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The Secret To Creating Products People Buy
The secret to the success of Facebook, Pampers, Innocent drinks, Instagram, Basecamp, Little Miss Match, Marie Forleo.com and on and on, comes down to one thing. The ability to stand in the customer’s shoes and see the world from where they are at.
Have you questioned what you client’s worldview is lately?
- What’s important to your customers right now?
- What are they excited about?
- What are they struggling with?
- What would they kill to know?
- What stops them achieving their dreams?
- What do they crave or covet?
- Why do they need you?
- What will they gladly pay for?
- How can you be part of their journey today?
- What might they need tomorrow?
Your business is built on the foundations of your story. Great products and services are created by understanding the essence of that story.
Image by Noukka Signe.
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Even The Big Guys Are Guessing
A couple of days ago Cadbury did their first product launch on Google+. The launch was an experiment, their best guess and they went with it. Even they don’t know for sure what will work and what won’t. Yes, they pay people to help them with the process of being more sure, but they never really know until the idea is out there.
There are no guarantees, no way of knowing one hundred percent if you’ve got the right answer. Will that idea that’s rattling around your head work? There’s only one way to know and that’s to press play, to hit publish, to set up your stall, to take your first feedback and that’s the opportunity. You have the chance to try and to fail or to succeed, if not this time, the next one, or the one after that.
How will you ever know unless you work hardest of all on getting it out there? Unless your idea is a revolutionary new pacemaker, there’s room to make your very best guess and there’s still time to change things tomorrow, after you launch.
Image by Mike Small.
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The Story You Tell Is A Choice
filed in Storytelling, Strategy
The story you tell is a choice.
Creating a series of lines in the sand.
Symbolic of values that you’re not willing to compromise on.
Your brand can’t be all things to everyone.
This and that.
The brands that stand out, that have soul, that win by being different, choose.
They choose to stand for something, then make that something the foundation of their story.
What’s your story? What lines in the sand have you chosen to draw?
Image by Martin Kalfatovic.
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The Apple Store, Belonging And Love
What’s the one thing you never find at an Apple Store? That thing you probably found in your hotel room when you checked in. The poorly expressed intention to customers, that guarantees they will never come back. Oh, and it’s most likely laminated and taped up in several places.
Ah yes….. a list of rules.
I found that list pasted four times around our ‘holiday getaway’ recently. Every poorly considered word told us what we couldn’t do in the outdoor spa and what we must do. Every time we saw that note we knew that we weren’t trusted and didn’t belong.
The Apple Store is a place without rules. No glass cases. No velvet ropes between the product and the customer. Everybody’s welcome. That’s part of the reason it’s the busiest store in your city. Every single contact point invites you to experience and start getting intimate. To explore, to touch, to play, to linger and belong. There are no barriers to intimacy. And that’s exactly what your customers want from you.
Your customers want to know they belong
Before they can allow your designs, copy, books and products to belong in their lives, they need to sense your intention. They want to trust you and feel that you trust them too.
Your clients want to be welcomed like a friend and wooed live a lover. They can feel your intention at every point of contact. It’s your job to communicate that with all your heart and soul. Doesn’t matter if you sell shoes, coffee, design, copy or connection. Making rules is lazy. Building trust and expressing intentions isn’t easy, but it’s worth it.
Have you found ways to create intimacy with your clients either online or offline? Tell me more about the businesses and brands that you love and how they do that?
Image by Dimas Barquilla.
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You Are Whoever You Believe You Are
filed in Worldview
While working with people on crafting stories about their brands, businesses, products and services I’ve stumbled across this under-acknowledged fact. Yes it is a fact, with a capital ‘F’ not simply a theory.
You are whoever you believe you are
Some of the most important stories you tell are the ones you tell yourself. The people who really believe in their heart of hearts that they can do anything, are the ones who do. You know this and you know them too. You watch them every day just doing it. Sometimes your heart sinks a little lower in your chest, because you want to believe that you really are, really will and really can too.
You have a responsibility to step into your story. To play the starring role in the epic that you are scripting. Because this is your life. And because the best of everything will be created by the people who can fill the biggest shoes they were meant to fill.
The world needs you to believe in the power of your dreams enough to give them direction.
Go, practice telling yourself an amazing story and then make it come true.
