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| Issue #3 October 2008 |
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You want your marketing to be more effective? Make yourself more memorable? You need to make it a lifestyle. Let me give you a few concrete examples: When I (Jim) went to my first writers' conference, I knew zero people and had zero connections. I had to meet people and get them to remember me, but I had to do it without being overbearing.
My solution?
I wore a white Disneyland baseball hat with Mickey on the front for
most of the conference. Who hates Mickey? No one. So immediately I had
a positive association going on. Then, when I wrote my follow up notes
after the conference I could refer to myself as the guy in the Mickey
Mouse baseball hat.
A serendipitous event happened at the same conference that I took advantage of. My birth certificate name is James, but I go by Jim. Guess what they printed on my name tag? James. They said, sorry, we'll print you another one. I said I'd be fine with the James tag. Then I took a Sharpie and crossed out James and wrote Jim.
Voila! Instant conversation starter with anyone. Probably 30 people
made comments like, "Hey, good to meet you, James-slash-Jim!"
One more example: I love sleight of
hand. Yep. If appropriate, I'll do some magic for people I meet. Think
they remember it? Think they remember me? E-mail us: info@heblogssheblogs.com.
Twentieth century photography. Few men are more intriguing than Swiss born Robert Frank. His photos are stark. Gritty. Black and white. His subjects of focus were innovative. See some of them here: http://tinyurl.com/3jv43t
Then we have Claude Monet, where moments of reality are suspended as we float through his interpretations, his impressions, his feelings about the world. Subtlety and nuance and color fill his paintings. They are the tools Monet uses to capture our emotions as lush images are painted on the canvas and at the same time, in our minds. How do we apply this to writing? Rather than explain, let's take a look at two examples. The scene is a garden early in the morning. The sun has just risen and is lighting up a slightly marred sunflower. How would you write the scene if you're going to Monet it? If you're going to Frank it? If you're really feeling saucy, try a whack at it before I show you my examples. Okay, ready? Write it like Monet: The sun caressed the sunflower with its first rays of dawn, illuminating the perfections and the imperfections in the fragile, tender, golden petals. Write it like Frank: Dawn. First rays of morning strike the sunflower. Golden petals. Perfection and imperfection. Want to take a guess which style of writing is more effective in 2008? We'll tell you the answer next time, but till then, here's a clue: Preference started shifting from one style to the other around 2003. Here's another clue: Think about television programming from 2000-2004. What was the major shift that happened during that time and still continues today? (Those of you who sharpened your pencils to a fine point this morning realize I wrote the description of Frank in Frank style and the description of Monet in Monet style.) A friend in the advertising industry wrote us:
A new client wrote:
We receive similar e-mails every week from folks we've told about HeBlogsSheBlogs.com--and from those who find our blog via a search.
In a perfect world, we would. But we have a business to run! Our top priorities are serving our clients and maintaining healthy relationships with our employees. Those things take time. We decided our blog should serve as a calling card: it introduces us and our services, gives prospects a sample of our work, and gives us the opportunity to share what we're learning about blogging, marketing, and writing with the world at large. Marketing in every moment. It's what we do. |
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