How Can I Help?

I keep driving this theme for a very good reason. It HAS to become our mantra, at every level.

If it already is, congratulations. You get it and it puts you a big step ahead of the game. If it's not, and you're still trying to find a center after all that's gone on, begin the practice of asking this question first, every day, within, as well as outside your center of business. How can I help means what it says - be mindful of the pain that's still out and be ready to show people you can forge a team to make better things happen for us all.

I recently spoke to a neighbor who's run their small business here in Denver for years. Up until March of last year, business would fluctuate normally and while, they couldn't predict the downturn of 2007 or other small roller coaster financial events, they managed well. Then came COVID and the havoc that was unleashed.

As this person explained to me (and I'm paraphrasing, not quoting), it wasn't so much the loss of business that was difficult to manage as much as it was the governmental regulations which arbitrarily took any and all control from their hands. Now, they COULDN'T plan because the government was changing the rules unpredictably and often. And the 90 day lockdown originally designed to flatten the curve became a year of fighting and clawing just to be able to open the doors. Being an established business, they did the best they could. Now, today, with relaxed restrictions, they can begin a comeback. But, they told me, it will take years. And the financial security they built up previously, (which was to sustain them as they looked towards retirement), was gone.

I bring this to you not for sympathy or anger, but to make the case for, 'how can I help?' We have to be sensitive to the fact that many out there struggled, but never totally lost their source of income. Millions of others did. Some lost everything they'd worked for EXCEPT their businesses, which they somehow kept afloat. So when I say, be mindful, it's important that you not just look at the long term impact from YOUR perspective, look at it through their eyes as well. They know they need you - they just need to figure out how the puzzle pieces fit together again. 'How can I help?' is designed to develop a conversation based in showing how to create a presence in the mind of the audience, and then maintain it, as the economy grows strength and recovers.

'How can I help?' means keep in mind, the recovery and bounce back won't happen instantaneously. There's a lot to be done - which is why we can be an integral part of what comes next. Don't accept falling into you old habits and patterns. Be bold, take chances.

Your creative should be even more thoughtful and original, better written and produced and presented in a manner that gains attention from the first six seconds the ad plays. Show the small business owner (the heart and soul of who sustains OUR business), that you do more than say you care. You're working as hard as they are to bring them back.

Let's do this. How can I help?