Business Lessons from sucessful entrepreneurs and business leaders: LunchLearning.com

Reading time: 2 - 3 minutes

Video Time: 49 minutes 48 seconds

Have you ever watched those old Star Trek episodes, you know, the ones with William Shatner in them? Don’t be embarrassed, you can admit it. For those of you who’ve never watched the show the main character, Captain Kirk, would sometimes send away teams to foreign planets to gather information and create alliances with alien species. Occasionally some of those aliens weren’t so friendly and a skirmish between the away team and the aliens would inevitably ensue. It was clear to the audience that the peaceful mission had turned into a dangerous problem when the dramatic music played and the communications officer said, “We’ve lost all communications with the away team.”

This week we’re focusing on the importance of communication for a businesses to succeed. You don’t have to fly around the galaxy in a starship to know that good communications is crucial if you want to survive in businesses. In today’s video Stefan Posthuma Technical Director of EA Games, talks about his approach to fixing some of the glitches he found in EA’s internal communications.You will see how poor communication can affect a business’s productivity and potentially its profits. Posthuma uses various strategies to fix these communication problems and while some of his ideas fail, he solves most of them with one little word…clarity.

In the video Posthuma discovers that his employees lack knowledge regarding team goals, career advancement, and management’s duties because the company has not clearly defined these areas. By communicating specific and concrete goals to his employees, Posthuma creates a stronger and more productive community of employees. As you watch the video, take note of all Posthuma’s techniques even the ones that didn’t catch on and see how the idea of clarity permeates all of his strategies.

Happy Learning…and Game On!

Reading time: 2 - 4 minutes

Video Time: 25 minutes 41 seconds

Welcome to a new week everyone. This time around the theme is marketing. It’s a pretty big theme with an even bigger impact on business. Think about it, how can you sell a product if no one knows it exists. Whether you’re trying to market yourself, a business, or a product a good marketing strategy is key. Hopefully this week you will gain new insights into the world of marketing.

We start things off with Russell Carroll creator of Game Tunnel an independent games website. In this video he explains what actions indie game developers need to do if they want their games to standout in the sea of other games. For the 99% of you who aren’t indie game developers every time you hear Russell says indie games replace it with small businesses. Russell outlines a few important steps for indie game developers (small business owners) to follow if they want to effectively advertise themselves.

His three main points are:
1. Consider the market
2. Create a press plan
3. Use the right medium (viral marketing)

Of those three points the most important one seems to focus on creating a good press plan. Russell details how important a press plan can be for generating interest especially in the early stages of product development. Russell also stresses the importance of establishing and maintaining a good working relationship with your business associates. When you perform a business deal you’re not only trying to sell a product, but you’re also selling yourself. If the buyer feels comfortable around you or even trusts you then you have a much better chance of selling. Also, you never know which of your business relationships will help you further down your career so it is important not to burn any bridges along the way. I hope that this video gets you geared up for more of the marketing tips and tricks that we have in store for you. Enjoy!

Happy Learning…and Game On!

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Reading time: 4 - 6 minutes

Video Time: 40 minutes 3 seconds

Why did the chicken cross the road?….Wait you’ve already heard that one. OK I’ll admit that I’m not that good at telling jokes, but I had to at least try and be funny since this week’s theme is humor in business. Today I’m going to show you a presentation from Ben “Yahtzee” Croshaw on what makes a good game. It’s a little off topic, but see if you can follow my rationale.

Yahtzee is a popular video game critic who has been shot to fame in the video game world with his Zero Punctuation series. Wondering how an upstart become so popular so quickly? It’s because he’s hilarious of course. When Yahtzee critiques a game he makes sure to incorporate his unique brand of humor to emphasize his main points and to keep the audience’s attention.

So what can Yahtzee, a video game critic, teach us about the business world. Well a lot actually. It’s very subtle, but Yahtzee is using humor to sell people on several ideas on what makes a good video game. Even when he is in a crowded room giving a presentation, Yatzhee’s humor creates a casual environment that allows him to speak freely without coming across as a raving lunatic. Another good point about humor is that it’s often memorable. Even if you can’t remember exactly how a joke goes, you can remember how it made you feel when you heard it. By pairing your main points with a joke the aforementioned points intrinsically becomes more memorable.

Using humor in business is important if you want to make positive and memorable impressions on clients. This is especially true in sales. Using humor in a sales environment can get people to return phone calls and close deals. Think about it, if two people were selling the exact same product to you, who would you choose? The person who made you laugh so hard you cried a little bit or the person who did everything by the books, but had you look down at your watch waiting for the pitch to be over. I’ll take two of whatever the funny one is selling, thank you very much. When you watch this video pay attention to how Yahtzee pairs his sarcastic comments with his main points to sell the audience on his opinions.

