Great for convenience … not so great for the drain on my energy level. I’m in Boston for three conventions at the Boston Convention Center; PodCamp Boston 2, VON and NepCon. PodCamp for myself, VON for our Client Iperia, Inc. and NepCon for another client (and new Brand Strategy success story … more on that later), Paladin ID.
Yesterday’s opening event was a fabulous line-up of New Media moguls, including; David Meerman Scott, Chris Brogan, Chris Penn, Jay Berkowitz, Scott Monty, John Wall, Adam Weiss, Jason Van Orden, and MANY more. Over a two day stint there are 77 (no, I didn’t accidentally hit my 7 key twice) presentations in seven distinct topic channels. And the price one pays for such a star-studded extravaganza??? FREE!

Although I was hoping to get some of my Sybil-like personalities to attend events in other rooms, I ended up not needing to do that because co-horts Allen Voivod (Epiphanies, Inc.), Chris Forkey (Web Action Group) and Leadership development gurus Kathy and Louis Emond (Strategic Directions) are also in attendance. Not surprisingly, we DON’T have to compare notes because each of the sessions has been recorded and will be available by (duh) podcast.

Here’s a nugget from the show; I had the honor of chatting briefly with David (thanks for posing for the photo op) right before his presentation. Here he is showing off his laptop. Why should you care about THAT? David points out to each of his audiences that, on a per square inch basis, he’s willing to rent out ad space. By posting this photo on this blog, I’m hoping to “up” the value proposition to those companies who have already signed up! [wink]. The real point is that David, from the beginning of his presentation to the end, makes you realize that times have changed. To succeed, you have to “think outside the box” (that cliche was included as an inside joke to those who attended the presentation). Much of the material was from his fabulous book The New Rules of Marketing and PR …. a must read.

A little factoid I didn’t really care to learn about, however, was David pointing out that you’re tagged as being over a “certain age” if you find yourself typing two spaces after a period. Yes, even the rules of digital book publishing and document preparation have changed. Hrrrmmmph. That one may take some effort to correct.

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Of course it can.… Here are some questions for you;… Do you have a plan on how you’re going to get career promotions in the near future?… Do you know the characteristics of highly promotable people?… Are you able to communicate your personal brand effectively to decision makers in a way that makes you a candidate for promotion?

If you were even a LITTLE bit stumped by any of the above questions, be sure to attend a FREE teleseminar conducted by my dear friend Susan Britton Whitcomb this Thursday at 3:00PM EDT…. Register here.

If you really want to embrace your own personal brand and find out how to skyrocket your career promotion plan, be sure to buy her new book “30-Day Job Promotion: Build a Powerful Promotion Plan in a Month.”… Susan’s book will be featured nationwide in Barnes & Noble during August…. You can buy it online or visit your nearest B&N bookstore before August 31st!

Congratulations on the new book Susan!

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I’ve been surfing Real Estate sites a lot lately (more on that later)…. I’ve also been in the middle of a massive re-organization and efficiency mode…. Here’s a “two-fer”; A great post with time management tips… from Kelly Quigley at Realtor.org.

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I’m finishing up the book The Deviant’s Advantage, by Ryan Mathews and Watts Wacker … subtitle; How to use Fringe Ideas to Create Mass Markets (Deviance meaning distance from the norm, not “a bizarre and twisted sociopath.”) Their premise is that ALL innovation goes through a predictable evolution of phases.

Here’s the Reader’s Digest version of the path:

• The Fringe …€” All new, bold, innovative ideas start out as a passion in the heart of a single individual. At this point there’s no audience, let alone a market for the idea.
• The Edge …€” Next, a very small number of people (typically different than those on the fringe) will adopt it and start to spread the idea (which they call the devox … the voice of the deviant)
• The Realm of the Cool …€” As the audience grows larger, the very early adopters will take hold of the idea. As the devox starts to move from the Edge to the Realm of the Cool, it starts to have market value.
• The Next Big Thing …€” This is where innovative ideas start to take off. Think Malcolm Gladwell’s Tipping Point, or Seth Godin’s Idea Virus. Most marketers and business owners seek to have their products and services make it to this level of success. But there’s much more …
• Social Convention …€” The innovation makes it to the mass market …€” through the early adpoters and on through the early and late majorities (a la Everett Rogers)

At this point, the ideas can take a path through one or more alternative phases. Let’s use Elvis Presley as an example to show you these next possible steps.

Certainly The King was an innovator. His hip gyrations moved him from the Fringe into the Edge. Radio exposure and teen fans moved him into the Realm of the Cool (think of all those screaming girls in his 1950’s audiences). Then came the Ed Sullivan Show moving him on to Social Convention (think of the size of the audiences and his record sales in the 60’s).

After all of the above happens, here are the next possible steps. Elvis is found in three out of four;

• Cliche …€” When you think of Las Vegas impersonators … yep, you think of Elvis. There are now LOTS of Elvis ideas that have become cliche; big side burns, peanut butter and ‘nana sandwiches, big-coller glitter jump suits, and on and on.
• Icon …€” Although many parts of the “Elvis Idea” have become satirized and have fallen into cliche, he certainly is seen as a music industry icon.
• Archetype …€” Watts and Wacker give a fabulous 5 point list of what defines an archetype. Look for this in a future post, or better yet, read the book. Suffice it to say, Elvis IS The King of Rock and Roll.
• Oblivion …€” Not yet into oblivion, but give it another generation (or two) and the passion for the King will likely die down. Think about the number of Rudolph Valentino fan clubs that are left in the world.

