Tag: Seth Godin

Knead the Need: Move the Needle!

 

You step on the accelerator and the speedometer needle moves.  The expression ‘ moving the needle ‘ was inspired from motoring. No prizes for guessing that.

 

In a distraction obsessed world, the biggest skill that we can acquire or improve on is to keep, retain and control our attention. It’s one thing not to fall prey to distraction and another to find the best use for your time, attention and effort. That is based on what is of the most significance to you. It is a calling that you will begin to recognise- focus, attention & effort on something that will actually ‘ move the needle ‘, to take things from where they are, to where it ought to be.

 

Pardon me for stating the obvious. The whole world is in constant motion. The earth moves, the clouds move, the waves move and we too must move. Move and reach the destination of your choice.

The three Ps will help us find our needle its vein. A physical goal, a personal goal and a professional goal. Together they achieve balanced productivity and regardless of what is going on in your life, if you accomplish these three things every day, you will move the needle in your life.

 

Most people set goals at the start of a new year. With a clean slate and fresh start, we’re optimistic, excited, and enthusiastic about the possibilities that lie ahead. But then reality sets in.

 

It’s harder than you thought it would be.

 

You don’t feel like you’re making progress.

 

Through no fault of your own, the world is in disarray (Pandemics, civil unrest, economic fluctuations, job loss, ruinous relationships etc.)

 

The goal you wanted to accomplish feels so far in the future or so far out of reach. You figure: why bother?

 

Does any of this sound familiar to you? If so, don’t worry. You’re not alone.

 

The best way to be where you want to be a year from now is to do something today you’ll be glad you did-Seth Godin

 

And it doesn’t have to be something big.

 

We underestimate the impact and potential of starting small and taking consistent action.

 

By breaking any endeavor up into the smallest manageable parts, you make visible progress, increase your motivation, and gain momentum.

 

Maybe you want to write a book, build a business or start a podcast. Writing elaborate business plans and conducting extensive research might make you feel productive. But these activities won’t necessarily move the needle forward.

 

The paradox of designing the future is that what you get done today is the only thing that matters. Tiny actions pile up and amass to something big and awesome.

 

If you need it, knead it. Move it. Move the needle.

 

ENDS

Un-Elevate The Elevator Pitch: Time For A Pattern Interrupt!

 

The quintessential elevator pitch has been indoctrinated into our culture for aeons. It is time to call time on that.

 

A pattern interrupt is anything that forces someone to change their natural pattern of thought. As a result, it is a technique that sales development and business development professionals use for a variety of situations in sales calls and sales processes.

 

Pattern Interrupt is an NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) technique for breaking a person’s usual habits by altering their mental, emotional, or behavioral state. Consider it an unexpected act that shocks them into a different state of mind.

 

” The purpose of an elevator pitch is to describe a situation or solution so compelling that the person you’re with wants to hear more even after the elevator ride is over “- Seth Godin

 

The brains of our audience are overloaded and preoccupied. Even a tiny bit of memory space is hard to come by. Experts will suggest the 3C model for your elevator pitch– Clear, Concise & Compelling. There is no shortage of advice floating around.

 

What if we do a pattern interrupt on the conventional elevator pitch? Which typically has always been about you making a pitch to a potential business partner or employer in the shortest possible time frame. No one ever bought anything on an elevator. The elevator pitch isn’t about selling your idea, because a metaphorical elevator is a lousy place to make a pitch.

 

When you are trying to cram in your perspective, your truth, your nuance, your past & your ambitions, all the while being judged, as you ride up a few floors, in just a few seconds, it is a sure fire way to failure.

So, how about putting the shoe on the other foot? We move from elevator pitch mode to a question mode, the elevator question. Beginning a conversation with the person you wish to connect with. Understanding who they are and what they want and then mapping it against who you are and what you want. So the elevator is like your trial room to check if the fit is right. And if the fit is not right, it is a signal, an opportunity to help the other side, even if it is not from you.

 

Rejection sets in when there is a mismatch of needs, narratives and what’s on offer. Rather than salivating over the prospect of the other person hiring you or doing business with you or fund you, calibrate your mind to think that no one can do these things. While you do that, open up the sunroof to bring in the sunshine of what you can help the other side with( and there are plenty of people whom you can help, mind you). And one way is that help could also come in the way of NOT making a pitch to them.

 

Hustle is de rigueur in our culture but a pattern interrupt that will work best is not to fall into the trap of hustling others.

 

Building a personal brand is an art. If you agree, this article from BrandKnew could be of interest, https://www.brandknewmag.com/you-need-to-establish-a-personal-brand-to-succeed-in-the-workplace-of-tomorrow-heres-how/

 

ENDS

Margins can be profitable!

