Save time ordering your morning coffee

We all hate waiting in line for our morning coffee, but maybe not as much as we hate messing with our own coffee pots. So here is 10 tips on how to get your coffee just about one-thousand times faster.

1. Order your morning espresso like you you’re in the army. Drink. Temperature. Size. Custom instructions. Don’t make the barista ask you questions, which will add seconds on to your order.

2. Don’t be on a cell phone. Seriously. It’s rude, makes everybody wait, and could get you a mediocre coffee. The service you serve is the service you’ll get.

3. If you don’t recognize the barista, don’t ask for your regular coffee. Not all barista’s know your drink by heart, and many work all different shifts and have a hard time remembering everyone’s drink.

4. Order all your drinks up front. Then the barista can group tasks together and make only one trip if she has to get anything. If you are still deciding on a last drink, let the barista know that.

5. Order loudly enough. It seems strange, but a lot of sound is lost through the gap between the windows.

6. Order from the driver’s seat if you’re at a drive through. It is hard to hear the passenger order, so if the passenger wants something, the driver should be the messenger.

7. If your friend’s drink sounds good, get the same thing the same way. It is faster to get doubles of something than different things: less explanation to coworkers, double the milk, few trips to get things, repetitive motion.

8. Personal mugs. Please have them ready and cleaned out.

9. Have your money ready. I’m not saying you have to add up your order in your head (which is helpful), but just have bills or card ready.

10. Punch card? Have that ready too.

So say that by doing each one of those things saves only one second, then you’ve saved yourself, and everyone behind you, 10 seconds. For six people in line for their morning coffee, that’s a minute. And, realistically, each one of those things takes more than a second. People, lets start changing the world, one cup at a time.

The little blog that could

This is a sad day for this poor blog. The term has finished and Online Marketing is no more.

But that doesn’t mean that this blog is no more. It will be turned into something and that something is

BIG REVEAL

I don’t know yet. As far as I know it will be about coffee and writing (how wonderfully cliché) and the book publishing program. Enjoy.

Expect a new title and images soon. We gotta SEO up this bee-zee.

Time Travel: Publishing 10 Years from Now

So, what is the world of publishing going to look like in 10 years? I don’t know for sure, but I have a few ideas.

There will be a standard e-reader format. And it will be Apple. Sorry Kindle lovers (who knows? Maybe Kindle will run on the Apple platform then). Apple is just so darn sexy, how can consumers help it? Apple runs their music; iPod has become the household name for MP3 player like Kleenex is for nose tissue and BandAid is for bandages. And just like there are different sizes of iPod, books will be read on different sizes of book players, from iPad to iPod to iPhone. I will read mine on my iPhone.

There will still be print books because my mom buys them by the truckload. She consumes those things like pirated TV shows, except that she spends a fortune. Her cohorts do the same, so I imagine that veracious readers of a certain babyboom-shaped demographic are going to want their printed books.

The printed book will last at least as long as the babyboomers, and at least as long as there is Christmas. EBooks make terrible gifts. Square, physical books are easy to wrap and make the giver feel like they are giving something of substance. Printed books are here to stay.

There will be major restructuring in the big publishing houses. Some might collapse, but this economy isn’t great for industries that already have small profit margins, especially when they can’t buffer sales with strong backlists or academic sales. Right now, they’re coughing up blood by focusing on this minute’s bestseller, but like the shallow blockbuster movie fad, people are going to get tired of cheap thrills. There’s going to be a literary backlash felt through the big houses, while the literature is being produced by small publishers, like the movie industry with the resurgence of independent films. Then it will cycle back through when indie becomes mainstream (ie Away We Go).

And I might be there. I might be your boss. I might bring you coffee. Or I might just sell out.

Time will tell.