I talked with a friend the other day. Nothing deep. Nothing dramatic. He moved into a new place about two weeks ago. I asked him how he was liking it. He got a huge smile on his face and told me he liked it because he gets to take a shower every day.
Wait–what? Yeah, I know I didn’t tell you he was living on the streets of down town Santa Ana first. I have been trying to wrap my mind around this idea that somehow that doesn’t have to be how I identify people.
He wasn’t my “homeless friend.” He IS my friend. At one point he was homeless. Sometimes he helps me with yard work. We met at Laundry Love Santa Ana. All those things are true. But fundamentally, he is my friend. Who he is should not be defined by where he sleeps.
Spend some time reflecting on the simple things in life that should bring you great joy, but don’t. Also, think about how we name and categorize people. One’s essential humanity should be first. You are who you are regardless of a whole slew of circumstantial things. Why should others be defined by circumstances?
What simple things are you thankful for? Whose identity do you need to reconsider?
My company started a simple branding project last week. Fully anticipated being done before I went to !deation. Five rejected mock ups later, today I am sending over revision eight of the logo and getting ready to start on some print collateral, a website and some social media integration.
Every now and then I like to revisit this PUBLICLY. It gives me a chance to ask you how I am doing and gives you a chance to see a glimpse into the why behind some of the decisions I make.
This is why my company spends so much of our time with social enterprise and non profit organizations, why my kids were up way past their bedtime last night at Laundry Love Santa Ana and why we go out to eat a lot less than we used to.
Does you family have a mission statement? Does it help guide your decisions?
Below is a presentation I gave at the Unleashing Beauty Conference in Irvine, Ca this last week. I have embedded my slide show and put my notes, expanded and with links to various websites and webapps mentioned through out. If your organization would like to talk about a more personalized solution lets set up a time to talk.
Unleashing Beauty Online: the power of social media for social justice
1. Welcome
A. Who Am I?
a. freelance marketer and social web developer for the last year and a half
b. keep track of conversations on twitter, facebook, even myspace
c. multi account posting and listening
d. columns for keeping track of friends, family, best donors, etc
6. Other
a. niche sites, geographic specific sites, etc
C. The Right Content
1. relevant
a. to your topic
b. to your demographic
c. to YOU
2. funny
a. funny spreads fast
b. funny gets people talking
c. funny keeps people coming back even when the big picture is bleak (ie sex trafficking, gang violence, etc)
3. personal
4. unique
a. not found elsewhere
5. shared
a. point people towards orgs, links, articles that are interesting or useful in your space.
6. universal
a. low cost of entry. if you want to get people to rally around something, make sure it is something they can rally around. don’t ask them to agree to a set of theological or philosophical propositions to join your movement. Don’t make it cost too much. 6. Vision
As you can tell, my site doesn’t look the same. It is still a bit buggy, and a teeny bit of the design is not how I want it yet. But I know that folks are starting to find it, Google is now crawling it and its popping up again as number one in my vanity searches. Beyond that I will be at Catalyst West this week and know that people I meet will be checking out the site. So here it is, in its not quite yet finished glory.
Poke around and let me know what is still broken. I know of a few things, but would love the help to make sure its great for you guys.
And if you are going to be at Catalyst hit me up on Twitter.
Over the next several weeks I will be posting much less rambling abstract thoughts regarding the Idea Camp, but wanted to let you know why I threw out so many tweets about this great unconference.
Also, for those who could not be there, there is a Vimeo channel up with videos being added every day.
1. There was only one traditional presentation the whole time and it was one given at TED a few weeks ago, so who could complain? The rest was all interview and Q&A in the main sessions. This made the focus more on ideas than on hero worship. Difficult to do when you are sitting a few feet away from some serious thought leaders in various fields. Also made presentations more honest, raw and authentic. Very few canned speeches.
2. By bringing together a lot of leaders from different fields it pushed people out of there comfort zone. Watch the video with Dave Gibbons interviewing John Park from Google and Maxim Karp (sp?) from Yang Dang. I went out with a lot of pastors after that talk. There minds were all blown.
When you bring together interdisciplinary thought leaders the potential for Medici effect type moments is huge. Would have liked to see more business leaders represented but social entrepreneurs, church leaders and non profit leaders is already pretty broad. Especially when most conferences only provide one of those and no breadth within a given category.
