In Las Vegas, on October 1, 2017, a gunman impacted the lives, friends, families, and community members of 58 people. As it is with all tragedy, when we aren’t impacted directly, our attention moves on to the day-to-day. It’s normal, and necessary in order for life to go on.
I had more or less moved on until I joined a group of entrepreneurs here in Vegas to work on their businesses. Everywhere you go, the hashtag #VegasStrong is proudly displayed; in neon, on t-shirts, on billboards.
To a one we wondered, “Is there still something to be done?” This community is committed to using their businesses to have a positive impact on the world, as well as generating profits. We googled, asked around, and consulted trusted advisors about whether we could help. The result, put together in about 24 hours, is a fund raising campaign we’re calling, #DearVegas.
Here’s what we came up with collectively. We launched today with a Facebook live with the following goals: get 5800 shares, using GoFundMe, raise $58,000. Tomorrow, we will take to the street on FB live and ask 58 people to tell the families, friends, and others left behind what they want to most want them to know — from love.
We bring this group together 3 times per year to work on improving their business. One of the things that most often trips us up in business is delaying until we are ready. We think things have to be perfect before we put them out there. We worry about what people will think if a link is broken or our hair goes crazy town — or worse, what if nobody shows up; what if no one buys?
Here’s what we learned from the exercise…
At 6 am this morning the team met, tired but excited to hammer out the details. At 7:30 for an 8 am go-live call, 25 also tired, sometimes casual, entrepreneurs showed up early and eager to make an impact. At 8 am we hit Live and rolled with it.
Our goals: 5800 shares of our campaign and $58,000. Within minutes we had traction — yes, some of it was well-coordinated, but most of it was a result of us telling the story of why we came together to do this and the importance of not looking away just because time has passed. Within an hour we had about 50 shares and had raised $500. Some people couldn’t find the link.
We fixed that.
Others didn’t know how to share a live.
We educated them.
In a short time we began to have an impact, and we are only hours into the campaign.
What would our businesses look like if we were willing to trust our gut with an idea and tie that to our experience — and go? Becoming more marketable starts with being more for your business. Showing up more and leveling the excuses with mindfulness about your why.
People want to hear from you, some even need what you have.
We may or may not reach the goals we have, but the idea that we had even a small impact on people’s lives is priceless. And we got a great lesson in being more for our business. We were able to come together and make this happen so fast and imperfectly because it was for other people.
“Pretend that your business is for other people. Because it is.” – Iman Khan