Note: The first two videos are really the important ones you want to watch. The last two are a Q&A session. If you liked what you saw in the first two videos stick around and see how Yahtzee answers questions on the fly.

Happy Learning….and Game On!

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Reading time: 3 - 5 minutes

Total Video Time: 22 minutes 25 seconds

Games tend to exist in a single state. Board games exist in reference to the board, sports take place on a given field or arena and video games exist in an enclosed virtual domain. With the advances in technology however, there have been developments in creating games, if they can still be rightly termed, that break through these boundaries. Alternate, or Augmented Reality Games (ARGs) utilize a number of platforms to develop immersiveness and to blend the boundaries of reality and fiction.

ARGs exist for a wide variety of purposes. They have been used to advertise, generate buzz, be a stand-alone game or even educate and push an agenda. However, what defines them is the blending of the real world and artificial world with no clear distinction. To achieve this, “hacked” websites, buried treasure, things washed up on the surf, to shadowy individuals and user contributions are utilized.

While a respectable number of ARGs have been developed, there are four particular landmarks: The Beast, produced in conjunction with the Stephen Spielberg movie A.I.: Artificial Intelligence, Perplex City, I Love Bees, developed to market the video game Halo 2, and World Without Oil. The Beast was the first major successful ARG, attracting three million individuals around the world to participate through emails, websites, faxes and phone calls. I Love Bees followed a similar, but far more complex path, inviting its participants to solve puzzles as well as further develop the narrative of a digital intelligence stranded on Earth. World Without Oil is regarded as the first serious ARG, utilizing user submissions to describe a, well, world with rapidly diminishing oil supplies to liven its narrative.

This video series follows the observations of Naomi Alderman, the lead writer for Perplex City, one of the first major ARGs designed to operate independently without external funding. While it was only moderately successful in achieving its goals, much of its structure is now part of the standard for ARGs. In a world where company interaction becomes an increasingly important element in marketing, ARGs are a step far beyond that of Facebook groups and Twitter feeds.

Thanks for joining LunchLearning.com today! Enjoy your Lunch!

Reading time: 3 - 5 minutes

Video Time: 24 minutes 55 seconds

Alright, so a lot of us are back from vacation and I bet you’re itching for some more lunch learning. This time the theme is boldness in the business world. All this week we are going to showcase individuals who have done something different, risky, or innovative that has had an impact on their business. Being the video game junkie that I am I couldn’t resist shining the spotlight on Shigeru Miyamoto. Miyamoto is the General Manager for Nintendo Entertainment Analysis and Development, but you might know him better as the creator of Nintendo’s Italian mascot Super Mario.

Today’s video is a question and answer session between Miyamoto and his fans about his work at Nintendo. Miyamoto talks about his innovative creations the Nintendo Wii (mentioned as the Nintendo Revolution in the video) and the Nintendo DS, two systems that drop the conventional standards of gaming. The Wii has you trading in your regular corded controller for a motion sensing nun-chuck apparatus while the DS gives you the ability the play games via touch screen. Both gaming systems have experienced wild success during these tough economic times even though people are cutting back instead of spending. So what made Miyamoto risk it all on two very experimental gaming systems? His personal desire to see video games mimic real life. In the video you will see that Miyamoto wasn’t content with just sitting around playing games he wanted to be active. His strong desire to integrate motion into gameplay was risky, but looking back it’s clear to see that it was the right decision.

This should be a lesson to all of us who are out there trying to make it as an entrepreneur. If you’re not following your own personal convictions or don’t have enough faith in your product to try something completely out of the box then you might not succeed. Now I’m not saying that if you believe in your product enough you’re going to be successful, I’m just saying that it’s one of the first steps for it to be profitable. When you watch the video you can see that Miyamoto is deeply passionate about what he does and as entrepreneurs we should be too.

Just for fun, let’s put a little perspective on this. According to Wikipedia the Xbox 360, a competing gaming system, has sold 31 million units worldwide as of August 27, 2009; while the Nintendo Wii has sold 56.14 million units worldwide as of September 30, 2009. That means Nintendo has sold roughly 20 million more units than its leading competitor…not bad for Miyamoto’s radically new gaming system. As you watch this video, I hope you can find more insight on what it takes to be a bold entrepreneur.

Happy learning….and Game On!!!

Thanks for joining LunchLearning.com today! Enjoy your Lunch!

