If you just tuned in, see the two previous posts for context.

Seth presented many great ideas today, but I am going to banish all of them from this post except one, because I think it’s so important.

The Work and the People

If the people giving you feedback on your work are telling you it’s wrong, that they don’t like it, and they don’t want to buy it, you have exactly two options that will fix the problem:

Option 1) Ignore them, because they aren’t the people who you want to sell your work to. Even better, insulate yourself from even hearing them.

Option 2) Change your work to fit what those people want, because they are the people who you want to sell your work to.

Non-Option 3) Try to convince the people who don’t like your work that they should like it. This is not an option that will work.

Anonymous internet trolls are always the wrong people, you can ignore Amazon book reviews and hater YouTube comments, all the time. Many, many other sources of feedback come from the wrong people too, so choose Option 1 a lot. This is not about being arrogant, this is about being very clear about who you are working to please.

Personal P.S: Another attendee put into words well something that is really close to my heart these days. “I’ve learned how to make money. Now I want to learn how to make a difference.” To this end, I will wholeheartedly expand my businesses to their maximum potential, and continue working to make even more money with them. And, a huge part of the difference I make is right inside my own companies, with the customers and employees we touch. While that is happening, I also want to take the freedom and money and opportunities I have to amp up the “making a difference” part of my life in a broader scope. For now I think this means a lot of learning about how making a real difference works, and what kinds of differences I am best positioned to make. Going to Ethiopia next summer is part of that. This Medicine Ball event is part of that. There will be more to come. Here’s to making a difference.

As you know I’m at Seth Godin’s Medicine Ball event in NYC. Here are the biggest ideas I took away from the day:

Companies have a choice between being involved in a race to the top (best quality, or one-of-a-kind, something that makes your product really special to your target customers) or a race to the bottom (cheapest). The problem with the race to the bottom is there’s only one winner, and that winner may not have any profit left.

Marketing is about telling people a story that resonates with their worldview. It’s really important to know who you want to tell this story to. It’s also really important to know what keeps that person up at night. The thing you do and the story you tell (they better match) that connects with their pain or their joy, and that is also unique about you, that’s your “superpower”. Align everything you do to deliver really well on your superpower.

What people say to each other about your product is really important. You get to influence what they say by making your product genuinely remarkable, so talking about it becomes irresistible.

It’s essential as a marketer to develop a “tribe” of people who are fans of what you provide, and who honestly look forward to hearing from you. This is earning attention over a period of time by building trust and offering relevant value in your messages. Once you have trust, you have an opportunity to influence them to take action (buy something, donate, volunteer, etc.)

Personal P.S: Lots of things make me nervous. Like coming to this big busy city having no clue how to get around on the subway system. Or going to dinner with 16 incredibly smart and successful strangers, knowing nothing about what they will think of me. Or raising my hand to ask what might be a stupid question. I think it’s pretty normal to feel nervous and scared, and I do, almost every day. But I take these actions anyway, because the impactful life I want requires it, and because I know the actual danger or something harmful happening to me is really small. Here’s to intentionally doing scary new things.

I’m in NYC for the Medicine Ball Sessions with Seth Godin. It’s a three-day event that starts tomorrow. Tonight 17 attendees who’ve never met each other before met for dinner. It was a great experience. Some observations as a prelude to highlights to come from the main event.

New York is crowded. Someone should tell all these people (and cars, roads, and buildings) in the Northeast that we have lots of space available in the Midwest.

Grand Central Station is really big. They are not kidding about the grand part. Truly impressive.

I’m encouraged by the caliber of people at this event. Really impressive all around. It’s inspiring to me in the face of lots of scary and pessimistic news about the economy and American achievement. (Actually over half that I talked to weren’t from America, hmm.) There are a lot of really smart and engaging people doing some really cool things in the world.

Of the five of us within earshot during dinner (it was really loud, they really need some acoustic panels in that restaurant) three of us were (and are still) heavily influenced by peer groups and/or coaching experiences. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that these courageous, different-thinking, want-to-make-a-difference people had that in common. I’m a believer.

Personal P.S: Last Friday we bought land for the site of a business building expansion, .adjacent to our existing facilities. I’m really excited to have the “where will we get more space” question settled, and to be moving on to the execution phase of this project. Here’s to brave plans for the future. -Mark

Seth Godin is a leading voice on marketing, especially marketing as it is changing due to major Internet-driven changes in our world. He also likes to talk about making a maximum personal impact, a topic I care a lot about. Reading his stuff keeps me inspired to start things, live with courage, and make a difference.

If you are involved in selling, promoting, influencing, or communicating anything, you must subscribe to his blog. His post today preparing for the breakthough/calamity is absolutely right about how success and failure normally happen.

Here are the books Seth has published. I think “Permission Marketing” is the most important.

Enjoy.

In 2005 I had a freelance software development business, and one employee. The software business was doing very well. I was grateful, and I was having a good time being full-time self-employed for the first time in my adult life.

But I was afraid. The software business had become increasingly specialized, to the point that all my customers were users of the same software package that I didn’t make or sell, but I provided services and add-ons for. I was afraid that someday that software package would go away all at once — be bought out, shut down, or replaced. I thought about how bad I’d feel if I had to tell my one employee he was out of work because something like that had happened.

So I was looking for a second business to start, as a backup plan.

It happened that this employee (Phil Gioja) and I had a common interest. He had majored in film production in college, and I had majored in video broadcasting. (Full disclosure: He graduated, I dropped out.) We got the idea in our heads to put a studio in our unused office space.

I really wanted to do it. It sounded so fun. I felt guilty about it. It wasn’t practical. In one conversation about it, I said to Phil “We’ll probably never make any money on this.” Boy am I glad we started that studio against our better judgement.

I was right, the studio was a lot of fun, and it never made any money. But in the process of building that studio I designed the acoustic panels that became the spark of that second business I was looking for. The acoustic panel business grew into a big success, and the software business ended just the way I’d feared, becoming obsolete about one year later.

If we hadn’t gone ahead with that passionately interesting, impractical, money-losing studio idea, we would have been in a really tough business situation, and more importantly would have missed out on a huge business opportunity.

Starbucks started in a similar way. The first store sold coffee beans and tea bags, not prepared drinks! The initial vision of the founders didn’t work very well, but it was the incremental step that opened the door to something that worked much better.

Start things. Try things. You’ll probably create a stepping-stone to something you never imagined.