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Bad performance, good performance and the other two kinds

In the industrial age, the boss defines a good job as one that meets spec. If you do what you are told, on time and on budget, it's a good job.

A bad job, then, is one that requires repair or rescheduling or produces a shoddy output.

In the connection economy, the post-industrial age we're moving into now, there are two other kinds of work worth mentioning:

A remarkable performance is one that exceeds expectations so much that we talk about it. (Remarkable, as in worth making a remark about). In just about every field, it's possible to be remarkable, at least for a while, and thanks to the increasing number of connections between and among customers, remarkable work spreads your idea.

It's difficult to be remarkable every day in every way, though, because expectations continue to rise. Which leads to a fourth category:

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remarkable performance the job it personal utm kinds good and

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Why vote? The marketing dynamics of apathy

Here's what political marketers learn from people who don't vote:

Nothing.

If you don't vote because you're disappointed with your choices, disgusted by tactics like lying and spin, or merely turned off by the process, you've opted out of the marketplace.

The goal of political marketers isn't to get you to vote. Their goal is to get more votes than the other guy. So they obsess about pleasing those that vote. Everyone else is invisible.

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vote the to voting don marketing of marketers you who

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When you don't know what to do...

That's when we find out how well you make decisions.

When you don't have the resources to do it the usual way, that's when you show us how resourceful you are.

And when you don't know if it's going to work, that's how we find out whether or not we need you on our team.

Making instructions is harder than following them.

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2012/11/when-you-dont-know-what-to-do.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+typepad%2Fsethsmainblog+%28Seth%27s+Blog%29

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when utm you typepad know don we how fsethsmainblog that

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Thank you, Zig

My teacher Zig Ziglar died this morning. He was 86. 

Thanks for teaching me how to sell and why it mattered.

Thanks for reminding me how much it mattered to care.

Thanks for telling us a fifteen-minute story about Johnny the Shoe Shine Genius, so compelling that I flew to the airport just to meet him.

Thanks for 72 hours of audiotapes, listened to so many times I wore out the cassettes twice.

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thanks for zig to utm mattered and typepad you the

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Avoiding "I'll know it when I see it"

This is a waste for the buyer and the seller.

When you have a business or individual waiting for you to bring them custom work, it can lead to an endless cycle of, "hmmmm not quite right." If the architectural drawings, high-heeled shoes or ad campaign doesn't meet their unstated standards, you're back to doing it again.

Sometimes you can make a handsome profit on all the fees you charge to redo things that indulge the ego of the customer, but more likely than not, your time is wasted until they're happy. If you have a client who feels the same way, you can work together to save time and money by being clear with each other about what's wanted.

I think helping a client say what they want before they see it is a worthy endeavor.

  1. Do it on purpose. When engaging with a new client, intentionally create an environment where personal taste is described in advance, and as much boundary-building as possible is done when it's cheap to iterate, not at the end when it's expensive.
  2. Demand benchmarks. The world is filled with things that are a lot like what you've been asked to create. So mutually identify them. Show me three other websites that feel like what you're hoping to feel like. Hand me a hardcover book that has type that reads the way you want yours to read. Walk me through a building that has the vibe you're looking for...
  3. Describe the assignment before you start. Using your words and the words of the client, precisely state what problem you're trying to solve. "We're trying to build something that does a, b and c, and not d..."
  4. Then, before you show off your proposal, before you hand in your work, restate the problem again. "You asked us to do a, b and c at a cost of under X. What I'm about to show you does a, it does b and it does c... and it costs half of X." This sort of intentional restatement of the scope of work respects your client by honoring their stated intent, at the same time it focuses your work on the stated goals.
  5. Make a decision about whether you want a reputation for doing this sort of focused work. If you do, don't work for clients who don't buy into the process. Over time, you'll earn the kind of clients you want.

Of course, this isn't going to work every time. Sometimes the client loves the power of saying no. Sometimes the client isn't articulate enough to describe what she wants. And sometimes the goal is magic, and no one knows how to describe that in advance.

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the you to client it of work and that what

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Online, where you can't buy attention as easily as you can with traditional advertising, most commercial media has the imperative of interestingness built in. The assignment is to make it viral, make it something people will watch or click on or even better, share.

This is hard for mass marketers, marketers who are used to making average stuff for average people and promoting heavily in media where they can buy guaranteed attention. And so, we see organizations buying likes and pageviews, pushing for popovers and popunders and all sorts of new ways to interrupt online.

