Simpleology Blog

So very many dynamic and highly successful relationships & businesses began on a napkin in a restaurant or at a kitchen table ~ love it.

Hi Mark. I really appreciate this idea. It helps to give people a true compass when the media only gives us one side of the story to react/respond to.

Thank you, Mark. Excellent way to view these events.

Brenda beat me to the comment! I second that! Way to go back to the original way of explaining things: Napkin explanations!

Your shock tail is eye opening when viewing the past as you say. However, your strategy for a fix is by default a given. Maybe not for some, but certainly for me. I have already applied your free simpleology course tactics and have produced average results. I would like to see something that would give me an edge over the competion which has become much more agressive due to this recession.

LOL! What a wonderful and simple insight regarding a "Recession!" Brilliantly and pragmatically explained as usual!

The Napkin presentation has a very negative conotation thanks to an MLM guru who has made a living out of selling it. Drop this concept before it comes around to bit you big time.

Couldn't agree more Mark... everybody is freaked out and 2008 was my very best year ever! :)

Recession? What recession???

You're reminding me about what's so great about a Napkin Presentation! It's intimate and fun.

Great topic - I JUST sent an email out to my list about deciding NOT to participate in the "recession." Thanks.

Mark - your usual impressive self. I just finished reading the Dancing Wu Li Masters and that one's a real validation for me but it took a whole book -
you just did it again in 2 minutes!

You ROCK!

Bill

Simpleology for sure......
I like it keep them coming, anything that makes you think is a major plus.

Thank you

Mark has done it again!

I've been saying that I'm not participating in the recession ... now I know why.

Awesome video. I like the short, to-the-point format.

Plus the content is excellent.

- @ryanbruce

The power of the napkin on steroids! Well done, Mark.

Very much appreciate the action-oriented & forward-looking approach to this.

Keep your head while those about you are losing theirs!

Paul

Thanks Mark ... now imagine we all turn our focus onto 'making sense' to redesign the future within a context of abundance.

Let's be complete with the past, it's past.

Great video, and a good reason to stop thinking recession and just think profit. Easy to understand format, it works.

Hi Mark,

love your presentation. As Brenda said, so many great ideas began on a napkin.

Connie

Hi Mark, I really believe that 'difficult' times are opportunity, and taking calculated risks times. You have helped reinforce my belief. Thanks!

i like your youtube it help me alote

I really like the method. Unique enough it catches peoples attention. :)

Hi Mark - very cool idea. Short, sweet, to the point, and it's easily understood and grasped by those watching. Keep up the great work!

Hi Mark,

Recession is all about the past, but we all treat it like it is the future... great insight. Thanks!

i love the napkin-style... what software do you use?

Best wishes, Eric

great format :) I love it & know that whatever you give your attention to will be fabulous!

Hi Mark,

Very nice presentation.

I do, however, think it is important to remember what the GNP represents. It affects all areas of our life and unfortunately after 2 consecutive quarters of negative economic growth, our entire economy is in a tailspin. Even the things that will rescue one facet may not affect another at all (bail out the porn industry and farmers or auto-makers still suffer, etc).

Just the effect of 2 consecutive quarters of negative growth, even if the third quarter shows some improvement, will find many people without homes and jobs and therefore unable to contribute to any growth that may be going on.

So it seems the real point is that some people will just have to lose everything, live on the street and we can find a way to make money off the few who survived...this time.

That is not at all what I think marketers should be concentrating on. I think we should shift our entire focus to whats really important and plan to outsource more, concentrate on how we can build our businesses by grandfathering in as many as we can afford, advertise on the sites of other marketers, in a similar line of business rather than pay Google, MSN and Yahoo billions this year.

It is a dangerous thing to say, "What recession?"

Other than that, I truly enjoyed the presentation and altho I believe your information was overly optimistic, I would tune in and listen to what you have to say anytime.

Wow! Thanks Mark, you never cease to amaze me. I really love the format and will be looking forward to future shocktails.

Thanks a Million,
Miles

It works for me. I passed the YouTube to a few folks. But since I'm following you on Twitter, wonder why I didn't get it there. Was it in the stream and not DM'd? That would explain it, so easy to miss something in the humongous stream on Twitter.

Elli

Dear Mark,

Thanks much! This is somewhat similar to what I ask my students,"Did George W. wake you up this morning so that you'd go to work?" Their response is, of course, "No". We are responsible for the results we produce.

