Fortunately, as contributing editor for SmartBrief on Entrepreneurs, I had a forum for asking that very question. Last week we polled our 35,000 readers, asking if they thought the Tea Party phenomenon was good or bad for small-business issues.

The results were unambiguous: 57% believe the movement is a good thing, compared to just 23% who see it as a negative. To me, the blowout numbers were shocking. I expected to see a much higher percentage of “not sure” responses, given that the Tea Party is relatively new, amorphous and untested.

Why are so many entrepreneurs drinking from this particular cup of tea? I think it’s largely a loss of faith in the current leadership of both parties, who are falling all over themselves to “help” their core constituencies with lavish, expensive government programs.

Case in point: Washington wants to help stimulate investment in small businesses, so what does Congress do? It passes a $3.5 billion incentive allowing investors a 100% exclusion on capital gains when they purchase stock in entrepreneurial enterprises.

But only if the stock purchase is made between March 15, 2010, and Jan. 1, 2012.

And only if the company is organized as a C corporation.

Oh, and if the business provides a service — think consulting firm, restaurant or inn — it doesn’t qualify.

Entrepreneurs all across the country will respond to this “stimulus” with a weary shrug, just like any number of SBA programs and tax incentives that came before. Who has time to jump through all the hoops required to qualify for the government’s “help”? We have business to run, sales to make, products to ship.

Government is about strings; entrepreneurs are about bootstraps. If they really want to help us, they need cut the strings and get out of the way so we can do our thing.

In its rhetoric, at least, the Tea Party movement seems to get it. Tea Party candidates promise to restore fiscal discipline, and entrepreneurs listen. Washington promises to help us, and entrepreneurs shrug.

Come November, things could get very interesting.

That’s certainly true, but I think it misses a larger point: Lifestyle businesses make life better/more enjoyable/more fun for customers too.  Take Maia Josebachvili, for instance.  While studying engineering at Dartmouth, she recruited all her friends and acquaintances to go skydiving — because it was something she really wanted to try, and she couldn’t afford it. Based on that experience, she went on to found Urban Escapes, a weekend adventure company for young urban professionals in four cities.

All week long Josebachvili’s clients slave away in banks, law firms and the like. Then, on the weekend they get out and really enjoy life, thanks to a little lifestyle company and an entrepreneur who pursued her passion.

In the busy summer months, Josebachvili says she serves about 500 clients — not a huge number, and certainly not the kind of business model that would impress venture capitalists or proponents of “high potential” firms. But she’s earning a living, providing jobs and bringing a little bit of joy to her customers.

The point is, it takes someone with passion to provide the sort of product or service that may never “scale.” For a big, soulless corporation or venture-backed company, it’s simply not worth the time.

This time, the very next item in my inbox was good news from another, much larger distributor. Coincidence? Only partly.

When Distributor #1 first contacted me, it seemed like a perfect fit with plenty of upside. Still, I have a firm policy: Any time I get potentially good news from one customer, I hedge my bets by consciously going after another. So, even as I started work on a deal with Distributor #1, I identified and made contact with Distributor #2 — the very same day.

Yes, I’m disappointed that we couldn’t come to terms with Distributor #1, and maybe we still will. But I didn’t lose any sleep over it. In fact, I slept like a baby and literally dreamed about Distributor #2. (Hello, Dr. Jung?)

Today I’ll get busy hammering out a deal with Distributor #2, but you know there’s more than that on the agenda. I’ve tasked myself with contacting three brand new potential customers, just so there’s always fresh hope in the pipeline.

If you’re a wine retailer, you might be hearing from me today. And a few weeks from now, I just might be dreaming about you.

Last week, a Denver family caused a media sensation when they reported their six-year-old son might be aboard a runaway helium balloon … and the Twitterverse held its breath.

This week, we learned that none of it was true — at least, not as originally presented. Security cameras in Altanta prove that Nicole White was always within a foot or two of her son during their long TSA screening, despite the fevered rant that drove up traffic at her blog.

In Denver, meanwhile, Richard and Mayumi Heene face possible criminal charges after local law enforcement determined that the entire balloon incident was likely a stunt designed to seal the deal for a reality show appearance.

What gives here? Why would seemingly normal, rational people use their children to garner a few minutes of fame?

Here’s our theory: Reality TV and social media have made it easier than ever to get noticed, and we’re beginning to get addicted to attention. We collect friends, followers, fans and contacts as if the sheer numbers somehow proved our worth. We compulsively Google our names and check our blog stats as if to reassure ourselves that others are aware of our existence.

“I tweet, therefore I am,” to paraphrase Descartes for the Digital Age.

The irony is that chasing useless metrics such as pals or pageviews can steal focus away from the things that really matter. In business, social media are supposed to be a marketing tool, not an end in themselves. Yet I know entrepreneurs who worry constantly about their “unfollow” stats on Twitter, even while they make no effort to get a handle on their lost customers.