Image by ho hocus.
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Take People Where They Want To Go
The products that sell, made by the companies that succeed wildly have one thing in common.
They take people to where they want to go.
It’s an elegant business philosophy. The ultimate brand strategy.
Neither push nor pull. Just pure magnetism.
Understand where your customers want to go, then find ways to take them there.
Image by Victor Nuno.
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21 Ways To Nurture Your Ideas
filed in Entrepreneurship, Strategy, Worldview
Your mountain is waiting.
So… Get on your way. ~ Dr Suess
1. Create an idea saving system.
Find tools that work for you, Moleskine or Evernote anyone?
2. Be ready to capture ideas anywhere.
J.K. Rowling tells the story of how Harry Potter “fell into her head” on a train journey.
3. Step away from the computer.
Pick up a pen, doodle, mindmap, take photos. Use both sides of your brain.
4. Understand your creative process.
Be aware of what drives you. Reflect on how you make things happen.
5. Use tools that inspire you.
Leather journals, coloured pens, scrapbooks, green ink….
6. Be on a mission.
Why does the idea excite you? Why this idea, why now? What difference will it make in the world?
7. Begin with the end in mind.
Visualise the end product, the colour of the book cover, the texture of the paper, the graphics on the packaging.
8. Stand in the shoes of the people you want to impact.
Now create the thing that makes the biggest difference to them.
9. Set goals.
Have milestones you can reach. A launch date. Write them down, then stick to them.
10. Don’t set goals.
Just go.
11. Follow hunches.
Trust your gut. Act on your wildest dreams.
12. Find quiet space.
Meditation, walks, getting closer to nature, time to journal. What works for you?
13. Plan meticulously.
Map out desired outcomes, skill sets, milestones, resources.
14. Work quickly.
Start to finish in a day.
15. Practice blue sky thinking.
Ask what if.
16. Resource and outsource.
Play to your strengths. Learn the skills you need to execute and get help when you need it.
17. Try and fail.
Today’s mistakes are the foundation for tomorrow’s successes.
18. Focus.
Limit distractions.
19. Do the work.
Hit publish, press send, hang the picture or launch the website. An idea without execution is just an idea, it has no impact on the world.
20. Do what it feels good to do.
Ideas that get you up early and keep you up late are the ones that live.
21. Remember that You Are The Map Maker.
Don’t let fear stop you from doing the things that matter.
How do you nurture your ideas? Over to you in the comments.
Image by Bethan.
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Change How People Feel Not What They Do
Every marketing decision you make should be prefaced with this question;
“How will it make her feel?”
Of course you want people to do, but you need them to feel first. When people feel they act. The feeling is what leads to the doing.
Think about the websites and cafes you love to visit, the book titles that attract your attention and the things that you own or covet. They have found a way to tell a story that short-circuits the connection to your heart.
It turns out that changing hearts not just minds, is a great business strategy.
Image by gak.
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If Only
filed in Entrepreneurship, Strategy
If only there were 26 hours in each day.
If only they understood.
If only the competition didn’t compete.
If only there was more space.
If only the economy wasn’t in such a mess.
If only chocolate didn’t taste so good.
If only the gym wasn’t so far away.
If only they hadn’t launched first.
If only holidays were longer.
If only you didn’t have to take so much time off.
If only people still cared.
If only the margins could be moved by two pixels.
If only you’d read the instructions first.
If only you hadn’t waited.
If only they’d paid attention.
If only she hadn’t noticed.
If only that, not this.
If only then, not now.
If only you had [————].
If only you could do [————].
Nothing to stop you.
If only you could let go of if only.
P.S. If only the media uploader was working you’d see this gorgeous image….. seriously!
Image by Jamie Henderson.
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What Does Success Look Like?
filed in Entrepreneurship, Worldview
Is it starting or finishing?
Getting there in a hurry?
Or stopping to take in the view on the way?
Is success the elimination of failure or growing with every experience?
Big deals?
Or a series of tiny impacts?
Is success really a destination or more of a journey?
One big blinding flash of brilliance?
Or a thousand of sparks wisdom?
Empire or legacy?
All or nothing?
Success could be viewed from 336,000 different perspectives.
True success though, is creating your own definition, then living that.
Image by Paojus Alquiza.