There were engineers, marketers, producers, pastors, consultants, non profit executives, artists, entrepreneurs, and all sorts of other people. Oh yeah, they even let me show up.
3. The huge focus on ideas and implementation made everything super practical and actionable. No esoteric “what ifs” or “if only’s” or idealistic theory.
4. It was affordable. Often times a conference will cater to learners who are virtually identical to the presenters. By putting successful folks on stage and allowing the Not-quite-there-yet’s to come in (by virtue of low cost of entry) it opened the doors for a lot of folks who may not have gone to a typical progressive thought conference in any one of the many fields represented.
5. It was extremely open. Text in questions all throughout. All presenters were out and about during the whole conference. I got to hit the water fountain with Scott Harrison (Charity: Water). Spencer Burke parked next to me in the parking lot. Zack Hunter checked in with his mom (who is a kind of a big deal in her own right) while I was talking to her in the hall. There were no false gods at this conference. Everyone there was there to learn, help, network, innovate.
I would love to talk more as I decompress and get in touch with all the great folks I met and promised some time to this weekend. If you went to the conference let me know your thoughts in the comments. If you have a favorite conference you have been to let me know that too. What makes it special?
Close your eyes and visualize your customers using your product or service. What do you see? How do you feel? Can you do it?
What I see with many of my clients is that an exercise like this just feels funny and they are not able to really know what their customers think and feel in their day to day life. What does your product mean to their life? Does it change it? Make it easier?
By learning the answers to these questions we are able to not only focus our marketing message, but also improve upon that crucial customer experience. If your product or service is EXACTLY what your customer needs or wants, then you no longer have a customer, but a Fan and Evangelist.
Of course, the question becomes, HOW???
The answer is fairly simple. Listen, engage, repeat.
Use the tools that are available today. Try out the new ones. Find ways to make THE CONVERSATION part of your daily routine. There are far too many tools to list here today (although I have one in the works), but here is what I use.
Listening
Google Reader, Twollow, Social Too, Tweet Deck, Twitter Hawk, Friend Feed, Google Alerts, Facebook, LinkedIn, Myspace (one of my clients in largely focused in the indie music scene),
Engage
Tweet Deck, Twitter Hawk, Social Too, Facebook, Twitter Search, GMail, Comments, Blogging, Phone (I’m a dinosaur, I know), Skype (less and less lately with the advent of…), TokBox.
You will see quite a bit of overlap between the two lists as many of these tools are more like places than tools. When using Twitter, you can be a fly on the wall and watch the conversation, or actively engage in it.
When your customers start knowing you personally they become friends. When they start to love your product or service they become fans.
What do you use to engage the crowd? When was the last time you made a change to your service based on a Facebook post? Would you consider your customers friends? Does your business have any fans?
Between having a toddler and a brand new baby, I have been neglecting my blog quite a bit lately. I apologize to all of you for this, and have been bringing back a few of my most popular posts from the archives to tide you over until things calm down a teeny bit around here.
Check out these “parody” videos being sold for almost $100 to churches. I put parody in quotes because parody implies wit, humor and smarts. These cheesy imitations of the great Mac commercials with Justin Long and that other guy who was in that movie with Tina Faye and Amy Poehler are not only really poorly produced (not every church has lots of money to invest in multi media, I know) but the acting is really bad and the scripts not that funny. A couple clever puns but by and large a scam looking to pawn some crummy “christian” movie off on some poor unsuspecting pastor hoping to be relevant.
Now I know someone out there is going to know the organization who put these together. Maybe you thought they were amazing. That’s fine. You spend the money on them. And maybe I am being overly critical but organizations that claim to be helping churches and churches themselves should be held to a higher standard. Their motives may be great, but good intentions are not enough. My point is that creativity and innovation should be hallmarks of the Church as we follow the God who invented the duck billed platypus. We need not steal someone else’s idea. We don’t always have to reinvent the wheel though. That being said. . .
Save your parishioner’s some money. Record the actual Mac commercials. Then use those clips to highlight any of the following for a sermon series.
1. Evangelism.
Mac could be represented as Athens. Windows is Jerusalem. A series on Acts17.(Updated: I specifically was thinking of the commercial where Mac talks about making movies and PC talks about spreadsheets. Some would not work because the point you should, I think, be making is that Paul’s methods were equal but specially suited to the circumstance.)
