand you prefer.

Here's what you do:
1)Mix equal parts of the cocoa and coconut in a small dish and set off to the side.
2)Mix all dry ingredients in a medium to largish bowl (to prevent over-splash)
3) Combine all wet ingredients in a Pyrex pitcher, (you know, the glass thing you measure milk and other stuff in) and whisk the egg til it's mixed in.
4)Melt the butter and pour into the wet container.
5) Mix the wet ingredients into bowl with dry stuff. Whisk until pretty smooth

The best thing to use for pancakes is a stainless steel electric skillet. (I may post a review on our Carico skillet that we got when we first got married, it's great.) Just make sure it's nice and hot.

Drop a couple big spoonfuls of batter in the hot pan, then place pieces of banana on top of the batter and let them sink in as it cooks.

Now for the fun part! Grab a couple finger fulls of the cocoa-coconut mixture and sprinkle over the top of the bananas and batter, then flip the pancake and push down slightly with the spatula. It should only need to cook another 20 or 30 seconds and then serve!

Be sure to flip it back over to display the wonderful golden bananas and brown crust from the cocoanut mixture.

Top with almond butter and agave syrup.

This makes for a delightful flavor encounter that kids and adults will love.

Please post your comments.

Thinking about subscribing to the GT after all

I had to use three Winco bags last night to get the fire started.

Made me think, where's this morning's paper when I need it?

Don't get me wrong. I like the writers at the GT. I know Matt N. and like he and his writing. I like Mike, the publisher, as well. The GT produces great content. I am one of the sets of eyeballs/unique visits on www.gazettetimes.com also.

I just would have found it really useful to have a GT on hand last night. I could have read the 6 or so local articles and the half dozen or so other local tidbits and then used the Associated Press content that makes up 70% of the rest of the paper for getting my evening fire started.

Newspaper is great for getting fires started.

I've been trying to get Mike and the crew at the GT to adopt a hyper-local model for the paper for the last 6 months or more. You can see my previous posts/comments here and here.

The reason I'm so emphatic? Because I think it'd be good for the community and ultimately profitable for the paper- it might even save them from the demise that papers around the country are experiencing en mass.

People like to read about themselves, their friends, their kids, their politicians, the companies they work for, and what's going on in their community . There are now a multitude of places a person can easily consume their national and international news and information from- on demand. Why fill the paper with redundant material? Does making it fatter increase the perceived value? (apart from fodder)

Isn't there enough stuff going on in our community to write about? People doing both awesome things and bad things. People moving, people shaking? Here's an idea:source articles from the many great staff blogs the GT has online. Better yet, identify some quality local blogs to source material from and put that in the hard copy paper.

Is $12 bucks a month too much to pay for a handful of great articles a day and reliable fire starter in the evening? As soon as our Winco bags run out, I'll decide.


*all posts should be taken with a grain of salt. They are not intended to provide business advice from which to make informed enterprise decisions. The above comments were made by an insurance guy with small children.