As for the purely social side of social media, the same principle applies: Online tools should add value in real life — and real life happens offline. Virtual relationships are great if they provide an occasional smile or morale boost throughout the day, but that’s no substitute for having a real drink with real friends.

No offense to our online groupies, but we probably won’t be chatting with you this weekend. Business is business and followers are fun, but we have more important relationships to attend to.

And we’re guessing you do, as well.

Prost!

With all due respect, we beg to differ. In a tough economy, nothing could be more important than exploiting the most cost-effective means of building a business. The starting cost for a social media campaign is exactly zero, and what could be more cost-effective than that?

Prost! Productions has been on Twitter for three weeks now, and we’ve already found a new artist, a new distributor, and even a new rep half a world away. We’re also in discussions with multiple wineries to create custom cards to sell in their tasting rooms. If even one of those deals pans out, it will pay for our $50 custom Twitter background many times over.

While all of this hardly makes us Twitter experts, it has turned us into Twitter enthusiasts, and we think more entrepreneurs would share our enthusiasm if they followed a few simple suggestions:

1. Define success. Know exactly what you hope to achieve, and judge your results accordingly. When you’re starting out, it’s easy to get caught up in the chase for followers, re-tweets and other meaningless metrics that don’t add a dime to your revenues. We started Tweeting with the goal of landing just one new retail account in our first month, so we think we’re successful — even though we have just 121 followers.
2. Define yourself. There’s nothing deceitful about maintaining multiple Twitter accounts — it’s just a way to keep your identity sharply defined. If you have multiple businesses, create multiple accounts so you’re not Tweeting about Tupperware to the folks who follow you for your health care expertise. Ditto personal interests: It’s great to reveal your personality online, but your business contacts don’t need to know every time the baby spits up.
3. Don’t chase numbers. We could have multiplied our follower count by many times, but what’s the point? With every new person we follow, we’re adding to the chatter in our Twitter stream, and making it that much harder to pick out the stuff that’s really important. If we want to establish meaningful relationships online, we have to screen out the meaningless ones.

The point is this: If you’re a small-business owner who’s still on the sidelines because you think social media are too self-involved or self-referential, just remember that it doesn’t have to be that way. Twitter, LinkedIn, FaceBook — they’re all just tools that can be used any way you want. And the fact that 75% of your competition is not using the tools? That just means more of a head start for you in building a successful businesss.

I was in Las Vegas, picking up my rental car for a one-way trip across Arizona and New Mexico. I’d booked the car well in advance, but when I got to the rental counter at McCarran Airport, I decided it was best to use a different credit card than the one in my computer record. “Sorry,” the Budget rep told me, “but this is a one-way rental, so we can’t alter the contract at all.”

“Really?’ I persisted, “because you just added a second driver to the contract, and that apparently was no problem.”

“Sorry,” she said again without a hint of sorrow in her voice, “but that’s the policy. You’re returning in Albuquerque, and they won’t let us change anything.”

I was halfway across the Arizona desert when the oil light came on. I quickly pulled the contract out of my glove compartment and called Budget’s 800 number. “Would you like to extend your rental?” the customer service rep offered right off the bat.

Uh, no, I wanted to shorten my rental, turning it in one day early so I could get a properly maintained car. “Sorry, sir, but we can’t change the contract on a one-way rental. You’ll have to talk to the Las Vegas location where you picked up the car.”

I politely tried pointing out the flaw in this logic: She had just offered to extend my rental, so why couldn’t she shorten it? “Sorry,” she said again, “let me connect you with Las Vegas.”

Three customer service reps and three “sorry’s” later, I decided it would be easier to stick with my current vehicle for another 48 hours, even if the engine ground to a standstill from lack of oil.

When my business in Santa Fe was done, I waited dutifully in line at the Albuerque Airport to change the credit card on my rental. The man behind the counter looked shocked at the request. “I’m sorry sir,” he said, “but we can’t change the contract on this end. You’d have to contact the originating location for that. Would you like me to give you the phone number for Las Vegas?”

By my count, that made at least eight “sorry’s” during a four-day rental. And that was the moment I decided on a new policy for my own business: “Sorry” is now considered a dirty word in any conversation with a customer. We’ll never use the S-word as a kind of bored shorthand for “I’ve got more important things to do and I really just want to get you out of my hair.”

Just as we would never curse at a customer, we’re never going to say “sorry,” either — not unless we immediately follow up the S-word with another phrase that shows we really mean it.

Right now I’m thinking that phrase should be: “How can I make it better?”

I’m open to suggestions, on that, however. What do you think is the best way to indicate that “sorry” is more than just an empty word? Leave your thoughts below.