ScottKalbach.com

Spending Shock and Awe

Okay, I’m wondering how many people out there are thinking like I am that our government is completely out of control and putting us on the fast track to economic disaster?

First off, I want to say that I do think the Bush administration shares some of the blame for setting the initial precedent on this bailout madness. While Bush didn’t even come close to spending what the current administration has, he did open the door and he certainly wasn’t a conservative when it came to economics.

However, the current administration and party in power are spending so much money it boggles the mind. Most of us can’t even comprehend these numbers. I heard a guy from the Wall Street Journal say that we’ve spent more in the last three months then we have in the last thirty years. Then there’s the never ending bailouts. Do you realize that Obama has basically nationalized our auto industry and that some of the big banks are in their sites next? Obama says it’s just temporary, but he knows better. Amtrak was nationalized back in 1971 and we’ve been subsidizing them with billions of dollars a year ever since. Profitability is right around the corner they keep telling us. The same thing will most likely happen with GM and the banks.

On top of this they want to add nationalized health care and then jack up all our energy costs sky high with cap and trade. Which some estimates say would cost the average American family an insane $3900.00 a year.

When times are tough for you and your family, do you buckle down, cut costs and save money or do you go out on the biggest shopping spree of your lifetime in hopes that will solve your problem? Apparently the government is living in bizzaro world where you go on the ultimate spending spree to solve your problems. After all it doesn’t matter how much we spend because our good friends in China are buying up trillions of dollars of our debt. Doesn’t that make you feel better? Common sense says that this methodology just isn’t going to work. My fear is that we’ll have proof of that soon enough if they keep up with this craziness.

I don’t care who you voted for and what your political agenda is. This madness has to be stopped or we are all going to suffer. The people of this country need to come together and tell politicians of both parties this out of control spending madness has to stop. I encourage you to contact your senators and congress men and women and tell them to stop the out of control spending now.

Scott Kalbach

New Office

I recently moved my office over to Park City, UT which is about 15 minutes from where I live. I’ve only been in the new office for a couple of weeks, but I must say it’s been pretty nice so far. For those of you unfamiliar with Park City, this is a town that thrives on the outdoors and for good reason. Park City is home to three ski resorts in the winter and in the summer there are over 150 miles of public trails to hike and bike.

I’ve been doing lunch time mountain bike rides from the office several days a week. It’s pretty sweet to be able to hop on the bike at the office and be climbing through an aspen forest within a few minutes. Today I road part of the Spiro trail within the Park City Mountain Resort and then hopped on the Eagle trail until I decided my time was up and I better get back to work.

Here are a few pictures from my ride today taken from my mobile phone.

Spiro Trail - Park City, UT

Eagle Trail - Park City, UT

Eagle Trail - Coming back down

Looking down on Park City from the ride

Scott Kalbach

Important business principles

Over the last four years I’ve been pretty consumed with growing my startup on-line marketing company, AvantLink.com. I think we’ve made incredible progress in the industry so far. We’ve set new standards for ad tools, support and ethics in the industry and we’ve made some great progress branding ourselves on-line.

Here are a few business principles that have served us well.

1. Think long term. In today’s instant gratification society people tend to forget that it can take time to build a successful, sustainable company. We regularly hear about these seemingly overnight Internet sensations and sometimes it makes you wonder why it’s taking you so long to build your company. If you’ve got that next overnight sensation idea, great, go for it. For the rest of us, I would recommend that you concentrate on the things that make any good company successful. A great product that is better then what the competition has to offer and exceptional customer support. If you focus on those two items, chances are that you will create some level of success over the long term.

2. Stay focused on your core strengths and business model. If you have a better product and exceptional customer support, then the next important thing is to stay focused on your core business model. You can always consider expanding outside your core business model once your business is a big success. Until then, be careful about chasing ideas outside your core business model that you think might make you a little extra money. Usually these rabbit trails will end up costing you time and money with little ROI.There is plenty of room for innovative thinking within your core business model. So always think in terms of whether your ideas stay true to, improve on, and build the bottom line of your core business model.

3. Make business ethics a top priority. Working in an on-line industry, I see a lot of shady business practices. Right from the beginning we knew that business ethics needed to be a top priority in this company. I know it sounds like common sense, but in this industry, many of our competitors are more then happy to look the other way and allow shady affiliates to practice techniques that make them a lot of money in the short term but are actually cheating their clients in many ways. While the short term money probably seems like the way to go for these companies, over the long term they will suffer serious harm to their brands as their good customers get burned by these practices.

Thinking long term, focusing on your core business model and being as ethical as possible will always serve your business well and help put you on the path to long term success.

Scott Kalbach