meaning
218 posts
Better Than Before
Our plumber, Evan, spends every minute of his day solving problems. There are no breaks to check email or to see who’s commented on Facebook. He’s too busy working things out, wondering where the source of the problem is or deciding how he might make the repair more robust than what was originally i
Permission To Be Impractical
Back in 1984, it wasn’t practical for Richard Branson to think he could launch a better airline with just one secondhand Boeing 747. And yet, that’s is exactly what he did. It would have been more practical for James Dyson to give up after the fifth attempt to invent the best vacuum cleaner in the…
Marketing Backwards
I recently witnessed a young friend agonise for two months about which new smartphone to buy. A thousand dollars was a big investment for her. She had to weigh it up carefully. She trawled through every online review site for weeks. But the internal dialogue went on for much longer. We often believe
Pedestals
Whoever said you should never meet your heroes was only partly right. There is an element of truth in the adage. Reality can rarely compete with the imaginary. Fleeting, real encounters are flat—two dimensional at best. The imagined meeting is all deep connection and unspoken understanding on both s
21 Questions For Creators And Innovators
Ideas are easy and free, execution can be painful and costly. Not just because it requires time, effort and resources—but because we often don’t do enough groundwork to get clear about the impact we hope to create. While it’s important to plan for success and mitigate against failure, what’s equally
In Praise Of The Ordinary
We devote a lot of resources to creating the momentous. Dressing the window for the big sales event, crafting the sales pitch for a product launch, planning the grand family celebration—those orchestrated events to remember, where we can shine. The truth is we have the potential to make the most imp
You Don’t Need To Compete When You Know Who You Are
Before globalisation, marketing, hair straighteners and the bullworker, our tribal ancestors and village businesses stood out by excelling at their craft. They became known for doing the thing other people in the village couldn’t or wouldn’t do. They were beloved for the way they went about their wo
The Rise Of The Interested
It doesn’t seem that long ago since a customer would get personal service at a drapery shop even if she was only buying four buttons for the baby cardigan she’d made. A real conversation ensued and colours were carefully matched. By the time money changed hands the assistant knew who the cardigan wa
Navigating Opportunity
Have you noticed how different the world feels when you set out on a familiar journey but leave five minutes earlier? You experience things you’d ordinarily miss. You become aware of the subtle change in the light or weight of the clouds. The traffic moves easily through green lights, and the birdso
Present Tense Planning
When surgeon and author Atul Gawande treats a terminal patient, he doesn’t assess the available options in ways a conventional medical team might have weighed them up in the past. Instead of wondering whether they should keep fighting or if the time has come to give up, he and his colleagues ask a d
A List Of Alternatives To Winning
Alternatives To Winning Caring Helping Being human Growing wiser Inspiring others Righting wrongs Upholding values Giving generously Learning patience Prioritising values Practicing empathy Building community Leading thoughtfully Acting with integrity Exploring possibilities Encouraging progress Mak
What The Best Marketers Know
The call centre operator insists ‘this is not a cold call’. She knows time is running out, so she desperately accelerates her sales pitch—speaking without pausing to either breathe or listen. She was trained to believe it’s possible to close the sale if she can just impart all the information in her
Flipping The Focus Group
We’ve been using focus groups for eighty years in an attempt to understand how to create things people want to buy and messages they want to hear. And while we question what our customers like and what demographic they fit into, we rarely think about who they are beyond the choices they make. What i
The Value Of An Internal Brand Narrative
In a commercial world, we use stories tactically to convince and convert prospective customers. We work hard to change minds and capture hearts, with persuasive words and evocative images in an attempt to make an emotional connection with the people we want to reach. The stories we tell our customer
Why Not Make Something Great?
Like his grandfather, before him, Shane was in the textiles business. He made good socks for a living until the day he realised that pretty soon there would be no living to be made in a product that was good enough. His company was struggling to differentiate from and compete with big retailers who
We And Us
The group of colleagues on a business trip say goodbye as they board their respective flights. The boss congratulates them on a job well done. Their smiles slip as soon as he’s out of earshot. How could he possibly think that meeting was a success? The company is just going from bad to worse. It’s…
The Limitations Of Marketing To Persuade
We assume sales and marketing are simply a case of fulfilling unspoken desires or unmet needs and making the people with those needs aware we’ve solved their problem. But there’s another piece of the marketing puzzle we often overlook—the doubts our customers must overcome. People don’t just want to
What Do You Need More Of In Order To Succeed?
If you had to pick one thing you need more of in order to succeed what would that be? Do you really need more time or more resources? Will more attention or more influence enable you to get to where you want to go? When we dig deeper what we find we’re lacking isn’t cash…
Attention Deficit
Worldwide ad spending for 2017 is expected to reach $583.91 billion. That’s an increase of 7.3% on last year. We spend extraordinary sums of money and disproportionate amounts of time trying to get people to notice us—often without being specific about the end we have in mind. No business ever died
Three Ways To Sell
If you want to get more comfortable about selling, it’s helpful to consider which of these three sales techniques you use and to assess how they’re working for you. Describing This is the most common way to sell—one you’ve likely experienced or used. Describing the specifications, features and benef
