For Immediate Release

John Spence is named one of Top 100 Thought Leaders by Trust Across America

Gainesville, Florida – January 26, 2012

For the second year in a row, John Spence has been selected as one of Trust Across America’s “Top 100 Thought Leaders”. Trust Across America is dedicated to unraveling the complexities of trustworthy business behavior, and selects the Top 100 Thought Leaders in Trustworthy Business Behavior. The recipients collectively represent a group that is dedicated to transforming and reversing the cycle of mistrust in business.

According to Barbara Kimmel, Executive Director, “This year’s recipients include leaders from the public and private sectors as well as authors, consultants, researchers and academics. Each recipient has made extensive, positive contributions to building trust in business.” Some distinguished individuals in the company of John Spence include Indra Nooyi (Chairman/ CEO of PepsiCo) Tony Hsiesh (CEO Zappos), and Mark Parker (President/CEO of NIKE).

The Top 100 Thought Leaders represents the culmination of three years of research. Trust Across America sought the counsel of and requested nominations for this honor from over 150 professionals across the nation. The list was narrowed through an extensive vetting and independent judging process. According to Barbara Kimmel “The honorees are inspiring organizations to look more closely at their higher purpose…to create greater value for, and trust from, all of their stakeholders. The full list of honorees can be found at:

Top 100 Business Thought Leaders

John also recently received the 2011 Small Business Influencers –Honorable Mention. Small Business Influencer 2011 honors companies, organizations and people who have made a significant impact on the North American small business market. Although there were 520 nominees, the voting for the top 100 was so close that the Honorable Mention category was added to give recognition to those that were close, but did not make the list of champions. Other notable Honorable Mention recipients were Malcolm Gladwell, Seth Godin and Apple.

About John Spence LLC

John Spence has earned a reputation as a leading authority in the areas of Strategic Thinking, High-Performance Teams, Advanced Leadership Development, and Delivering Consistently Superior Customer Service, making him one of the most highly sought after executive educators and professional speakers in America. He is also the author of “Awesomely Simple – Essential Business Strategies for Turning Ideas into Action,” and Excellence By Design – The Six Key Characteristics of Outstanding Leaders.”

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I have some very strong beliefs about what it takes to run a highly successful business and right at the top of my list is: Whoever “owns” the voice of the customer and uses that information to build an organizational culture of Extreme Customer Focus will own the marketplace.

Here’s why: When you focus intensely on your customers and provide customer service that truly meets and exceeds their specific needs, you win their loyalty at a level that is nearly impossible to shake—even when that competitor down the street is offering giveaways and steep discounts, or your market is crowded with dozens of me-too products or services.

Simply put, Extreme Customer Focus produces unparalleled customer service, and unparalleled customer service creates an unfair advantage for you. And what business owner wouldn’t want an unfair advantage? Continue reading “The Secret to Owning Your Market” »

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Here are just a few VERY good books that I recommend — PLEASE feel free to add you suggestions!!!

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I am extremely thankful this week because a group of college students have restored my faith in the leadership potential of the next generation. This semester, in partnership with a great company in my hometown called TutoringZone, we offered a special leadership training program called “Let The GATOR Lead” in conjunction with the Warrington College of Business Administration at the University of Florida. Every other week or so, a group of students would get together with a student facilitator and go through a chapter in my book: “Excellence by Design: Leadership – the six key characteristics of outstanding leaders,” and talk about the principles I put forth and what those leadership characteristics meant to them as college students.

Out of the 250+ students that originally signed up – more than 130 wrote essays that were judged by me and several senior executives from Fortune 100 companies in order to choose three winners that received cash scholarships as well as donations to their favorite charity and a small reward for the rest of the people in their discussion group.

All-in-all the essays added up to about 500 pages of reading, and I must say it rivaled the best leadership books I have read in the last few years. The essays were thoughtful, focused, provocative and entertaining – I could not be more thankful for all the wonderful ideas and feedback these amazing students gave to me about how they view leadership and the way they want to lead their generation. Below you will find the top three winners and two honorable mention recipients, I think there’s some wonderful stuff here that you will enjoy great deal – and I have to say that it is a shame I cannot put all the essays here on my blog – the students did an incredible job and I’m very, very thankful for what they taught me!  Continue reading “I am VERY thankful for…” »

I hope you enjoy this video, I think it has some extremely important ideas about what every person needs to do to create job security/career security in the face of even the most challenging economic times. If you find value in the ideas I share, please send a link on to your friends and colleagues so that as many people as possible can hear these suggestions. Thanks so much, I look forward to your feedback and comments – John

This first video is in response to a request from my good friend Hiro who asked me to recommend a few of my favorite books on branding. Hiro and his business partner Song run two amazing sushi restaurants in Florida, Dragonfly Sushi and Sake Company, and he is getting ready to update the brand on those wonderful restaurants and the franchise idea he has called Rolls ’n Bowls. So here are six books that I think are superb for helping you build a stronger brand…  Continue reading “Two New Videos: Branding & Impatient Customers” »

Just a few weeks ago I had the great honor of presenting a program at the Apple Specialist Marketing Conference. My talk was entitled “The New Normal” and focused on how these folks, who sold such incredible Apple products, could continue to be successful as the realities of business and economics remained in constant fluctuation. The talk was even more poignant given the fact that Steve Jobs had passed away just a week earlier. Here is a very brief excerpt of some of the ideas I shared on how I feel companies can survive and thrive in… The New Normal.

PS – Do not forget that I am participating in this fantastic event…

During this week alone I will meet with eight different entrepreneurs who are all looking to start businesses. Some are building mobile apps, some are starting publications, some are going into manufacturing, and one is creating a TV show. Yet even though they’re all over the place with what they are focusing on as a business, my advice about how to be successful as an entrepreneur was just about the same to all of them. Here are some of the key ideas I shared with them for what I feel it takes to successfully create and grow an entrepreneurial business. Continue reading “How To Be a Successful Entrepreneur” »

As summer officially comes to a close I wanted to squeeze in this great guest post from Tom Asacker which I saw on his fantastic blog Opportunity Screams. I think it absolutely hits the nail on the head: We need more LOVE in business…  Continue reading “The Summer of LOVE” »