Greed is Good?

by Dave Carlson

Gordon Gecko, the high flying speculator from the movie “Wall Street” coined the phrase, “Greed is good.” To him, it was. It brought him the things he wanted—a big office with people at his beck and call. A beautiful beach house in the Hamptons, and untold wealth to do with what he liked. But he got trapped by his greed, and that is often what happens with greed. It traps you until you have no way out. It can be humbling.

I met with a guy the other day to talk about a possible business venture. I thought he wanted my help with a web site or marketing strategy. What he really wanted was for me to get involved with a multi-level marketing web strategy where a miniscule amount of people actually succeed. I decided to pass and was actually unkind about it (but I was mad to have wasted my time so it was justified.)

Several months ago I was approached about a job selling financial planning. I thought I could do it, but it was also a multi-level marketing scheme. I don’t go for those.

Depending on how desperate you are, some people go for things like this. Either they don’t know very few people succeed at these things are they think they are the exception.

I know of a family business put in peril because of a gambling habit—the owner speculating on high risk investment with little chance of actually succeeding.. The funny thing is that this man had built a business that had more than $20 million a year in sales, and now was in an arrangement where there was little chance that it would succeed.

It’s funny what greed will do. The Bible say, “The love of money is the root of all evil.” Money isn’t the root of all evil. The love of money is the root. How much do we love money and how much extra time are we spending at the office to make that extra money to get extra things?

Life is not things. It’s people—the people who are important to us.

Dave Carlson is a Google Registered Adwords Professional and owns Green Chair Marketing Group, a Denver Internet marketing firm specializing in driving visitors to web sites by search engine optimization, pay per click advertising, and web site design/redesign. Call him at 720-922-3124.

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