It’s way easier to eat lousy food than it is to exercise it off. Your effort is undermined by your inputs.
And the same thing is true for corporate culture.
You can work as hard as you like to create expectations and policies. But the people you begin with–their dreams, their narratives and their habits–are difficult to transform.
Successful projects and organizations require more than good intent. They require inputs from committed people who are going where you’re going. And they require a strategy that rewards not just short-term effort, but thoughtful direction and useful daily engagement.
Start with the right people. Figure out what the market needs and turn that objective into a daily practice, step by step. There’s no such thing as an overnight sustainable success.
PS #1: We just posted a job to work with us here in NY.
PS #2: Today is the best day to sign up for The Marketing Seminar. It’s the most effective workshop of its kind, and it will enable you to see what you’ve been missing—on your way to causing the change you seek to make. Join more than a thousand people on this journey forward… I hope you’ll consider checking it out. Look for the purple circle today.
January 3, 2019
If you need to persuade someone to take action, you’re doing marketing.
If you’re looking for votes at the city council meeting, or looking for a promotion, you’re marketing.
If you’re writing copy on your website, taking a selfie for your social media profile or trying to talk your way out of a speeding ticket, you’re marketing.
Marketing goes way beyond advertising, email pitches or the way you do pricing. In fact, most of the time, marketing has nothing at all to do with money.
We’re surrounded by people who would like a piece of our attention, a bit of our trust and some of our action. Those people are marketing to us, and it helps to know what they’re doing right (and wrong).
If someone says, “I don’t do marketing,” they probably mean, “I don’t spend money on ads.” Those are very different things.
Our culture is driven, more than ever, by marketers. The links we click on, the shows we watch, the people we vote for–they’re all marketing artifacts. If you don’t like the political situation, you’re commenting on the marketing situation.
As soon as we take responsibility for the marketing we do and the marketing that’s done to us, we have a chance to make things better (by making better things).
PS Today’s the first day of The Marketing Seminar. Look for the purple circle today to get our best price.
This workshop will change your work for the better.
January 2, 2019
Two dangerous uses of social media:
- To find out what other people are saying about you behind your back.
- To follow people you don’t particularly like, just to hope that they’ll mess up all over again.
The thing is, people have been talking about you behind your back your entire life. Hearing what they’re saying isn’t helpful.
And coming up with new ways to think less of others isn’t particularly useful either.
[Alert German speakers have pointed out that I’ve broken “schadenfreude” in half the wrong way, and it should be InstaSchaden but that doesn’t really roll off the tongue. Sorry for mangling it.]
In every field, extraordinary benefits go to those seen as being in the top five percent. One out of twenty.
Sure, the biggest prizes go to the once-in-a-generation superstar. But that’s largely out of reach. It turns out, though, that if you’re thoughtful and diligent, the top 5% is attainable.
The approach is to pick the right set to be part of. Not, “top 5% of all surgeons,” but perhaps, “top 5% of thoracic surgeons in Minnesota.” Be specific. Find your niche and fill it.
That’s challenging, because once you set out to be specific, you’re on the hook. The standards are more clear. No room to waffle.
Which leads to the second half of the approach: The hard work. The work of leveling up and being honest about the choices that those you seek to serve actually have. If they knew what you know, would they choose you? What would it take for you to learn enough and practice enough and invest enough to truly be one of the top 5%?
That’s something you can achieve in exchange for focus and effort. To be in the top 1% takes a combination of luck and magical talent. But to be in the top 5%, one in twenty, is mostly about choices.
The thing is, you’re not competing with the other 19 people, not really. You’re competing with yourself, competing in a journey to determine how much you care about making an impact.
Here’s to a powerful and productive year. Make a ruckus.
January 1, 2019
