Pushing It

A story of mine is due
to my editor-for-hire
tomorrow.

Normally, it takes me
two months to write a story
of this length.
I wrote this story in a month
(and I’m damn happy with it).

It came with sacrifice.
I didn’t leave the house all month.
I didn’t see friends,
saw very few family members.
I didn’t sleep much.
I worked long hours.
I was a bit grumpy.

But everyone knew I was
on this tight deadline
and they accepted that.
They also know
the push will be over tonight.

Tomorrow,
I will be brain dead.
It also won’t be
a working day.
Friends and family will expect
to see me,
to spend time with me.

We all have to push it
from time to time.
The key is
to have an end date
for this push,
communicate it to loved ones,
and spend time with them
once the end date has passed.

Idris Elba And Failure

Idris Elba
shares

“I’m not afraid to fail.
I’m not afraid to fall over,
to make a mistake.
That often times
cripples people
on the onset of
getting into anything.
The first time I ever picked up
a DJ deck was horrible.
But I’m not afraid of that.
I’m not afraid of that feeling.
It actually propels me,
works quite the opposite.”

The key for me
in dealing with failure
is viewing it
as a step toward success.

Failure isn’t the end.
It is part of the journey.
Look at failure
as proof that you’re closer
to your goal.

Sink His Own Ship

I’ve seen this unfold
in corporate
and I’m watching this unfold
in the Presidential Election.

One candidate
(for President
or a job
or whatever the competition is)
isn’t the most intelligent person
in the group.
The other candidates
allow him to talk,
thinking he’ll blunder
and eliminate himself
from consideration.

And he usually does blunder,
many times,
but offsetting this
is the fact that he has the floor.
He has more face time
with people.
People might not respect him
but they know him.

MANY people
are afraid of the unknown.
They’ll align with
‘the devil they know’
over a stranger.

Go ahead.
Allow your competition
to make a fool of himself
but ensure
you have as much time
with the decision makers
as he does.

Should You Care About Brexit?

A romance writer told me
yesterday
that she didn’t give a shit
about Brexit.

I care.

The UK is my second largest source
of romance eBook sales
(the first being the USA).
That alone makes the situation
worth understanding.

Brexit will have a major impact
on what stories are popular.
I haven’t yet figured out
where tone will go.
I suspect stories set
outside the real world
will gain in popularity.
Contemporary romance
will be even more challenging to sell.

And that’s simply the impact
on the romance novel industry.

The world significantly changed
last week.
Even if you only do business
within the USA,
Brexit will have consequences
for your business.

Whether or not
this change is good or bad
depends on your industry
and your business
and how you respond to it.

You don’t have to understand
the details of Brexit
(I don’t think anyone
fully understands that)
but you should try to understand
how it will change your business.

The world is small.
Major world events
will change the future
of your business.

Benchmarking Against Others

A healthy vibrant industry or niche
has competitors.
Why?
Because competitors push
each other.
I write more words
when I know
other writers are writing.
The big beverage company
I worked for
constantly tried to outdo
their competition
with creative marketing.

But constantly comparing
yourself or your business
to others
can
be damaging for your confidence
IF
you do it the wrong way.

Katie Bingham-Smith
shares the most common error.

“The thing is,
when we compare ourselves
to others,
more often than not,
we are comparing
our worst moments,
our weaknesses,
to
their strengths.”

If you’re going to benchmark
against someone,
track ALL their movements
-the good and the bad,
the successes and the disasters.

David Cameron And Being Out Of Touch

David Cameron resigned
as Prime Minister
after Britain voted
to leave the EU.

I understand why he would do that.
He represents the people.
That’s his job.
And, after the vote,
he realizes
he’s out of touch
with what his people,
both his employers and his customers,
want.

As business builders,
it is easy to find ourselves
in the same situation.

We sell baby clothes
but our own kids
are now teenagers.

We manufacture dairy products
but we’re now lactose intolerant.

We sell to low income customers
but we now live
in a middle class gated community.

What do we do?

One option is the David Cameron option.
We step aside
and allow someone more in touch
with our customers
to lead the company.

OR

We put in the work
to stay in touch with our customers.
We hang out where they do.
We watch the TV shows they do.
We learn everything
we can about them.

To increase the odds
of success,
the leader of your company
HAS to stay in touch with your customers.
Either give the job to someone else
or make staying in touch
part of your job.

Better Than You

A year ago,
I was the least seasoned,
least successful writer
in a boxed set of 20 writers.

It was a bit intimidating.
They were better than me
at…well…everything.
I felt stupid and useless.

So I kept my mouth shut
and learned.
I learned more with that boxed set
than I’d learned in the previous year.
Not only did that boxed set
end up on the USA Today Bestselling List
but my skills jumped
two or three levels.

Seth Godin
shares

“It takes guts for an employee
or a group member
to aggressively try to persuade people
more passionate,
more skilled or smarter
to join in,
because by raising the average,
they also expose themselves
to the fact that they’re not as good
as they used to be
(relatively).”

If you want to improve
quickly,
team with people
who are better than you.

When To Share Your Plans

I always knew
I’d be a published writer
some day.
However,
I had sh*t I wanted to do
in other industries first.
I launched new products,
implemented new systems.

And I didn’t talk about
my writing goals.

I wasn’t ready
to work on the writing
and I didn’t want people
to ask about it.
I had other things to talk about.

Seth Godin
shares
another reason
to keep plans for the far future
quiet.

“At first,
it seems as though
the things you declare,
espouse and promise
matter a lot.
And they do.
For a while.

But in the end,
we will judge you on
what you do.
When the gap
between
what you say
and
what you do
gets big enough,
people stop listening.”

Don’t share your plans
before you’re ready
to take action on them.

Why Your Marketing Partner Should Be Watching Game Of Thrones

There are buttons
floating around
social media
stating
the posters
are NOT Game Of Thrones viewers
and they’re proud of it.

This is NOT the person
you want
as your marketing partner.

Why?

Because over 10 million people
watch Game Of Thrones

every week.
It is so popular
that many of the people,
who don’t watch it,
still know about it.

If a marketer
isn’t interested
in figuring out
why Game Of Thrones
is attracting such a large audience,
you don’t want her
working with your brand.

I don’t like Supernatural
but I watch it
because it makes me a better marketer.

Marketing professionals
should be in touch
with popular shows, books, video games, etc.
They don’t have to like them
but they should know why they’re popular.

Published
Categorized as Marketing

Avoiding Head-To-Head Competition

Sunday revealed episodes
of two big TV shows
– Game Of Thrones
and Penny Dreadful.

Normally,
the time slots for these shows
are different.
Viewers can watch both.

This week,
Penny Dreadful,
the show with the smaller viewership,
overlapped their two-hour ending
with the Game Of Thrones slot.
This forced viewers to choose,
which made viewers unhappy
and lowered viewership
for both shows.

Why they did this?
I don’t know.

Recently,
I found out that a much beloved writer
in a niche I’m writing in
was re-releasing a popular series
along with a new story
in the same month
as one of my books was releasing.

I changed my release date.

Readers, book bloggers and reviewers
were thrilled.
They didn’t have to choose
who to support,
who to promote,
who to read.
They viewed it
as me being respectful of their niche,
identifying me as one of their tribe.

The other writer was grateful.
She is promoting me
to her much larger readership.

If you can avoid
head-to-head competition
with other people/companies
in your niche,
consider doing so.