So, what does this mean to you? Your products, your services, your entire industry, your ideas are all on the above path …€“ like it or not. Are you managing their growth or are you just hoping things work out.

Having an awareness of this evolution process can be both motivating and enlightening. Realizing your industry is passing into oblivion may help you adjust your career path so you don’t go down with a sinking ship. Realizing that you might be actually watching an idea move from the Fringe to the Edge might allow you to hang on to a screamin’, multi-million dollar ride to the center of Social Convention (think Pet Rocks and Frisbees). Understanding that an idea steeped in Social Convention may provide the opportunity of developing a Cliche product line. This awareness provides endless possibilities. Enjoy the ride!

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I visited the offices of Epiphanies, Inc. this afternoon for a quick 15 minute chat about a client…. Three hours later I find myself back in my office with my head swimming!… Those “big picture”, “big idea” folks tend to do that to you.

In our discussion, we were discussing whether a topic was a “soft topic” or a “hard topic”… and the value of that determination on marketing…. Here’s a sample scenario;

If a marketing consultant creates a low-cost teleseminar on Improving Your Marketing (where one of the topics discussed might be creating a signage campaign), it is, indeed, a soft topic. Is this a bad thing?… Maybe not…. There will certainly be people who will want to hear what an expert has to say and will derive value from the experience…. BUT, what if it was turned into a hard topic? Would the perceived value increase?… We say “yes.”

The teleseminar might become “Top 10 Strategies to Improve Your Marketing”…. In the presentation, the discussion would be “Steps to objectively measure return on investment with a signage campaign.”… Wow, what a difference!

Allen Voivod’s three criteria for determining if something is “hard” are:

• Can you measure dollars (revenue, gross sales, net, etc.) in any way?
• Can you measure a percentage change (increased leads, sales forecasting, etc.)?
• Can you attribute any other objective, measurable number to the idea (widgets sold, web site traffic, etc.)?

This isn’t rocket science but if you look around you (at your marketing, specifically), you might find that you’re implementing A LOT of soft ideas…. Be brutal in your evaluation and change your strategy to MAKE IT HARD! If you can measure it, you can improve upon it and it will have meaning…. If you can’t measure it, it’s essentially worthless.

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This morning’s big event was me giving six back-to-back 20 minute presentations at Gilford (NH) Middle School’s Career Day. This was a combined event with all Gilford and all Gilmanton seventh graders. In my third year of doing this, I was surprised at how much has changed in just two years. In my first presentation in 2005 I spent a good deal of time talking about how technology was going to be changing quickly and that we were on the cusp of a major change … but I didn’t say what that change might be. Here we are two years later and I was able to use the same slides as the past two years but was able to provide examples of how technology is changing the lives of young people, and the impact technology will have on their careers.

Many of my questions were inspired by Guy Kawasaki’s panel discussion this past September where he invited young people to chat in front of a room full of middle-aged business owners about how they (the young people) use technology …€” attempting to determine if advertising is dead. Some of the things Guy found were FASCINATING! What I found during today’s sessions not only completely supported what Guy found, but took the findings to a whole new level. Guy’s panel was 18-24 year olds …€¦ high school and college aged youths. My group was middle schoolers.
Here’s what I learned today (data/numbers are my approximations):

• 70-80% of seventh graders own cell phones and 2/3 of them text message to friends.
• Most will text message 50-100 messages per month. A few will text as many as 800-1000 messages per month.
• 90%+ own mp3 players with an average of about 300 songs. All but just a couple owned iPods.
• 50-60% have a MySpace/FaceBook page. Of those that said they spend time on their page daily, 100% of them were girls.
• VERY few knew about Digg, Technorati, Flickr or Twitter. However, almost all of them knew about YouTube.
• Unlike past generations, they “get” technology and are comfortable with it. When presented with the idea that we’re all in the middle of a technology explosion, they asked questions and wanted to know more about it.

I suspect that in the next year, enough will have changed in technology and how young people communicate, I’ll have to dramatically change my slides … hmmmm, maybe I won’t even be using an archaic medium like Power Point. Check in here next year to find out how the presentation went.

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When I saw Seth’s post about “Learning From Bananas“, I figured it was going to be an extension of his lessons on web interface design (from his book The Big Red Fez). I jumped right into the post and found I was wrong. What he was writing about is how bananas, apparently, are easier to peel from the “wrong” end. Because it doesn’t feel like the right thing to do, it’ll be a tough thing to teach.

In your business, there are likely LOTS of bananas … things that people do because of convention, tradition, or simply “that’s just the way things are done.” For example, why is it that Real Estate Agents put their pictures on ALL of their advertising but Insurance Agents not so much, and Stock Brokers almost never? Or, why do car sales people feel the need to be wacky when appliance sales people don’t? Let’s take it down to an even more fundamental level. Why do most businesses create tri-fold brochures (called “rack card format”), even though the brochure will NEVER be put into a presentation rack?

The lesson? Carefully consider everything you do. Is it on brand? Are you making decisions because that’s just the way you’ve always done it?… or that’s the way all of our competitors are doing it? If so, you’re peeling the banana from the “right” end. Pick one of these things and, for once, turn it around to see what happens.

Would you notice if:

• An insurance agent had a paper bag over their head in their photo and the caption said, “to see what I look like, come visit me at….”?
• A brochure came your way and it was round!

The possibilities are endless.

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