🪄Magically Thriving Business💸: The Grinch, a Call for Founding Faculty, and Dystopian Nightmares 8-Dec-2024
Plus How Paypal is Scr**ing Us Now, The Hottest Marketing Platform Around, and What Gen Z can Teach Us About Business...
Quick Hits
I know I'm long winded, here's my solution. Click to get stuff from me this week…
💸 How to Generate Business for new Title Agency Start-ups! (Lots of good advice for non-title agency businesses too!)
The Grinch
Hi everyone! I hope those who celebrate Thanksgiving had a great time. I spent time with family, my college student was home for a few days and we decorated our Yule/Christmas Tree, and I took my youngest and 3 of my nephews to see an excellent, off-broadway production of How the Grinch Stole Christmas.
A Call for Founding Faculty
In other news, I have a meeting on Tuesday to discuss opening up the Business Witch Academy to additional faculty members. If you’re a coach/teacher and think you might like to leverage the technology of a private community and participate in collaborative marketing to grow your business, please join us!
And a Dystopian Nightmare
Continuing on my thoughts from earlier last month about how using LinkedIn's new AI Hiring Assistant may backfire for businesses, I may have stumbled upon the worst idea in hiring practices, ever!
Have you ever tried to record yourself for a TikTok video?
Were you brave enough to play it back?
If you're anything like me, Ophelia, or countless others, it was terrible.
There's a reason they don't cast just anyone in the TV and Movies we all love to watch. Learning how to talk to a camera like it's a real person is a skill that requires practice and dedication to master.
So, I ask you, why on Earth did anyone, let alone 60% of hiring managers think the One-Way Interview was a good idea? Have you heard of this? This is a tactic where companies require a job applicant to record a video of themselves answering questions the company has supplied. Ophelia and I had quite a rant about how dehumanizing this is and a slew of other reasons that this is a bad idea for both businesses and the people they want to hire.
Don't get me wrong, I love technology! But only when it's employed and deployed properly.
I have made an entire career out of improving processes and maximizing efficiency for businesses of all sizes, but one of the hidden secrets to successful optimization is to know when and where to apply.
There are a lot of places where sacrificing the human element in favor of speed is a net loss, not a net gain. This is one.
Another Dystopian Nightmare
As if One-Way Interviews weren't enough of a dystopian nightmare, anyone who uses Paypal needs to pay attention to their latest Terms of Service update. This is another net loss…
Latest Hot Social Media Network - Don’t Miss Out!
Sorry to be such a bummer this week! Let's shift this to a more positive note. If you haven't checked out BlueSky yet, it's currently the hottest social media platform around.
As of Saturday morning the 7th of December it had 24 million users and counting. They've gained over 5 million users in the last month.
Bluesky supports text posts up to 300 characters, images, GIFs, and videos up to 60 seconds in length. This is similar to platforms like X (formerly Twitter) and Threads, which also allow users to share text, images, GIFs, and videos. However, Bluesky's decentralized architecture (it's part of the Fediverse) and customizable algorithms offer users greater control over their content and feed curation, distinguishing it from these more centralized platforms.
If you've been frustrated by a lack of reach on other platforms, then this is definitely something to check out. I've been playing with it for a week, and I already have 802 followers!
If you want to follow me on Bluesky, you can do that here, but I will warn you my content there is about 1/2 amusing political commentary to support my Cheryl.wtf brand, and 1/2 business related, so if that's not your cup of tea, I totally understand.
Join the Conversation
Here are a few questions for you to ponder. Join the Business Witch Academy on Quora to join the conversation and provide your answers.
What’s your big vision for your business for 2025? How do you plan to achieve it?
Have you ever hit a rough patch in your business? How did you get your glow back?
Got a body double? How has working side-by-side with someone, even virtually, boosted your productivity?
Self-compassion is a superpower! How do you practice kindness to yourself while running your business?
Getting Hustled: How Gen Z is Beginning to Lose the Plot of Business (And So Are the Rest of Us)
I recently read an excellent article entitled "Getting Hustled: How Gen Z is Beginning to Lose the Plot of Business" by Keith Nord. My son sits on the cusp of Gen Z at the age of 26 and my youngest brings up the final year of Gen Z at the age of 15. We don't see a lot of quality representation of Gen Z in the professional world yet, which is to be expected. I really expected it to be another boomer bashing on Gen Z - which I hate, so this was refreshing
Collectively, the first wave is just starting to establish themselves in the adult world and it's important that we understand them in order to build successful professional relationships with them. Keith makes some really excellent points in this article and I do think they are spot on for the influences that will shape Gen Z but I think he's also hit on some themes that are impacting Millennials and even some of the younger Gen Xers who are now in their mid to late 40s.
(Just for some further age context, Gen Z has mostly been raised by Gen X and the small pocket generation I belong to Xennials. Millennials, largely, are raising Gen Alpha.)
The article explores how Gen Z is rejecting traditional life journeys in favor of more creative and freeform pathways because of their awareness of how those traditional pathways failed their parents. This disillusionment with the American Dream is based in observed facts, and forcing them to embrace different values and expectations. However, the author warns against falling for the allure of quick success and emphasizes the importance of creating value, making sound financial decisions, and approaching entrepreneurship with patience and consistency. These are valuable lessons for any budding entrepreneurs, regardless of your age.
Here are the Key Points, but I'm not doing it justice and I highly recommend you click through and read the whole article:
Hustle Culture: Influencers exploit Gen Z's fears by selling courses and quick-rich schemes that promise freedom but often end in financial losses. This pursuit is fundamentally flawed as it lacks genuine value creation.
Chasing Flash vs. Real Wealth: Flashy purchases and “flex culture” are traps that drain wealth rather than build it. Real wealth comes from sound financial decisions, not from showing off.
Useful Distractions: Many people get stuck in the initial excitement of starting a business but lose momentum. The illusion of progress through routines or surface-level activities isn’t enough to sustain a successful business.
True Entrepreneurship: Real success comes from fulfilling genuine needs, staying consistent, and delivering real value to customers, not from glamorized hustle culture or flashy symbols of wealth.
Write Like You’re Running Out of Time…
More from me this week…
Q&A: Click to read my answers…
What is the recommended number of social media platforms for a small business to use simultaneously?
Stay Magical,
Cheryl
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