I appreciate the graphic example. I'll share it.

What a neat idea Mark, you've done it again.

Good informative quick messages people will be willing to watch if they are short and to the point as this one is.

A great way to get people in to get info, free item and an offer. Do our affiliate links apply here?

. . .and as to the "recession",most everybodies thinking and behavior is an after effect as well. Sure some people initially had some financial problems, real setate, etc, but most people are reacting to all this news. Changing their behavior and contributing to more people becoming involved. Our economy is based on cash FLOW, not cash HOLD.

Ahhhh! the followers drag themselves into the reality of others for no reason other than fear!

John

Such a simple explanation of the current situation, beautifully drawn. It is all in one's perception.

It's original! Napkin marketing is a bottom line-friendly concept and tends to bring out creative ideas generated on the subject. It's exciting as it may lead to develop clever marketing "prototypes" from ethnographically-derived
database.

Thanks Mark. You have put into words and pictures exactly WHY I've been saying for over six months that our government needed to declare that we ARE in a recession so we can start to come out of it. It seems like until the declaration is made - everyone just keeps denying that we're in one - we never start things into the improvement phase and things never start to get better for everyone. I for one am choosing NOT to participate any more in this recession.

Hi Mark,

Greeting from Bali

Thank you and it great and look forward to having another issue.

Love and Peace,
Gede

Hello,
Great concept and great explanation. The presentation was effective as I watched all the way through to the end.

Great format:) and very true..can always rely on you for showing us the bright side.

grate explaination

What can I say? Great concept and Wonderful explanation...

Hi Mark,

What a great way of watching the recession that is a reality almost all over the world. But we need to think of the futur now.

Kind Regards,

Gilles

* I like your napkinization of these wisdom bits. Informal meets mindbomb.
* The point you made about what "they" are not telling us about being in a recession is, perhaps, the MOST powerful piece of wisdom in life! It is a good reminder for me, thank you. Love this insight of a recession being a yesterday issue. In the juiciness of one second - one choice changes the world - and then (poof) it's gone and a new one arises - a perpetual motion.
* "Recess-ion" - definitions to consider...
- a pause from doing something (as work)
- a hidden, secret, or secluded place or part
----> Life is a mystery - let's be creative:
a pause from doing something (as work) *can illict* a hidden, secret, or secluded place or part (let it be something very good!)
* "Take Five" was great - is this your Shocktail theme song?

Muchas Gracias.

Nice! Still in Highschool and this little idea and its content are both great to me. I really like this way of thinking about it. And the format with the Napkin. lol thats just cool.

I got goosebumps a "R", so it works for me! Looking forward to more shocktails and to sharing them with others.
Krishna

Thanks for sharing this Mark. Reading the above comments, it is clear how "that" word influences people's thinking. I agree, I've seen more people become millionaires in a recession than in good times.

One should always remember, that which you think (worry) most about is what you attract to you all the time!

Regards from a somewhat rainy South Africa. Don't worry, the sun always shines here!

regards.

Mark,
I thought this was a great little presentation put in simple understandable terms. Thanks for sharing and keep doing all the good work!

Hi Mark,
Loving your work!

I believe recession is purely a state of mind. It only affects us if we allow it too.

Regards

Jon

Hi Mark,
Thanks for the Insight, knowing the other side of the coin always help in making a fair judgement

In this period of global economic turmoil the internet is an unknown factor. Ideas like Shocktails help positive people around the world stay in touch. The power of that is awesome. Great concept.

Hi Mark:

I liked the video since it simplistically offers some optimistic motivation towards recovery; however, it's hard to overlook our depressed economy when its effects can be seen everywhere you go. I'm from a middle-class suburb in the midwest and we have a high percentage of upper middle-class residents, but you can take a walk through almost any given block and see several forclosed homes on each one. Some of these homes were huge ($500,000 - $850,000).

On the edges of town are factories that have closed if they are in the automotive supply chain, or if they are in any other industry, they are running on only skeleton crews and producing very little product. It's easy to see this while driving by their almost empty parking lots during what should be a very busy weekday.

The home-town stores are selling fewer goods; consequently, they are closing earlier and not even hiring part-time help. This means high school seniors, college students and retired folks won't be able to find many summer or part-time jobs, for any type of income or occupational supplement.