Margin is the space between our load and our limits– Robert Swenson

 

Remember, back in the day, when writing on paper was a salve and stylus and laptops were not as omnipresent as they are now, we would fold the foolscap paper from the left by an inch or so and offer it a margin ( I would never get it in a straight line but I always made an effort). It was the signal where to start off from and give our articulation some space before it began. The fold mark remained conspicuous and so did our writing, in most cases.

 

As you play your vinyl, you are happy to hear the reassuring hiss between the end of one song and the beginning of the next. Building expectation. It happens as credits roll as a comforting precursor to the constitution that is the movie that is about to begin. All of our media has margins. A space between what we are consumed with and the rest of the world.

 

As Christa Sterken put it, the best things in life are written in the margins. White space has the calming, soothing effect that a Hoover agnostic mind and life are not letting us. The white space serves us an offering to think outside of the confines of the text. Like a visual and a mental break.

 

Imagine books or magazines or newspapers. Think of how difficult it would be to read if the words were to be taken completely to each edge of the paper. Paintings have a frame, or a wall separating them from the next.

 

Margin is having the pace and space in your day to allow real life to happen. The margins are where you will find yourself. The honesty, the integrity, the real friends, the relationships that last a lifetime through good and bad.

 

As the inimitable Seth Godin puts it ” The self-discipline to see the margin and use it as a tool is a gift we offer the consumer of culture “.

 

Living in the margins will not make you marginalized. On the contrary, that probably is where the you-er or even the you-est ( the best version of you) in you will come to the fore.

 

ENDS

 

A subtle trap called ‘ tactics ‘

They go by different descriptions:-

” Birds of the same feather, flock together ”

” Herd mentality ”

” Collective bias ”

” Wisdom of the crowds ”

Agreed. In his book ‘The Descent of Man‘ published in 1871, English naturalist Charles Darwin presented the idea that human beings and apes have a common ancestor. There’s a simple answer though: Humans did not evolve from chimpanzees or any of the other great apes that live today. We instead share a common ancestor that lived roughly 10 million years ago.

So much for ‘aping ‘ then!

Imitating others may not be the way to go. Or copying their tactics. But tactics, as Neil Gaiman reminds us, can be the subtlest of traps. Just because others are using a tactic or a tool doesn’t make it the most effective way to accomplish your objective.

What’s more, when you copy the “proven” tactics of others, you end up basing your decision only on success stories.

Sure, that photo of hundreds of people waiting in line for Seth Godin to sign books looks impressive. But you’re not Seth Godin (and if you are, I’m a big fan). And you’re not seeing the hundreds of authors who walked into a Barnes & Noble to do a reading only to find a handful of readers waiting for them.

The wiser thing to do maybe to go back to the drawing board and first principles. Understand the principle behind a tactic. Zoom out of a conventional tactic and see the other possibilities that escaped your attention. And as we go along, here is what we could learn:

To stop being a hunter-gatherer of other people’s tools, tactics, and formulas.

Instead, master the principle behind them.

Once you know what the principle is—once you know the why behind the tactic—you can create your own extraordinary how.

We assume erasing our fingerprints from our work and following the herd makes it safe. We hide behind what’s expected and what’s accepted. We’d rather be wrong collectively—we’d rather fail singing the same gospel song that everyone else is singing—than risk failing individually. So we chase trends, adopt the latest fad, and, as misfortune would have it, walk the line.

The line “no one does it that way” stops a conversation before it can bud. This monkey see, monkey do approach creates a race to the center. But the center is too crowded with others. Birds of the same feather. In the herd, you rarely get heard.

Becoming extraordinary requires becoming more like yourself—and embracing your own gifts, whatever they maybe.

When you do that, you become a magnet that attracts some people with the same force that it repels others.

The people you attract are your people. The others aren’t.

You can’t be liked by all and disliked by none. If you aim for that unachievable objective, you’ll only reduce the force of your magnet—the very source of your strength.

This doesn’t work if it’s a gimmick—if you’re just trying to get attention or zigging simply because everyone else is zagging. This isn’t rule breaking for the sake of rule breaking either—rebelling without a cause against the establishment. Rather, it’s an intentional bending of the rules, driven by a desire to live in a way that’s aligned with who you are.

It’s only by embracing, rather than erasing, your idiosyncrasies—the things that make you extraordinarily you—that you become remarkable. Tactics mean doing what you can with what you have.

Rather than spend several, deeply unproductive days wishing that the universe had dealt you a better hand and going into a canyon of despair, unleash you. There is an audience waiting. With drum rolls.

You reckon this is a tactic worth pursuing?

ENDS

The changing idea of marketing as a concept!

If you are one of the marketers who embraces convention, no one will point a finger at you if you were to follow the norm that has been practiced for years. Build/produce/manufacture, brand, market, sell. Justified linear thinking.With strong empirical evidence( I mean brand and business success) to boot.

With so many years of conventional wisdom( that also is the wisdom of the crowds that drive collective bias) in the ring, it would have been a really uphill task for any brand to alter(let alone disrupt) the narrative. But there is something about audacity and moonshots that make them perfect partners in rhyme.

