Secret Hacks to Increase Traction (part 2)
Here are the last 14 of 28 Secret Hacks to Increase Traction (SHIT) to fit right in and get quick market share: [You can read the first 14 here] 15. Build a love mark. Because you need to be loved by everyone. And can manufacture love. 16. Build a personal brand. Because that way you’ll show up authentic. And brands aren’t artificial. 17. Find your brand’s purpose. Because every business needs a purpose. 18. Marketing is storytelling. Because it’s about creating compelling content to earn…
Scale up
That’s all you hear: “You need to scale up” as the way to grow your business. What do they even mean by that? That you “must grow”. You can scale up and grow and still… Have high revenue and high costs Be near bankruptcy Be unprofitable Get thin, almost inexistent margins Be in the midst of a price war Get commoditized Be ignorable Get (more) shit clients Increase revenue (and hidden, sunk costs right with it) Surpass your capacity Destroy value Keep your clients unsatisfied Growth is not…
The BEST guitar player of all times
Everything is seen as a competition. Winners. Losers. Who’s the best —and everyone else can’t be the best too. There needs to be only one. It’s about winning. In business. Or life. How can you win where there are no fixed rules or equal results? How can you win in a game that will outlive you? Whoever tells you “Here’s how you’ll win [in life or in business]” is bullshitting you. You can get ahead or behind. Winning? Nah. Ask yourself: do you really have competition? The interesting thing…
Racers and 4x4s
Ethan Garofolo’s lovely email about “What’s faster: Land Rover or F1 Racer?” set up the stage for a different path. While he talks about how at early stages of business, it feels more like you need a 4×4, and when you advance, you focus on getting an F1 in order to grow; there’s another perspective. It depends. How most people see things is “Ok. This is bumpy and quite an irregular field. Let’s look for a smoother road, so we can build our F1.” They start looking for the perfect road to have…
Creativity and Productivity
As creatives, entrepreneurs or soloists, there’s this mix up to believe that creativity and productivity are opposites. They’re not. Creativity. The ability to see opportunity. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. Productivity. Ratio between the maximum output and the smallest effort. Peter Drucker. They’re different playgrounds, not ends of the same spectrum.
Don’t start with why
“Rod — Why haven’t you started referring your network to […..] yet?Hit reply and let me know. I want to hear from you.” While the intention of this message is well intended, having Why put me on defensive. It felt like i needed to justify myself. It felt my in-action had a judgement over it. And nothing was about me. It was about the one who sent the message. “I want to hear from you.” More importantly, my reaction came as WTF?! why would I need to give my reasons —if any at all? Have you…
Provocateurs
Your price is not a response to the market. It’s a provocation. Push them to consider. Think. Wonder. It’ll change the conversation from: → “Could this expert help me?” (and compare you to others) into → “How could this expert help me?” (compare your proposed options) In agitation,
Relationships are transactions
Transaction. Its root comes from transactio “an agreement, accomplishment”. Relationships are agreements between parties. They can be written or unwritten. But you know what makes these transactions more solid? Trust. Because both parties are for the long game and willing to make commitments —and compromises. Hearing “We’re not transactional, we’re looking for relational” lands funny. It wants to give the impression that the latter doesn’t ask for anything in exchange. ????♂️ (Spoiler: they’re…
Lessons learned from saying Yes to free work
Lessons learned from saying Yes to “free work”, “show/prove your worth before charging” and “let’s start with this small/insignificant amount of money that will hopefully turn into a larger gig”. It’s bullshit. That’s what i learned. Here’s why. Most of these situations are unfiltered properly. You’re too excited/over invested into closing them, so you don’t qualify them thoroughly. → You do the free work and then “We’ll evaluate it and get back to you”. Which is code for “Ha! Thanks, moron….
What they don’t tell you of working for free (to “close” future deals).
The advocates of working for free to “prove your worth” and then “close” deals/gigs keep something important out from you: That you have to be extremely picky of who you’ll work with. It’s not simply “I’ll work for free to show you I do great work. Then you’ll pay me.” That’s a nice fairy tale (or bullshit). Reality is, it’s about who you’re talking to (or have access to). If you don’t have the right access, doing work for free is doing whatever you can for whomever shows up. It stenches of…