Franklin Taggart's Virtual Coffee Break

As I write this description, the north wind is picking up outside, and our temperatures here are about to plunge about 40 degrees in the next hour.  This is a welcome respite from a Summer that has had more 90+ degree days than any I can remember in my history. For the past two days, my sone has been released from school two hours early due to the high heat and lack of functional air conditio...

I've always felt that my intuition and hunches are reliable, but I've been told to be more reasonable and logical in my decision-making. Reason and logic are great, but they haven't been as reliable as my intuitive intelligence. In fact, when I've chosen the reasonable path, it's often been a dead end. I still don't know what to make of Human Design. My woo meter is off the scale, but every time I...

Life is a story you tell yourself. Don't like it? Tell a better story. Considering I'm a Wyoming native, it's taken me long enough to find the Longmire series of novels by Craig Johnson. It's nothing crazy, but there were a few decades where I didn't read any fiction until I realized I was becoming a dull boy and signed up for Audible. God knows I don't have the patients to sit down and actually r...

If perfectionism has been something you work with, you've probably heard in recent years that "done is better than perfect." I'm guessing the roots of this motto are from the lean or agile movements. God knows I haven't had a software upgrade in decades that worked as it should from day one. This all started today because the computer I've used as my main video workstation for the past four years...

If you're ever in Longmont, CO, stop in at Babette's Artisan Bakery for a breakfast or lunch sandwich, some wood-fired pizza, and don't forget to wrap up a loaf or two of their amazing sourdough bread to take home with you. Find their hours and more about them here: https://www.babettesbakery.com/ We found out about Babette's from some foodie friends who would drive from their home in Genessee, ab...

All the recent changes in my life have me reflecting on what matters most. Figuring out what I'm doing now that I'm only doing one thing. I want to do it well. I looked back at all I've done for the past 13 years, and the one thread that keeps showing up is helping people start and build strong relationships. This hasn't been limited to one area of my life; it's come up in several. And it's also b...

What if 96 percent of people looking for a service like yours were ignored by the top-performing competitors in your industry? By now, the easiest to find customers in your industry are finding the companies who can afford the most expensive ads, keywords, and the top of page one on Google. But imagine if you found a closet full of bankers' boxes with people who wanted your service but couldn't ac...

Today was a day full of great conversations. A recurring theme today was the question of how audience building has changed for people over the past few years. We also wondered aloud how the pandemic and quarantines have impacted how we attract and gather people to our causes. In my case, my enjoyment of participating in social media has changed pretty drastically in the last few years. It used to...

I use a simple framework to guide my marketing and sales activities. 1. Connect human to human - forget the technique and build a real relationship through your message. 2. Inspire imagination - Help people experience a different possibility in their mind and show how you will help them reach it. 3. Invite people to take the next step toward that outcome. 4. Deliver valuable and memorable experien...

In the right state of mind, every one of us is susceptible to the suggestions of others. Advertisers have been planting ideas, catchphrases, taglines, mottoes, and anything else they can slip through our mental filters for the length of human history. Every day, we witness how powerful irrational and sometimes dangerous beliefs can be, yet we constantly expose ourselves to them through the inputs...

In a recent conversation with a friend, she asked what I did to build my audience. I asked her where her curiosity about that question stemmed from. She talked about recent events she's applied to be a speaker or presenter for and how much importance was placed, not on her topic or her expertise, but on the size of her audience. While she has a respectable number of loyal followers, a large percen...

I've had twenty ideas for what to talk about in this video, but when I push the record, I can't remember one. So here we are after 11 PM on a Sunday, and I have no idea what to say. What does this have to do with Willie Nelson? I saw Willie on VH1 Storytellers a couple of decades ago and remember him talking about how he wrote the song Crazy. Yes, the one immortalized by Patsy Cline. While in the...

I've made a lot of PDF downloads for lead magnets, starting with a first guitar buyer's guide I offered for one of the first blogs I started in 2009. Free PDFs were how most online marketers built their lists back then, and it seemed to work pretty well - until it didn't. When I started to study digital marketing more intensely a few years later, I started to collect PDF lead magnets. The Google D...