Smart advertisers, though, are realizing that they have to make content that people decide is worth watching. Some have very good indeed at making media that's so entertaining that we not only want to watch it, but spread it.

The challenge is that all those hoops you need to jump through to attract attention might be precisely the opposite of what you need to do to cause action, to get someone to change her mind or to connect.

A squadron of singing ferrets might make your video spread, but that approach isn't going to cause the action you seek.

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Hey, even the headline is a bummer. The first thing that they teach you at business book/blogging school is that "fun and easy" are the two magic words, followed, I guess, by "dummies." Difficult and frightening are not part of the syllabus.

Alas, the work we're being asked to do now, the emotional labor we're getting paid to do, is frightening. It's frightening to stand up for what we believe in, frightening to do something that might not work, frightening to do something that we have to be responsible for.

Tonight is the first ever Icarus Session, a worldwide event that might just be happening near you (click here to find the local event, and here to find out what it's all about). There are more than 360 communities signed up so far, with thousands of people around the world getting together in small groups to speak up and to support each other.

Two things might hold someone back from sharing the art they've got inside: The fear of telling the truth or the lame strategy of hiding the truth behind a sales pitch. 

If you can, find a way to come to a session near you tonight. And if you can find the voice, stand up and tell people what you care about.

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Tomorrow is the biggest day of the year for charitable giving in the US.

The reason is clear: if you make a donation Tuesday, you have to wait a whole year to get a deduction. Make it today and you get it right now.

Of course, charitable giving shouldn't be driven by the search for a tax deduction, but the knowledge that now is your last chance short-circuits the sooner or later decision.

So, today, before it's too late, why not help build a platform for those that need it, a platform that generates a hundred or a thousand times more pareto-optimal joy. Not because there's a heart-tugging pitch or an external urgency, but because sooner is better than later.

Room to Read, The Acumen Fund, Juvenile Diabetes, DoSomething, Afaya

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You can't argue with success...

Of course you can. What else are you going to argue with? Failure can't argue with you, because it knows that it didn't work.

The art of staying successful is in being open to having the argument. Great organizations fail precisely because they refuse to do this.


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argue you can with to because precisely organizations argument refuse

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Why do we get stuck?

Writer's block was 'invented' in the 1940s. Before that, not only wasn't there a word for it, it hardly existed. The reason: writing wasn't a high stakes venture. Writing was a hobby, it was something you did in your spare time, without expecting a big advance or a spot on the bestseller list.

Ngramwritersblock

Now, of course, we're all writers. We put our ideas into words and share them with tens or thousands of people, for all time, online. Our words spread. 

With the stakes higher than ever, so is our fear.

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The only purpose of 'customer service'...

is to change feelings. Not the facts, but the way your customer feels. The facts might be the price, or a return, or how long someone had to wait for service. Sometimes changing the facts is a shortcut to changing feelings, but not always, and changing the facts alone is not always sufficient anyway.

If a customer service protocol (your call center/complaints department/returns policy) is built around stall, deny, begrudge and finally, to the few who persist, acquiesce, then it might save money, but it is a total failure.

The customer who seeks out your help isn't often looking to deplete your bank account. He is usually seeking validation, support and a path to feeling the way he felt before you let him down.

The best measurement of customer support is whether, after the interaction, the customer would recommend you to a friend. Time on the line, refunds given or the facts of the case are irrelevant. The feelings are all that matter, and changing feelings takes humanity and connection, not cash.

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2012/10/the-only-purpose-of-customer-service.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+typepad%2Fsethsmainblog+%28Seth%27s+Blog%29

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the customer facts is changing feelings utm service to and

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Where do you go to trade in the points?

There are all sorts of actions we can take to earn points. We can earn points with our spouse, with a boss, with a customer... "Wow, you get extra points for that."

The question one might ask is, "what good are the points?" Hey, I'm earning all these points, what am I supposed to do with them?

When it comes to trading them in, they're actually a little like frequent flier miles. They're really difficult to redeem, even for an upgrade you'd like. Hardly worth the effort, it seems.

But for this kind of points, that's okay. The best part of earning points is earning them, not trading them in.


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Four questions worth answering

Who is your next customer? (Conceptually, not specifically. Describe his outlook, his tribe, his hopes and dreams and needs and wants...)