Almost everyone in the family is home all day and fewer people now have any disposable income to buy convenience store items and they are not using much gas, nor are they buying any. For many, even having pizza on Friday night has become a real treat. (By the way, 2 pizza stores in our town have closed in the last 2 months, so even pizza delivery jobs are getting scarce.)

I really doubt if there is enough room for everyone to have a home-based biz and/or online income. Someone has to mine the resources needed to make goods, someone has to transport goods and someone also has to manufacture and assemble the goods. Even if we figure out how to have robots do all of these things, someone still has to put them together and be able to replace their batteries.

It's a culture of high-hope that looks forward to the future and that doesn't dwell in the past (let's hope we at least learned from it), but I don't think we can escape from it to the point of declaring non-participation because we don't like its forecast or result. After all, from a national standpoint all of us Americans are in the tough-times together and it will supposedly take all of us working together to turn things around.

From a global point of view, we now have a greater opportunity to have an even more diverse economy and work-force than we currently have and it does make it easier to look at the upcoming quarter as being a blank page. However, we put ourselves in a recession-suseptable position and the rest of the world at risk by overlooking the greedy, selfish and self-serving agendas and investment goals of a small percentile of affluent power-players. We have allowed them the freedom of manipulating the financial institutions and markets to reflect a false perception of progress at the expense of a much larger, but less fortunate portion of the population .

If internet marketers can turn around such a bleak situation, just by using the idealistic approach of extractring and labeling a group to be an economic phase definition vs. their well-being improving from a technicality default mechanism, let us continue! Carry-on quickly through this next quarter and see if the Gross National Product doesn't start rising first, then the unemployment rate should start falling. We will all then be making a profit from our new home biz - right?

Hi Mark, great idea! Works for me. Short and sweet.

I like it, its easy to comprehend what your saying and great visuals as well. Keep them coming. Thanks again Mark for all the knowledge you're sharing to everyone. Great stuff. Thanks.

David

Hi Mark!

While your 'napkin presentation' is refreshing within the online context, the support doesn't really matter - it's about the content - and that's always great food for thought.

THANK YOU & FO[R]WA[R]D IN 2009 - with or without an R or even 2!

Sunshine regards from South Africa

Bianca

Hey Mark,
I absolutely love the napkin idea and also the format - that you are actually drawing it as you speak. I'm looking forward seeing the next epizode.

Do I have to subscribe somewhere to get updates on this or will I be notified if I am a member of Simpleology and I am subscribed to Simpleology blog news...?

Mark, on a certain level, you're correct. You give the standard newspaper definition of a recession and make no bones about it. But, as academic as it is and as surface-level correct that it CAN be, it ignores the magnitude of the particular problem.

First, your definition does NOT take into consideration other variables - er, like the REALITY of tattered household balance sheets (yup, consumers actually are tapped out and in too much debt), unemployment ( the numbers are staggering ) or consumer confidence.

Second, by using quarterly data this definition makes it difficult to pinpoint when a recession begins or ends. This means that a recession that lasts ten months or less may go undetected.

Back to the DEBT thingy - loan delinquencies hit record highs last year ( Washington Post ). Retailers had their worst December in 40 years ( LA Times ). The world economy is correcting... scratch that... "trying to" is the more appropriate phrase. It's hard for it to naturally play out it's slump because the Fed is hell-bent on stopping it by infusing debt with more debt.

Just like you can't help an alcoholic by giving him free hooch, you can't help a debtor by giving him more credit. Yup, the system is still is lavish "spend like there's no tomorrow" mode. But, as the great Bill Bonner will say as well: "people nowadays are acting like every day is tomorrow. Instead of spending, they are beginning to save."

So, the Barry common-sense observation is: when there's MASSIVE money on the sidelines ( as in NOT in the game ), selling some things or doing more of we're already doing as entrepreneurs is not likely to make us wealthier if people can't afford our product or service. Unless, of course, we cater and mold our product or service to meet more expansive needs.

Very interesting. It is a great way to help focus on the future and not the past. You are totally right about the self-made millionairs and billionairs during the Great Depression. They took ideas, that were outside of the box, and made them profitable. When everyone was doing the same thing and wondering why they weren't making it, the small few changed what they were doing to change their world. Looking forward to the next installment.

Hi Mark,
Yes! You have a knack for making the difficult very simple. You focused me on the future with expectation with your napkin presentation. WOW!

I am looking forward to Shock Tails 2.