A little more topically Mac can be seen as kind of an ancient future type faith. One that maintains the time less truths of the faith but expresses them in a way that people today can get. With Windows being the stuffy “we’ve always done it that way” type.
Mac could be Paul and Windows Peter. Make sure to reference 1 Corinthians 9:19-23 to drive home the point as well as Galatians 2:11-21 (of course).
2. Doctrine
I have to be careful on this one so I don’t get my mailbox flooded with the DIE HERETIC emails again, but I would take one of three approaches on this one.
a. Correct Doctrine is Mac. Heresy (or for the ecumenical, Error)is Windows.
b. Those Focused on strong commitment to doctrines and statements of faith are Mac. Those who would cast aside doctrine on the altar of relevance are Windows.
C. Those who believe that Truth can be bigger than our intramural squabbles and thus agree to disagree for the sake of community and to spend our resources doing the work of the Kingdom are Mac. Insert your least favorite famous Christian figurehead as Windows.
I am sure there are plenty of people way smarter than me who have even better ideas.
Animal trainers, management consultants and psychologists all seem to agree that positive reinforcement (or operant conditioning or Whale Done or etc.) is the best way to deal with people. And yet we still scream at employees, spank our kids and choke our dogs.
Pavlov, Dale Carnegie, Ken Blanchard, BF Skinner, they all recognize that by rewarding correct behavior and redirecting incorrect behavior we can sustain radical long term change. And judging by the cultural influence and sales volume of these thinkers, we know what they said has merit. So the question is, “Why do I consistently focus on the negative in my staff, family, spouse, dog, friends, tiger, etc.?”
The answer I think lies in our inability to deal with our pride. Someone does something incorrectly, we freak out and chew them out. Later we remember that we were supposed to have reaffirmed them as a person, showed them what it was that was expected and helped them get there. Then praise progress and celebrate success. Not only is this more effective than our natural reactions, but it also feels better for the giver and receiver. Better relationships are formed. When people like you, they are much more likely to do what you want. Earn their trust, respect, friendship, and you do not have to struggle in this area.
Tomorrow morning my wife and I head to the hospital in anticipation of a planned c-section for the birth of our second son, Micah. Because of this, I have been thinking back a lot to a post from a couple years ago, when my first son was born. Below is the post.
My son, Jedidiah was born in January of 2007. He spent his first 3 weeks in an intensive care unit. The first couple days were very scary. There was a lot of uncertainty regarding the future. Since then he has made a remarkable and full recovery. He is a happy and healthy little boy full of energy with a short attention span (I wonder where he gets that from? Do you like turtles?).
I learned alot during that time. Medical terms, how to sleep for 12 minutes at a time twice a day, how to hold a baby on a respirator and iv’s, lots of interpersonal relationships skills, so on and so forth.
But I also learned something about leadership and the art of influence. In the midst of all that chaos, the doctor never seemed stressed, and still seemed to genuinely care for my son and my family.
As I reflect back on the three weeks in the hospital, I only remember being asked one single question. Everything else was told to me. Not in a pushy forceful way, but in such a way as I understood the unspoken, “It is whats best for your son, I’m the expert.” The doctors and nurses told me what they were doing, what they hoped to accomplish, and why. All of this was not presented as options and price was never even mentioned. (Later when I recieved the bill I nearly had a heart attack, but then heard my son laugh and realized that it didn’t matter.) Budgets were not talked about.
I never questioned the doctors. They said this is what is happening and I believed that they were making the right decision. I trusted them not with an arbitrary decision, but with my son’s life.
The question remains, why? Why would I let a stranger make some of the most important decisions I have ever been faced with? Why would I entrust my son’s life to someone who to this day I still could not tell you his name? And more importantly, why can you not command that same respect from those whom you lead, your clients, even your coworkers?
The answer I believe lies in the doctors demeanor from the moment I first met him. Confident, caring, concerned. I knew he was the expert even though I had no evidence. Some of you are already complaining, but Scott, he’s a doctor I’m just a _______(fill in your career here). But, that misses the point, I never saw his medical degree, I don’t know if he was a resident, a fellow, the chair of the dept, or a nurse practitioner. I know he presented himself as a the one who had the answers; answers I desperatley needed.
So what did I learn from this? I learned that a genuine desire to help people, coupled with a sincere belief that I can help people, along with a dash of ability to help those people, will give me unlimited opportunity to lead, influence, sell, persuade, teach…You should get the idea.
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