GarthBox

There are a handful of extremely smart, talented, quick, avant-garde people I work with, who I read, who I listen to, who I walk by each day. I often wonder, how did they get there?

Simply being mystified is a cop-out from answering the question. So here’s the answer.

They made similar mistakes to what we’ll make. In fact, many of them will be the same.

I was trained by an exceptional receptionist once (because I love to know what people do from top to bottom on the totem pole). She said something very comforting to me.

“There’s nothing you will do that I haven’t done myself.”

She’s made all the mistakes in the book, that’s how she got so good. Same goes for marketers, musicians, and magicians.

Don’t let yourself believe that incredible people were born that incredible, that things just came easy, that they’ve always done their work flawlessly. It’s not true.

There’s nothing you will do wrong that they haven’t done, and, if there in fact is something you do that they haven’t, then you ought to consider yourself lucky and one step ahead of them.

 

Stay Positive & Mistakes Are Special

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I labelled 2015 the year of Transformation. After listening to Matt & Kim’s song “Now” I was inspired to declare 2016 the year of Now. Instead of thinking about doing things I’ll just do them right away. This will help me fail fast, stop the lizard brain, and eliminate the consequences of procrastination.

 

Thinking on it, though, it’s counter intuitive to wait until next year.

 

So with that. It begins now. With this exact blog post. We’ll see what comes of it. At least I’ll try it for 30 days.

 

Stay Positive & No Time For Being In A Rut

It’s awfully easy to tell when someone is lying if you’re focused on their responses to your questions. This goes for interviewing, talking to coworkers, and asking friends what they think about your shirt.

What I love is when people respond with “I don’t know.”

Their response and what they do after it says more than a piece of truth or a lie ever would. “Not knowing” falls under two categories.

The first is simply because no one told them. They haven’t read it online. They haven’t sought out a teacher for it. This is fixable thanks to Google and the connection economy. If you want to find someone to teach you the guitar, you’re just a Google search or FB status away.

The second response is the “I don’t know”…”and I don’t care to find out.”

At first it may sound rude of them, but ask yourself what’s the reason they don’t want to find out. What are they afraid of? Why don’t they care? Would it be your job to motivate them? Because that’s your job as a marketer, to practice motivating people to overcome their fears.

While it may be best practice to hand-pick the talented, perhaps you yourself can become a bit more skillful by providing the pressure, the support, the care to get your friends, your coworkers, your candidates to turn their “I don’t knows” into “I cans,” I wills,” and maybe even “I now knows…thank you.”

 

Stay Positive & Beggars Can’t Be Choosers, But They Can Be Teachers

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If marketers tell the right stories… If the stories resonate with the right people: the target, the boss, the friend, the client, then we consider our work a success. What is the story you’re telling yourself about yourself?

I’ve read so many times how the most successful people have something they’re working toward. I’ve talked to successful marketers and what has stood out most is the story they have about themselves.

This isn’t to say it’s easy. In fact, telling stories about others will get a lot easier once you take the time to craft your story about yourself. However, you’ve learned so many tactics as a marketer, why not use them on yourself?

 

Stay Positive & Make It A Story You Look Forward To Listening To Each Day

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It’s fun to brainstorm a great launch, to think of making a giant splash at the start of a new product’s life, to get media validation that your creation will be successful at the start.

However, it’s not worth the extra time, the extra money, the extra resources to do.

 

Stay Positive & Best To Invest In The Long Run

 

Free is an excellent tactic for getting initial attention.

What many marketers fail to incorporate into their overall strategy is that once free is used as a tactic, it has to be repeatedly used in fresh ways while still marketing something of greater value for a price.

When it comes to content people will expect it to be free unless it meets one of these three criteria.

1. It’s so special that they can’t get it anywhere else
2. That it makes their bond to others like them stronger (connects to their tribe)
3. They benefit by being the first to have it

Great content marketing is a weave between free and each of these three pieces of criteria.

 

Stay Positive & Free For Now…

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