A Second Opinion

I was assigned a new writer to mentor.
She asked me a question.
I spent about an hour of my time
replying and then discussing that reply.

A day later,
she posted the same question
on the general writing loop.
That is the last bit of mentoring I’ll be doing
for this writer.

Getting a second opinion
on important decisions
is a great, great thing to do.

However…
if you value the first opinion,
you may want to keep
the fact that you’re getting a second opinion
to yourself.

Successful people are busy.
If they don’t think their opinion is valued,
they won’t offer it.

Offer Product Versions

Rafi Mohammed,
author of
The 1% Windfall:
How Successful Companies Use
Price To Profit and Grow,
advises to use
different product versions
to appeal to a wider range of customers.

“Consider offering
good, better, and best versions
to allow customers
to choose how much to pay
for a product.
For example,
many gourmet restaurants
offer early-bird, regular and chef’s-table options.
Price-sensitive foodies
come for the early bird specials,
while well-heeled diners
willingly pay an extra $50
to sit at the chef’s table.”

The key is,
of course,
to have three very different options
for the three very different price points.

Can you offer
good, better and best versions
of your products?

Focusing On The Present

One of the key habits
of happy people is
they enjoy the present.

That doesn’t mean they don’t set goals.
As
Tal Ben-Shahar,
author of
Happier: Learn the Secrets to Daily Joy and Lasting Fulfillment,
states
“The primary objective of goals
is to liberate you
to enjoy the here and now,
the journey.”

You are likely not yet
at the stage you ideally wish to be
with your business building.

The thing is…
if you’re an ambitious person,
you likely will NEVER be
at the stage you wish to be.
As you reach your target,
you make a new target.

So enjoy where you are.
Enjoy start up pains
and that crazy growth period
and all the other stages of business building.
You may never experience this again.

Old Spice Success

They are witty.
They are fast moving and full of content.
They are self-deprecating.
I can watch them again and again.
I love the Old Spice commercials,
including the youtube responses.

Turns out…
everyone else does too.

There are parodies
(my favorite being the library parody)
which reinforce Old Spice’s original messaging.

And this has translated into sales,
reviving a brand.

Old Spice body wash sales
have increased 107%
in the past month.

All because the brand managers had some fun
with a very traditional brand.
Brilliant.

Published
Categorized as Marketing

Look To The Future

I’ve had three great offers this week.
Yeah, I’ve been damn fortunate.

Yet…
I turned down all three.

Why?

Because these great offers
don’t tie into how I envision my future.
I know they will lead to other opportunities
but these other opportunities
will take me even further from my goals.

The opportunities don’t disappear.
They will go to someone else
who will value them more.

It is tough letting them go.
It means standing firm
on what I see as my future.
Yet my dreams will never come true
if I’m chasing someone else’s.

Alice Cooper And Bad Press

In an interview with Much More Music,
Alice Cooper talked about the wild rumors
that surrounded him and his band
when they first started out.

He said he didn’t bother to dispute them.
He laughed about the rumors
and they became
part of the Alice Cooper legend.

The press had fun painting him
as the villain of rock,
a role he embraced.

“Half of it was the press saying
this was fun
and this guy didn’t mind.”

The rumors changed his brand image permanently.
He didn’t use his energy to fight them.
He used his energy
to convert them into record sales.

That’s a lesson many brands need to learn.

Published
Categorized as Marketing

False Starts

I’m participating in a Christmas anthology.
I started a story for this
five times yesterday.
All five starts didn’t work.

I wish I could say
this was unusual.
I wish I could say
that the number of false starts
will decrease in time.

I can’t
because it isn’t
and it hasn’t.

What HAS changed is
when I kill the false starts.
In a longer novel,
I know to kill a start
if by the third chapter,
the characters haven’t taken over.
In a short story,
I know it isn’t working
in the first 1,000 words.

We talk about this a lot on this blog
because it is key to success.
Most successful people fail
but they fail fast.
They’ll have 10 failures in 10 weeks.

Learn how to spot a failure quickly.

Making Dinner For A Foodie

One of my cousins came to visit last week.
She’s a foodie.
She buys only the best ingredients
and spends hours every day
cooking for her family.

I’m the type of gal
who orders a burger
at The Chophouse
I didn’t cook for my cousin.
We ate out every night.

That should be obvious
but is it?
How many times
do companies try to sell their products
to people who clearly aren’t interested?

I worked in new business development
at a quick service restaurant.
We tried to develop
a ‘healthy’ french fry,
a fry that health conscious moms would like.
We were never successful.
Once the moms heard
the quick service restaurant developed it,
they nixed the fries.
The fries could have been made of oxygen
and the moms wouldn’t have approved them.

A friend of mine
has been trying for a decade
to convince her religious mom
to read
the steamy romances she writes.
That’s not going to happen.

Unless you’re a top chef,
don’t make dinner for a foodie.

Published
Categorized as Marketing

Products That Build

An author friend of mine
is trying to sell
part two of a series.
The challenge is…
part one is unavailable
and part two builds on the first book.
No publisher wants this second book.

I missed an episode of a tv show.
This tv show builds.
Unlike many other shows,
past episodes are not on the internet.
I don’t plan to ever watch this show again.

If you have a product that builds
and you wish new customers/viewers/readers,
it may make sense
to make the previous product available
for free or a nominal charge.

Forewarning About Favors

I’m getting asked for a big favor today.
I know
because the relative called me
on Saturday
and said she wanted
to discuss something with me today.
She wouldn’t discuss this on the phone.
I’m 99% sure it is a favor.

I don’t know what kind of favor.
I don’t know how big this big favor is.
So since Saturday
it has been simmering
in the back of my mind,
irritating the hell out of me.
Although I usually grant all favors I can grant,
I am predisposed to say no to this one
(just because it ruined my freakin’ weekend).

If you’re going to warn someone
that you’re going to ask them a favor,
at least have the decency
to let her know what that favor consists of
(financial, time, expertise, etc).

It also helps, if you can,
to build up to the favor.
Hint that you’re having financial difficulty
or that you may be kicked out of your house
or…

Otherwise, simply ask
and DON’T forewarn.