Generally speaking we are all addicted to what we love. Trying to handle things we don't like will be a massive attack to our hearts. One day this year i woke up, thought of circumstances of life and explained to myself: You will never regret what you do as long as you love, what you do. So challenge the future and keep close to your believes and the trust in your abilities and values. And don't regret!

Leave people behind who are producing negative feelings, leave people behind who cannot feel the passion and ambition you are living. Instead put your arm around them, who want to challenge the future with you. Trust the people, who present you with their trust. Stand at the side of those who inspire. Live with those who keep their words.

2011 will be great. 

Uhm! Approx. 90% of my day-time is fully booked with doing business. We discover, we learn, we practice... it's a great story (review of the year will be posted in the next days). It's entrepreneurship. Developing yourself always means to me achieving step for step more experience. And one day we will harvest the fruits, at the lastest by giving these fundamental experiences to our childs. That's save.

Despite we learned a lot, we don't need to fool ourselves: We are still working on the continuation of the basics... so: 

In 2011 there will be a bulk of challenges i want to recap here, so just listen if you are interested or involved, my top10:

#1: identity marketing
As mentioned in one of my blog posts of relevanz, i will concentrate on identity marketing. Maybe i will take further steps by developing a website concentrated on the subject and where we can exchange experiences. Furthermore i'm very interested in writing a small book affecting the subjects of marketing/distribution or the development of personal identities. Publishing it on Amazon would be a dream... :- )

#2: seo / sem
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and Search Engine Marketing (SEM) has a deeply impact on me. In times of oversupply the clients we manage in marketing communication need to reach their customers. SEO and SEM is now included in the agency services, because i guess that you can empower brands visibility and sharing information on products will always play an important role in the internet. We will expand these services. Actually we have made contracts with clients, more are coming up... stay tuned :- )

#3: magento development
Besides of marketing services we will amplify our technical unit. By now we are developing huge magento shops and already could collect ample experience in e-commerce. Co-founders of aijko, Gerrit Pechmann and Erik Frister, will manage the growth while i'm concentraiting in new business and all stages of marketing communication. We are setting up first cooperations and will definitely challenge the future. 

#4: marketing consultancy
This will be an exciting exercise: To strengthen our consultancy unit. Our fields of operation are becoming more and more complex. On the one hand you need the specialists, creating persuasive work. On the other hand you have to come up with allrounders, who know the processes of the specialists, knowing requirements of the agency and the clients at the same time, communicating in a transparent way and making win-win deals. So, are you young and hungry? Please send your application for account management at aijko to my hands, i will come back to you as fast as possible.

#5: technical mastership, innovation
aijko performs well in technical concept services and coding (frontend and backend). I hope we have the possibility to integrate new, outstanding developers. That would be nice for creating ideas for innovation and that followed the direct implementation by our own coding team. We want to be the first partner if you need demanding development (web, mobile...)!

#6: friendship / trust / sustainability / long relationships
Our clients are our friends. As creative corporate consultants we are very close to the people we work with daily. With all of our clients and partners we want to align new strategies due to the strenghtening of the companies and their products. We want sustainable cooperations. In 2010 we won more than 10 new clients; we started with them and now we want to improve.

#7: time-management / work-life balance
I have to work at my time-management and work-life-balance. If i loose drive and spirit, i will fail. Stop this by taking time you need for yourself: To reflect, to meet with people, to look beyond one's own nose. So work-life and other life has to be in balance. In 2010 there was no balance. We just forced our growth by strong commitment and passion. We'll have an eye on it.

#8: education by sharing
All people who are willing to join aijko will participate in an open-minded culture. We will share our knowledge to get the best employees in our space in 2011. And you are welcome to share your knowledge with us :- ) Let us rock young professionalism and create values and essence.   

#9: don't stop your visions
I was always conducted by my visions. And nothing else. Maybe it's creative power to handle things. To keep these visions alive you have to make sure that your personality, your imagination and your perception can unfold without restrictions. It keeps your drive and spirit alive. If it works, all the people surrounding you will notice... it's more than aura. I guess it could be part of #1 ... :) stay tuned.   

#10: To all my readers: I wish you all the best in 2011. Enjoy!

Listen...

"Listen as your day unfolds 
Challenge what the future holds 
Try and keep your head up to the sky 
Lovers, they may cause you tears 
Go ahead release your fears 
Stand up and be counted 
Don't be ashamed to cry 
You gotta be 
You gotta be bad, you gotta be bold 
You gotta be wiser, you gotta be hard 
You gotta be tough, you gotta be stronger 
You gotta be cool, you gotta be calm 
You gotta stay together 
All I know, all I know, love will save the day 
Herald what your mother said 
Readin' the books your father read 
Try to solve the puzzles in your own sweet time 
Some may have more cash than you 
Others take a different view"

Yesterday i was invited to Van der Valk Airport Hotel. More than 350 visitors came to Düsseldorf to join the first Online Kongress 2010 of the Rheinische Post. I proudly have to thank M. Brillen and K. Struck for the personal invitation and the really warm welcome. 

My friend Marcel joined me there and both we were excited about what the Kongress would be like. In general we passed a lot of Kongresses in the past and therefore we actually can give good or negative points to the contents, the organisation and so on... but Online Kongress 2010 we enjoyed definitely. It was all done well and despite the fact that I know a lot about Online Marketing there were some new aspects from speaking experts I was thinking about deeply.

So Frank Dopheide (Chairman, GREY), had the opening-keynote. Frank is a godlike speaker and really knows how to catch his audience. It's quite simple, but it has relevance and impact. And he speaks with passion and humor. Passion you feel. Just the right balance. He talked about emotional value and the replacement of each product in this world. He spoke about the change in advertising due to the internet-revolution. And the need of rethinking in marketing.
After his speech Frank left very early. But i catched him in the entrance while he waited for being fetched by taxi. I shortly asked about his further steps in career and that i'm interested in identity marketing as he mentioned in press as well. I hope that I'll find the time to write down my aspects of identity marketing in the near future (before christmas 2010!); i will post it here. Frank and I will meet again.

Later on we joined the "panels". There were some speaking experts for different subjects you could choose. We joined "Mobile" (heiko schwamb, YOC) and "Social Media" (KPMG). I was disappointed about the guys from KPMG. Maybe the content of their speech was okay (but there were intensive discussions though..), but such a boring presentation. I ever thought people from organisations like KPMG are thrilled to best speaking and to perform well in front of an audience. Nevertheless... Social Media is at odds all the time - i will track the development at aijko.

Rheinische Post will send out USB sticks with all the presentation slides which had been presented. If you are interested as well, just drop me a message.

I even will connect with people like Prof. Dr. Heinemann (Hochschule Niederrhein Krefeld) or Rainer Kunst (KunstundKollegen). Maybe we can initialize some professional but kickin' projects in the context of marketing.

Stay tuned