Reading time: 3 - 4 minutes

Video Time: 24 minutes 15 seconds

It must be hard being a woman in the video game industry. Think about it, I mean really think about it. The video game industry has been a boys club for years. The developers are boys, the publishers are boys, and the general audience…..you guessed it, BOYS! It must be difficult or perhaps awkward for women to break into a male dominated industry. Well, Torrie Dorrell (@TorrieD on Twitter) Senior Vice President of Global Sales and Marketing at Sony Online Entertainment is making sure that this trend doesn’t continue.

In today’s video, Torrie talks about the role diversity plays in the workforce. It’s necessary to understand that when an issue is identified, like a lack of females, it is important to proactively try and fix the problem. Torrie does this by creating G.I.R.L. a program designed to help women to get a foot into the “male only” video game industry.

There are two major points about women in the industry that Torrie addresses. The first is that women bring a new perspective to the table. In the video, Torrie brings up a story about how an idea was pitched and all the men in the room thought it was absurd while all the women thought it was a great idea. Through the collaboration of everyone in the room they were able to make a fairly successful online game. In any business it’s important to diversify the decision makers because a product that might seem useless to one person could be a huge benefit to someone else.

The second point is make the product for everyone. Lets think again for one second. If video games cater to only one demographic (males) that’s fine I guess, but if game developers create games (product) for a larger audience they have greatly increased the potential for new customers. Businesses must think this way too. Even if the product is “just for men” the people in charge should consider how they can broaden their audience. This could be anything from making the product relevant to men of all backgrounds and ages or sell it to women as a way to understand the male mind. There are other aspects of women in an industry that Torrie talks about so I hope you can glean more practical business tips from this video.

Happy learning…and Game On!

Thanks for joining LunchLearning.com today! Enjoy your Lunch!

Reading time: 2 - 4 minutes

Video Time: 19 minutes 30 seconds

Well this is it for me, its been great sharing with you this week. I want to end my series with a look towards the FUTURE. In today’s video Jane McGonigal (@avantgame on Twitter), and a researcher at the Institute for the Future, talks about how the social aspects of online gaming can be transposed onto the real world. She believes that the social networks in online games which allow players to effectively communicate to one another will eventually become the foundation for how we will use technology in the future. As an example Jane’s social game World Without Oil shows how people can effectively create multiple solutions to a large problem in a short period of time. Her game also demonstrates how people can use new technology to creatively solve problems when given the right means to achieve a goal.

New technology helps create better products and helps small businesses advertise in inexpensive ways. Technology like Google, Facebook and Twitter give entrepreneurs the resources to target specific consumers and streamline marketing. What might sound silly now, like making the real world mirror video games, might be as normal as checking an e-mail in the future. Technology and business go hand and hand and the partnership between these two economic giants help drive change. I picked this video to remind you that technology is your friend so play nice. I hope you enjoy it!

Happy Learning and Game On!

Reading time: 4 - 6 minutes

Total Video Time: 28 minutes 20 seconds

Today I want to switch things up a bit and present a person who used savvy business skills to turn her dream into a reality. That person is Felicia Day and If you’ve ever played an online RPG or if you know which color kryptonite makes Superman go crazy then you probably already know who I’m talking about. If you you’re asking, “What do rocket propelled grenades have to do with video games?” or “There’s more than one color of kryptonite?” that’s OK, let me explain my point. Felicia has done a fantastic job of marketing her popular web series The Guild to a niche group of…well, for a lack of a better term, nerds. The Guild is a show about six online gamers who must band together online and offline to help keep each other out of trouble. Whether she knows it or not, Felicia used smart business sense to create a show that caters to the needs of her niche. Here are just a few ways Felicia turned her zeal for online games into a successful business venture.

1. Passion - This is the most important part of making a business successful. As you watch as she explains the origins of The Guild, it’s easy to see that Felicia truly loves her craft.
2. Customer Service (the fans) - Felicia knows who her fan base is and knows what they want. In the video she describes how using a web series format was perfect for reaching her target audience. Even the interview at BlizzCon, a huge gaming convention, shows that she knows which events are important for circulating information to her fans.
3. Realistic - She works within her budget and doesn’t try to spread her self too thin when it comes to costs. In the interview, she discusses how she filmed in her house to minimize the overhead.
4. Growth - Felicia has a successful show on her hands and she knows that if she wants to grow her brand she needs to expand her footprint. Her cross platform content like The Guild comic book and The Guild music video insures that her brand will stay fresh and appealing to her current fans and attract new ones.

For those of you not familiar with how the gaming industry works some of the video’s content might be hard to understand. Don’t focus so much on the specifics, but focus on the big ideas; like the energy and drive it took to create a show from scratch or how Felicia answers every question with enthusiasm indicating her love for the subject matter. I hope this video will inspire new entrepreneurs and perhaps invigorate old ones to follow their passions.

