Veritasly Ironic

The MBA application process is by no means a simple and easy one. It takes months of planning and implementation. Applicants have to repackage themselves with an updated resume, current professional recommendations, past transcripts, applications, and their best GMAT score.

Planning out the resumes, recommendations, transcripts, and application are all pretty cut and dry procedures that I have allotted plenty of time for. To say that my undergraduate degree has some holes in it is being polite. A more accurate assessment would be, a giant funnel sized hole. My choice of funneling as a routine activity might have something to do with the exceptionally average undergraduate record.

Knowing this gaping and very important hole exists in my resume I have decided to take the past two months to study my ass off for the GMAT. After working slavishly at my computer for 8-10 hours a day sending email, (yes I send email, no I am not a spammer, and no email marketing is not the same as sending your friends porn and jokes in hotmail) I get to return home to study for the GMAT for 2 hours. The worst part of studying for this test is the humiliation I have had to accept, I have eaten enough humble pie in the past two months for two lifetimes. At this point I have worked my way up to being as well verse in quantitative and verbal issues as I was in 9th grade.

Like a lot of average business school applicants, I have recognized my weakness and decided to outsource the help. There are several companies that are willing to help individuals just like me bring their GMAT score up to snuff. After researching a few of them I decided on Veritas. Veritas comes highly recommended by past participants, and business schools. After all the word veritas means truth in Latin. So I bit the $1200 bullett to sign up for the weekend crash course. The weekend crash course is 72 hours of in-class instruction spread over two weekends.


That was two months ago. This upcoming weekend 2/24 - 2/25, I was (note the was) scheduled to take the first day of the 72 hours of courses. Much to my surprise, I received an email from Veritas this morning 2/22 that the course had been canceled due to a lack of participation. This is information that would have been helpful 2 weeks prior to the start date, not 2 days. As an alternative I was informed that I could attend a different weekend course the same weekend. Sounds good, one problem that course is in another state more than two hours away. The other option was to take a course that was scheduled after the date I am taking the GMAT.

Veritas is a service company that provides GMAT testing solutions for business school applicants. Their clientele is America's future MBA students and eventually the business leaders of tomorrow. To give two days notice of cancellation is poor customer service in any industry, multiply that with their service is at a premium, combined with their client base, and you have a major business boner.

I responded to the "Urgent" notice with my concerns and frustrations. In addition I have called twice and left a voicemail. Apparently the "Urgency" is not in getting back in touch with the same customers they left in the lurch.

Where We Are

If you think you get the internet watch this video. Chances are you don't even know what you don't know.

Two Important Things

1. Politics is something that I pay close attention to, and have for sometime. To agree or disagree with a politician is fundamentally American, not to know politics has become increasingly American. In a very early and crowded race I have my pick on an early favorite.



Barrack Obama is officially Obama '08. If you are looking for change from our current leadership, I don't think a more radical change is possible. Check out his website and promo videos.

2. I have another motive for my support of Barack Obama. Beyond his candidacy for the next President of the United States he is an online marketer in disguise.
Look at his site:

1. It is clean and easily navigable


2. It incorporates broadband TV through brightcove


3. Email sign up is front and center as a means of communicating with supporters


4. There is a blog


5. Users have the ability to create their own Barack Obama communities

If he doesn't win, my hope is that his popularity will help to push the relevancy of internet marketing, broadband video, and web 2.0, further into the mainstream. If he does win then I guess I get a win-win.

Bordering on Fetish

Okay I realize this is the third post involving Seth Godin. I also realize that I commented on a weird man-crush in my last post. But, things seem to come up in threes and I read an interesting blog post today on copyright material in the digital age.

Copyright, or the lack of control, is a question that the digital age is wrestling with. The ability to instantaneously publish massive amounts of information has made the Internet the greatest innovation since the invention of the printing press. Unfortunately it has also produced snake oil salesman straight out of the old west.

This post ironically involves none other than Mr. Seth Godin. Man that guy is everywhere. Check out the post to read about the devious workings of BNP Publishing.

Seth Speakth the Truth

So the event has come and gone and, I am left with more questions than answers. The questions have little to do with Seth Godin's presentation and more to do with making sense out of what he said. The speech started with an introduction from a manager from Microsoft speaking of his Seth Godin addiction. I was unaware that human beings had the same properties as crack cocaine. It was a weird businessman man-crush that bordered on fetish, especially when he showed pictures of himself with a shaved dome.

On to the speech. Here is a man of high intelligence, high education, an early adopter (in socks not shoes), and a marketing visionary. To say that his presentation was air tight all the way around wouldn't do justice to how well prepared it was. It had the right amount of case study without being boring. The right amount of theory without being abstract. The right amount of humor, without being a standup routine. Above all else a well crafted message that advertising is broken. The age of the snake oil advertisement salesman, while still ever present, is no longer effective. To further illustrated his point he spoke harshly of the events sponsor, then spoke honestly about what he thought about getting an MBA. In the QA session he spoke of the disastrous Zune MP3 player, while Microsoft was the sponsor. Later he told students, who are currently in the MBA program and prospective students at UMD, not to get their masters. For those who are already students he said don't go to class, use your experience to gather contacts and squeeze the grapevine. He didn't regurgitate information and play the safe card, he urged an audience of young and old business minds to be remarkable.

So there it is, be remarkable. Sounds easy enough, but it easier said than done. This is the part that stirs up more questions than it answers. From the speech this is what I have gathered as the simple solution. I say simple solution because all questions have a simple solution but the path to achieving the solution is never simple.
Step 1. Find a problem
Step 2. Be the first one to solve the problem
Step 3. Get the permission of early adopters
Step 4. Turn your customers into your advertisers (Flip The Funnel)

With all of my new found knowledge and simple solutions I will be on the complicated path to discover my problem. Hopefully this doesn't end up being the ugly nasty red mark on the top of my head, but if it is that's okay too.

Email Calculator

Here is a simple Email Calculator establish expected results

The Master of Marketing, The Sultan of Sway, The Prince of Permission, et. all

This Friday I will have the pleasure of seeing Seth Godin speak at UMD. Purple cow is the book that made me want the fabulous life of a marketeer. His blog is a great source of daily perspective on how to permissively market in an uber marketed world.