Hi Mark,

My first thought as a Promotional Consultant is - there are pads made of napkins that can be imprinted with your logo and business name - what a cool way to help people see what you have just told us and leave it with them so they can show it to others.
Great way to look at things - too many people keep focusing on the negative and that increases the difficulty. Looking at the positive helps increase what is working and shifts our attitude to create more of the same.
I'm looking forward to the next Shocktails..

Excellent. I have been saying that just because some people are having a difficult time, it doesn't mean that I have to participate. What you focus on is what you have in your life. I am focusing on the now and the future and building a great income! Thank you for your simple explanation.

Sorry not for me, I am on dial up and it is just a pain, have no access to
broadband, maybe in future?
Good job thou, i really like it.

Hi Mark,

your presentation is really nice and appealing..Did you draw the lines with a mouse? I can't help doing that...I mess it always up when I try drawing on a computer ;-)
As far as the message is concerned, however, I have a mixed opinion. Sure, your pragmatic and "positive" approach is interesting and most probably needed. On the other side, the concept of "the past" you expose can be quite misleading. I'd better say upfront that I'm a complete zero in economy and marketing, I haven't done a penny on the internet and stuff alike. I'm a very normal engineer, an employee. Having said that, just applying common sense I went to parallel your example of recession with the notion of movement and speed. If you're in a car driving 70mph, well, this information is related to the past exactly as that of recession. Your tachometer tells you that you've been riding 70mph in the past few seconds. Now, I think that everybody would agree in being a little scared, if an obstacle suddenly appeared on the road, wouldn't they? Of course they would; and that is because you can't physically go from 70mph to 0 mph in no time. That is, the information of the past DOES influence your present and your future.
In the same way, the fact that two quarters in a row showed negative growth imply we've built up some amount of speed, and to counteract this, to reverse this speed, some amount of EXTRA work will be needed. Can't escape that. So, I think that it is good to have a positive attitude, but at the same time let's try to see things as they substantially are.

M

Hi, Mark!
I think you have a great idea! It's concise, to-the-point, and, for those who are more visually-oriented and have a difficult time focusing auditorially, your point is driven home with your little graphics presentation. If you keep them all short and sweet like this one, many who see them will grow by them.

There will be positive and negative opinions expressed, but I, for one, greatly appreciate the input/impact you are making into my life. [I see that most opinions expressed here already are positive, however, even the negative ones have some value in their comments, so I would carefully consider the message behind their words as well.] I personally need all the help I can get - free being the best price for my disability-income budget - and I appreciate the lesson in economics. We all should learn something new every day; this was mine for today, so thank you!

greetings from sunny singapore -

just curious how you made the small film on the napkin - it is any special kind of software you use?

Great Job Mark keep up the good work

cool, he draw the face with just one eye .) - now that´s a real recession !

Mark thanks for the reality check...While I think it's important not to ignore facts that are staring you in the face, many people right now are making up facts and scaring themselves silly
- Suzanne

Mark,
I love the format -- concise to the point and informative. In past hard times, I had my head in the "job" and didn't notice much. Now I'm self-employed as a real estate agent and see and feel the pain of people every day. The reality is that there are a lot of things you can't change...so why worry about them. Don't stick your head in the sand and try to make the best of everything.

Aloha!

I got some email asking if this crazy formula worked for me and what topics would I like to see: yes, it works for me; napkins are one of my favorite venues of expression, I love napkin diagrams. Lots of people do. When I bartended through college how many businessmen did I see drawing things up on napkins? lots.

Topics? I could definitely see some of that nile source diagramming and flowcharty things. and why not use napkins for zero constructs?

It's a humble but effective presentation and nice that such a soft, overprocessed former piece of tree can be dedicated to such ends.

This is the first time I know how to get extra income from the internet
Thanks you Mark
You are the One !

I love the format! :) Also the POV was a simple and yet surprising thing... More and more Shocktails! :)

Hi Mark,

What you'e saying is true... irrespective of what's going, there are always areas/markets/countries where you can make money. Heck, you can even make money while the market is falling... which have given some investors the highest returns in over a decade... i.e by being short stocks and long USD etc etc...

Cheers,
JJ

P.S. Technically, you explanation of a recession is incorrect... your graph showed a declining (but positive) GDP, not a negative GDP. A negative GDP would be below the line. But the essence of your message is correct.

Hey.....nice post!!

Awesome, No more words to explain :) :) :D just....cool blog.