What is the story he told himself (about the world, about his situation, about his perceptions) before he met you?

How do you encounter him in a way that he trusts the story you tell him about what you have to offer?

What change are you trying to make in him, his life, or his story?

Start with this before you spend time on tactics, technology or scalability.

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Ways to improve your performance:

Compete for a prize
Earn points
Please a demanding boss
Make someone else's imminent deadline

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utm to typepad compete feed the is performance against head

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The first time was youthful bravery--I was playing hockey with people far better than I (not older, merely better) and they slammed me into the boards. That's something almost heroic, at least when you're twelve.

No, the second time was two days ago. I finished a delightful breakfast with a friend and as I walked out of the restaurant, I focused on the door to the street and the weather outside--and completely ignored the interior plate glass door, slamming right into it at full speed.

The important lesson: while it matters a lot that you have a goal, a vision and an arc to get there, it matters even more that you don't skip the preliminary steps in your hurry to get to the future. Early steps might bore you, but miss even one and you might not get the chance to execute on the later ones.

My nose is fine, thanks, better every day, but the reminder was a worthwhile one.

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2012/11/how-i-broke-my-nose-for-the-second-time.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+typepad%2Fsethsmainblog+%28Seth%27s+Blog%29

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the utm and typepad was better you matters to sethgodin

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A year ago today, do you remember where you stood?

Last year about this time, I was lying on the couch, having ripped my hamstring with a loud pop while working out early in the morning. But that's not the sort of 'stand' that I'm talking about.

Are you more trusted? More skilled? More connected to people who care about your work?

How many people would miss your work if you stopped contributing it?

New Year's resolutions rarely work, because good intentions don't often survive a collision with reality. But an inventory is a helpful tool, a way to keep track of what you're building. Drip by drip.

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Search marketing harvests demand, it doesn't create it (ht to Drew at Dropbox).

Most small businesses believe that they're too small to have an impact on the whole market, so they resort to picking the fruit that's already grown instead of planting their own seeds. It's far easier to wait until someone is ready to buy than it is to persuade them to buy.

Except the answer isn't to poach demand at the last minute. The answer is to redefine the market into something much smaller and more manageable. You don't need to persuade everyone that you have a great idea, you merely need to persuade one person. And then make it easy for that person to share.

One last semi-related thought: Wenda Millard quotes a Mercedes Benz exec, "If the only time I show you a Mercedes ad is just before you're about to buy a fancy car, I've lost." The fact is, advertising to build brand and recongnition and demand is a very long-term proposition, not something you measure with clicks.

A last-minute swipe of purchase intent is a tactical win. It's not, however, a long-term way to build your organization.

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Actually, I don't.

I know what I would do in this situation, but I'm not you.

I know what your customer should do, but I'm not her.

I know (and you know, and we all know) what we would do in a given situation, but that's not the same thing.

Empathy requires something extremely difficult: accepting the fact that we are not and never will be in the other person's shoes. There's no rational, universal course because individuals have different goals, different worldviews and different experiences.

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know utm what different not typepad do and but feed

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How much of your time and effort goes into protecting yourself from the things you fear?

And how much is spent serving your muse and your tribe and your potential?


http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2012/11/to-protect-and-serve.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+typepad%2Fsethsmainblog+%28Seth%27s+Blog%29

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utm and typepad your feed much how protecting tribe feedburner

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The whiner's room

When my friend Elly taught in a middle school, he never hung out in the teacher's room. He told me he couldn't bear the badmouthing of students, the whining and the blaming.

Of course, not all teachers are like this. In fact, most of them aren't. And of course, trolling isn't reserved to the teacher's room. Just about every organization, every online service, every product and every element of our culture now has chat rooms and forums devoted to a few people looking for something to complain about. Some of them even do it on television.

The fascinating truth is this: the people in these forums aren't doing their best work. They rarely identify useful feedback or pinpoint elements that can be changed productively either. In fact, if you solved whatever problem they're whining about, they wouldn't suddenly become enthusiastic contributors. No, they're just wallowing in the negative ions, enjoying the support of a few others as they dish about what's holding them back.

It pays no dividends to go looking for useful insight from these folks. Go make something great instead.

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2012/11/the-whiners-room.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+typepad%2Fsethsmainblog+%28Seth%27s+Blog%29

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