I devote this blog post predominantly to understand marketing from a new lens- the one that brand Tesla is scripting so brilliantly. Directed by Elon Musk(Iron Man). Allow me to go back a few years.

It’s the 4th of April, 2016. The Tesla Model 3 is being launched in the US. It sports a price tag of US$ 35,000 and bookings can be made with a U$1,000 down payment.  Then history unfolds. A whopping 276,000 cars were booked(read pre-sold) on the day, probably a first ever in automotive marketing . And Tesla gathered US$ 276 Million in upfront cash. And here’s where the story gets interesting. There was not even a model car ready. All the sales happened courtesy a few photographs of the Model 3. That’s it. There’s more. There was not even a single car that had gone into production. The first promised schedule for delivery of the Model 3 was late 2017, that was a good 18+ months away. Tesla had disrupted automotive marketing on it’s head and how.

Let’s try to understand more of the phenomena that is brand Tesla.

  • Tesla’s $0 marketing budget is incredibly awesome marketing
  • Tesla Motors has no advertising, no ad agency, no CMO, no dealer network. And that’s no problem. – AdvertisingAge
  • If you drop by the Tesla forums, you’ll see a community of passionate fans discussing how to market Tesla better. There are over 55,000 people subscribed to the /r/teslamotors subreddit. The brand has clearly struck a chord with its fans.
  • Tesla fans are crazy advocates. They attach deep emotional significance to the car. They’re not just paying for a mode of transportation, they’re paying for a slice of the future.
  • Prior to the Model 3 launch, Tesla had introduced the P100D Ludicrous– a luxury model priced over US$ 80,000(base level) with upgraded versions well over US$ 100,000. The marketing masterstroke was in the message conveyed. ” While the PD100 Ludicrous is an expensive vehicle, we want to emphasise that every sale helps pay for the smaller and more affordable Model 3 which is under development. Without customers willing to buy the expensive Model S and X, we would be unable to fund the smaller, more affordable Model 3 “. This is brand positioning at it’s masterful best, making a luxury purchase almost into a charitable act.
  • Every element of the Model S – from the recharging technology to the drag coefficient of the car – is presented as the pinnacle of research and engineering.
  • By eschewing marketing completely, Elon Musk is actually communicating that Tesla is focused on ground breaking technology.
  • Tesla the brand transcended from being just another automotive player in the business to encompass economics, politics, world power to have global energy NOT driven by oil. In the process, creating the marketplace, the eco system where they are the game. As also the game changer.

“ BMW has a marketing department called engineering.” – Seth Godin

These things obviously don’t bother Musk too much. If one were to give him an advertising budget, he is sure to divert that into production. And the final result: an even more incredible car. And inspite of NO Advertising, he gets the world talking about his brand, especially the people who matter.

How does Tesla manage to do all of this free of cost which other brands would spend millions to buy?

First, build something that matters to people. Then, tell a story that resonates with people. Just like iPhones/iPod and Steve Jobs, electric cars are a great story. The greatest stories are aspirational, representing the triumph of passion, conviction, persistence and diligence.

” I know a lot of very wealthy people.  Most of them made their money in technology.  I don’t think Bentley or Rolls-Royce is anywhere near the top of very many of these people’s idea of an impressive car.  A Tesla is more like it “. – Jimmy Wales, on Quora

This sort of advertising is earned, not bought.

You earn this sort of attention by making something truly newsworthy. Or saying something newsworthy.

” The public tends to be, as they should, interested in things that are precedent and superlatives.” – Elon Musk

Musk is all over YouTube. The media is chasing him nine to the dozen. Why? Because he is always working on cool, fascinating, path breaking projects.

Musk is a CEO who understands the power of showmanship(tonnes of interviews, cameo roles in films and media appearances.

Just Google ‘ Elon Musk  says ‘and you will get the most quotable of quotes that media loves to lap up and carry forward.

The Hyperloop is something that Musk is NOT planning to make but delivers great PR for him as a tech visionary.

At most times,Tesla has more orders than they can build – that in itself is great marketing.

Tesla has demonstrated that brands and organisations can move on from a Build/produce/manufacture, brand, market, sell model to that of a brand, market, sell, build one. Welcome to the next normal.

As William Gibson would say, “The future is already here – it’s just not very evenly distributed.”-  which will be nothing like what we have experienced before, we’re all going to be completely re-evaluating so many aspects of our lives: education, medicine, work, social responsibility, inner calling, the list goes on. And under the aegis of the Covid 19, all of this is happening remotely right now. And the question for a lot of companies and brands is going to be: Now that this shift has happened, am I still relevant? Does what I do still make sense? Am I serving an essential function, especially in a time when everyone is being careful about their finances?

Answering in the affirmative will separate the men from the boys. Wanted. More Musketeers!

ENDS

https://www.groupisd.com/story

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