Happy learning and Game On!

Reading time: 3 - 5 minutes

Video Time: 38 minutes 6 seconds

Today, I want to focus on Sid Meier, the Director of Creative Development for Firaxis Games. Sid realized the potential video games have for teaching and capitalized on it. In the video Sid presents Civilization, a game he helped create, as an example of how games can be used to educate. In Civilization the player jumps into the role of all powerful leader and gets to decide how he or she wants to build a society. You start the game as a small settler town, but by the end of the game you could be colonizing space. As your society grows throughout the ages, you begin to compete for resources from neighboring nations. How you choose to interact with these nations determines whether you’re an enlightened pacifist society, a war mongering nation, or anything in between. The game essentially becomes a giant economic and history lesson that lets you see if you have what it takes to create an empire that can withstand the test of time.

Sid presents how he took his video games from just being pure entertainment to a rewarding learning experience. He begins his lecture by stating that people don’t like to be taught, but they like learning. Sounds like a contradiction, right? Well, he’s right in the sense that people are not always receptive to being told what to do or how to do it. Sometimes the best way to learn is to do it for yourself and video games give the player the opportunity to do just that. When something, like history, can’t tangibly be manipulated video games can be an excellent learning tool. Sid talks about the importance of choice when it comes to cultivating a desire to learn. Everyone learns differently and Sid shows how presenting information in various ways allows people find a learning style best suited for them. He also believes that to engage an audience, the mode in which the information is presented should be entertaining. No one is going to learn anything if they’re not paying attention.

So how is this relevant to the business world and not just students? It’s easy if you think of it in terms of on the job training. I don’t know about you, but I’ve had my fair share of training meetings where the trainer droned on and on about a topic and the only thing I learned was that I could draw a really cool fire breathing dinosaur. The techniques Sid uses to create a more rewarding educational experience for his gaming audience can be applied to creating more effective and dynamic training sessions.

Training doesn’t necessarily have to involve a video game. Training can take the fundamental aspects of learning that Sid mentions and use them to present the information in a way that is appealing to the audience, creates an interactive environment, and allows the trainees to learn at their own pace. I hope you enjoy the presentation.

Happy learning and Game On!

Reading time: 4 - 7 minutes

Total Video Time: 33 minutes 38 seconds

Today I want to talk about Rock Band Network (RBN) and how bands can use this amazing new tool to market themselves. However, before you can understand RBN you need to know about Rock Band the game. Whether you’ve heard about them or not music games like Rock Band have become a huge phenomena in the gaming industry. Rock Band allows you live out your childhood fantasy of becoming a rock star without those pesky addictions that have ruined the lives of so many of rock’s icons.

Here’s how the game works, you are given a set of peripherals in the shape of guitars, drums and microphones. Each peripheral, except for the mic, has colored buttons. You can grab up to three friends and pick a song from Rock Band’s music library and start playing. As you play the game you will notice colored bars scrolling down the screen at the same speed as the beat. Your job is to press the corresponding colored buttons on your peripheral at the same time the colored bars pop up on the screen and voilà, you have just learned the basics of Rock Band.

Rock Band comes complete with a large selection of songs already on the game, but you have the option of downloading more songs to expand your music library. You can choose to play songs from legendary bands like The Beatles, Metallica, and Iron Maiden or choose from more current bands like Fall Out Boy, Weezer, and Bon Savants…wait, who was that last one? This is where RBN steps in and lets indie bands like Bon Savants convert their music into tracks that can played on Rock Band. This is a huge, like I said in my previous post the video game audience is large and expanding. This is a great opportunity for indie bands to present their music to people who otherwise would not know they existed.

Bon Savants is one of the first bands to take the jump into this new form of music distribution, but I hardly doubt they will be the last. In their video blog they explain how RBN works as well as the difficulties they faced while converting their tracks into sound files for the game. Unfortunately, Bon Savants has not finished making their Rock Band tracks so their video blog is incomplete. To finish the lesson, I supplemented Caleb Epps’ presentation and tutorial about RBN. Most of Caleb’s first video reiterates what Bon Savants talked about except Caleb presents RBN from the developers perspective. If you’re impatient like I am you can skip to 3:37 of Caleb’s first video and pick up where Bon Savants left off. Caleb rounds out the tutorial by explaining how to polish the finished tracks and market the the music on RBN.

If you’re like me and are interested in learning more about Bon Savants check out their website here at http://bonsavants.com.

Hope you enjoy the learning and Game On!