A couple of years ago, I was on The Solopreneur Society website, and there was an invitation to find out my brand archetype. All I had to do was take a short quiz that would tell me some important information about my personality and how it relates to branding my business. I took the quiz and was blown away by the insights I gained from the result. I had to know how Dre Beltrami had done this Vood...

Thanks to all who attended this morning's masterclass. I enjoyed the discussion in my breakout group very much and have been reflecting on it all day. We were specifically talking about what it is that people are attracted to in the work we do, whether as creative people, in business, or in the causes we support. A few answers presented themselves. First, we are attracted to people we sense have t...

A great gig tonight that may be my last, at least for a while. Gigs like this make me remember that music is worth it sometimes. Thanks for all your interest and support over the years - 43 years now. I'm always questioning how and why things work or don't work. Business is a fine laboratory for such studies. It's a mystery how something will work beautifully once, and then the next time it will s...

Thanks for the positive feedback and the interest in What's Your Next Step? A Choose your Own Adventure Business Masterclass coming up this Thursday, August 25th, at 10 AM Mountain Time. I've featured interviews with the other six coaches on the program for the past week, and I have been asked to share what I'll be focusing on in the breakout session I'll be leading. When I was asked to identify t...

The last coach in this series of introductions is Maryann Cruz. Maryann is a Connecticut-based business strategist, coach, and consultant who helps creatives build and grow the business side of their careers. In What's Your Next Step, Maryann will be leading a breakout session on the topic of when to automate, delegate, or outsource business tasks, so you have more time for the aspects of your bus...

Followers of my podcast are already well acquainted with Alison Proffit. She's been a guest a couple of times, talking about soulful entrepreneurship and her January summit. Alison will be one of the featured coaches at What's Your Next Step? A Choose Your Own Adventure Business Masterclass coming up this Thursday, August 25, at 10 AM Mountain Time. Alison is a master coach when it comes to sales...

This week, Your Own Best Company is making room to introduce you to six coaches who will be joining forces next Thursday, August 25th, at 10 AM Mountian Time for a 90-minute class that will be an unforgettable event. What's Your Next Step? A Choose Your Own Adventure Business Masterclass will be happening online. In 90-minutes you'll have a chance to pinpoint the one business priority that needs y...

Instead of the regular Virtual Coffee Break shows this week, I'm introducing you to the coaches I'll join next Thursday for the What's Your Next Step? A Choose Your Own Adventure Business Masterclass. This event is designed to be short, sweet, and to the point. The first half will be spent pinpointing the one area of your business where you need to focus right now. The second half will be a breako...

Continuing the intros for next week's What's Your Next Step? A Choose Your Own Adventure Business Masterclass, I'm excited to be working with my friend Amanda Fuel. Amanda is a highly sought-after transformational speaking coach whose programs have made confident public speakers from people at every level of speaking experience. For the masterclass, Amanda will lead a breakout session on marketing...

I'm taking a few days away from the regular Coffee Break schedule to tell you about a masterclass I'm participating in next week and to introduce you to the other coaches I'll be working with on the event. Today, I'll introduce Karen Joy Fritz, who helps business owners find the right tech solutions that help them deliver their best service. You can learn more about Karen at https://karenjoyfritz....

This week, I'll take a break from the regular Coffee Break programming to introduce you to each of the presenters at an online masterclass I'll be participating in next Thursday, August 25th.  The event is What's Your Next Step: A Choose Your Own Adventure Business Masterclass. It's a 90-minute class where you'll identify the area you need to work on most and then work with one of seven coach...

There's a pervasive belief that certain skills are inborn, innate talents and don't require any kind of learning or practice. Another belief suggests that new skills shouldn't take time to be mastered and that they should be easily adapted and integrated. Life doesn't work that way. If you're learning to play the guitar, you'll spend hour after hour, day after day, week after week, and year after...