In The Box Podcast

Episode 40: Trusting Reviews, Apologizing, Regaining Control And More

On this episode of In The Box Podcast we talked about the overuse of “sorry,” one way to regain composure and control, why we trust stranger reviews, one takeaway from Michael’s time in higher education, and how to handle rules that were meant to be broken.

Episode 40: Trusting Reviews, Apologizing, Regaining Control And More

Sorry – When should you say sorry?

Control – One tip for regaining control if you feel you are losing control?

Trusting Strangers – Do you think we are more likely to trust strangers reviews about a product over any facts that brand or marketer will tell us? Why?

Education Takeaway – What is the biggest lesson or takeaway you learned from when you were in college?

Bonus – How do you handle rules that are unjust or make no sense?

 

Stay Positive & Trust Is Still Fickle

In The Box Podcast

Episode 17: Team Building Failure, Brand vs. Customer Voice, Self-Reliance And More – Podcast

On this episode of In The Box Podcast, we wrapped up our thoughts on luck, talked about why most startups fail, the difference between responding and reacting, and how much self-reliance is too much.

We also explored the idea of changing a brand voice to suit the voice of a publication one is pitching to and why many groups fall apart.

Give it a listen on itunes and subscribe.

Episode 17: Team Building Failure, Brand vs. Customer Voice, Self-Reliance And More

Luck – Trust that things will always work out.

Startups – Why do you think most startups fail?

Team building failure – Do many groups fall apart because of poor character dynamics or because the purpose of the group isn’t strong enough?

Brand vs Customer Voice – To get a publication or blogger to cover your business, should you choose your brand voice to fit their style or should you forget them and only seek out those who either speak or value your brand voice even if it doesn’t resonate with their own?

Respond vs react – How do you differentiate between responding and reacting?

Self-reliance – Is there such a thing as too much self-reliance?

 

Stay Positive & Is Your Purpose Clear?

Glamorous, Gumptive, And Getting To The Point

Glamorous, Gumptive, And Getting To The Point

It’s easy to turn short writing into fanciful long form. A lot of books can be written in 100 fewer pages. A lot of speeches can be cut by 5, 10, 20 minutes. A lot of podcasts can say what they are saying in a five-minute personal video than a 50 minute scripted podcast.

That being said, it’s still easy to turn short writing into pretty, short writing. I call it glamorous writing, but what it needs to be is gumptive writing; writing that’s honest, transparent, and human. It gets the point of the emotional labor needing to be done and shows that you’re in whatever you’re writing about for the long run.

Glamorous long form: Through innovate endeavors we can seek and conquer the path of least resistance that winds us into a less competitive market allowing us to facilitate well-thought-out marketing strategies that will rope in the plurality of the masses and satisfy our unwavering desire for a consistently increasing profit, which in turn we can build bigger facilities and add to our paid advertising budget.

Glamorous short form: We’ll market to a niche group, increase profits and grow our company.

The long form is pretty, isn’t it? Full of buzz words, passive voice, and a lot of empty promises. As for the short form, it’s quick and to the point, almost like a bullet point on a slide with too many other bullet points. But what about the Gumptive form?

Gumptive form: We’ve found the people seeking the solution we offer and know they have friends sharing the same problem. By adding some design and marketing to this tribe, we can leverage the power of word-of-mouth because we’ve shown we care and we know the tribe is full of influencers. With profits, we can hire additional designers to increase the remarkability of our solution thus always giving people something new to talk to others about.

It’s a bit longer than the glamorous long form, but it’s more honest, transparent, and full of care. You can tell they meant every word they wrote and would be happy to talk about any part of it in depth. As for the glamorous writing, ask the writer of it any question regarding what they wrote and they’ll, well, either choke or give you another glamorous non-answer.

The reality is we don’t need to find artful ways to say very little or artful ways to say a lot. We don’t need to thesaurus every second word and overuse the rule of three. We need to be definitive about our passions and how they can benefit others on an emotional level, on a human level.

By being real we become trusted and by becoming trusted we can do work that matters for people who care about doing work that matters. And in the end, it’s really about the forwardness of intentions for all parties. As ol’ Zig said, “You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help enough other people get what they want.”

 

Stay Positive & Are You Sure You’re Helping?

It’s Not The Answer You Want

It’s Not The Answer You Want

2941559903_484dcd49ee_b

How do you tell someone who feels like you’ve done them wrong, that you can’t do anything about it? How do you get people to talk about politics when they don’t want to? How do you get a hardcore punk-rocker to buy your classical music? How do you get a math major to write a fiction novel that’s not sci-fi?

The answer is you don’t. Not only do you spend their time and energy on something they don’t care about or are uncomfortable talking about or working on, you also waste your own hour and effort appealing to someone who doesn’t want to hear the message you have to offer.

As much as the world seems like it’s a discourse in manipulation and persuasion, it’s not. The game isn’t the game you think it is. It’s not who can please the most, who can convert the most, who can get the others out of their bubble into their own. The game is finding and connecting those with the same bubble as you; color, shape, goal and all.

Campaigns don’t move forward logically, that’s why so many people are frustrated with politics. Campaigns move forward emotionally, through connections of people who trust one another. The lesson here is not to preach to those who don’t trust you and you don’t earn trust with those who don’t agree with you.

Run social media for business’s who believe in it. Talk politics with those who enjoy talking about politics. Please those willing to be please. Don’t aim for the masses, the market that’s not listening or anyone who you haven’t fist earned the trust of.

 

Stay Positive & Your Message Is Only As Strong As The Peoples’ Trust In Hearing It

(not how convinced you are that you’re right)

Photo credit

The Brand Formula

Seth Godin said a brand is the product of two things: prediction of what to expect times the emotional power of that expectation.

Where does the emotional power come from? That too is the product of two things: the relief in getting what you expect times the joy of getting more than you expected.

Earning trust isn’t about meeting expectations. More importantly, it’s not about lowering expectations so you can exceed them upon delivery. No. The good stuff, the brand, the trust; all of that comes from setting high expectations to begin with, but always finding a new way to surpass them.

Johnny Cupcakes, yet again, is my go-to. You get everything you expect (high quality content and packing), and inside the box I find something I didn’t expect, something goofy and special, something that brings me joy.

Relief and joy, two seemingly opposites actually make a perfect duo.

 

Stay Positive & Branding Is Making Bold Promises, But Always Over Delivering

Building A Winning Team

I was ignorant when I began building teams. I didn’t necessarily make a big mistake, I simply wasn’t as efficient in my gathering of team members as I could have been. Early on I thought the best team members were the ones who were extroverted, spoke up in classes, sought extra work out and openly challenged things often. (Yes, basically people like myself.)

Doing so left out two extremely important categories of team members.

1) People who are extroverted and speak up, but only when called upon.

2) People who are introverted in the environment you see them in, but who are extroverted when on their own turf.

I don’t believe there are people who are introverted 24/7. I don’t buy into the idea that those who are extremely intelligent and passionate about something can do so quietly. They may put on a decent illusion, but if you get to the heart of what they love, there’s no stillness, quietness or introveredtness.

There’s talent all around you. What makes you a good leader (and gets you a winning team) is when you’re willing to actively call on people to join you as well as meet them on their own turf.

There’s a regularly held belief that if manager’s employees don’t see their managers doing tasks that they (the employees) are set to do, then the manager misses out on important respect. For example, a store manager needs to stock, run the register and reorganize the decor section (it’s one of the worst kept sections) in order to earn the trust of their employees as well as inspire them.

The same goes for those wanting to build a winning team. You’ve got to meet people on their level, ask to learn from them and show them what you already know. You’ve got to connect.

You might be able to gain a following sitting behind a computer screen, but you’ll never build a winning team.

 

Stay Positive & Go Build A Winning Team