[Copyblogger] The Seth Godin Interview: How to Become a Leader

The Seth Godin Interview: How to Become a Leader The Seth Godin Interview: How to Become a Leader Seth Godin needs no introduction to this crowd. And there’s a good chance many of you already have a copy of this latest book, Tribes. If not, Tribes is all about leadership in a post-geography world. The Internet allows anyone to become a leader of tribe big or small, with members from across the planet. And people want you to lead them in all sorts of contexts. But how does one become a leader? What’s the process and why does it happen? I asked Seth 5 questions about the dynamics of tribal leadership, and here’s what he had to say: 1. How does a member of any particular tribe know she's ready to lead one of her own? Seth: Well, everyone is a member of a tribe. A community tribe, perhaps, or a spiritual one. The time to go start your own tribe is when you realize the obligation you have to contribute your leadership and when you are passionate enough about a goal that you will make the commitment the tribe demands to get there. In other words, do it when you care. If you don’t care, don’t whine, don’t complain. But if there’s change you want to make happen (business change, social change, any change) then this is the way to do it. 2. You've stated that the most interesting things happen at the edges, and I suspect this is true with tribes of all types. I think it's also true at the intersection of neighboring tribes. Are the edges and intersections the most fertile ground for new leaders? Seth: If you look at the innovations that we’ve seen online, they’ve all been at the edges. No one wins by saying, “this is a better version of AOL” or “this is a better version of Yahoo.” Google won by finding an edge that Yahoo cared little about (search) and embracing it. With tribal behavior, we see that most people aren’t interested in joining a new tribe. So who does? Fringe types. Restless folks. Dissatisifed seekers. That means that your earliest members are fellow travelers, people willing to take a leap. THEN they bring in their friends and the growth happens. It’s rare that we have a schism between different tribes (Arabs and Jews, Shiites and Suunis, Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich). For more likely is apathy. Far more likely is that most people are just sitting there doing nothing. The big middle. Your opportunity is to peel folk away from the middle and give them what they want, which is movement and connection. 3. We here at Copyblogger are obviously big proponents of using quality reader-focused content to become an online leader. Where's the fine line between giving people what they want and leading them where they need to go? Seth: Most people have no clue what they want, and if you ask them, you’ll get a lame answer. Most people don’t know they want Pretty Woman or Slumdog Millionaire. They don’t know they want Purple Cow or one of your killer articles. So if you want to have an impact, all you can do is lead. You can’t ask. 4. You mention repeatedly that Tribes is not a "how to" book, since all tribe-building is unique and context-dependent. Are there any universal principles you can share? Seth: There are many: People want to belong, they want to be missed when they don’t show up. Charisma doesn’t make you a leader, leading gives you charisma. Most of all, people care about themselves. Faith is belief in the future and it is critical. Religion is a set of rules designed to amplify faith at the same time it guarantees the status quo. As you can guess, heretics have a lot of faith, but not so much patience with religion. And heretics are the ones who make change. When in doubt, work with small groups. If you can’t find 5 followers, how will you find 1000? Talk to people with respect, don’t advertise at them. Transparency is your only option, because the tribe will smell artifice. 5. Does a real leader make moves that the tribe may rebel against, even if only to understand the tribe better? Seth: It’s not a democracy. It never is. It’s about acting in a way that you’re proud of, that the tribe can interact with. Often, the leader’s job is to come quite close to destroying everything but she does it to get to the end goal that everyone needs. Many thanks to Seth Godin for his time. Pick up a copy of Tribes at Amazon today. What about you? Do you consider your current online publishing and marketing efforts to be a form of leadership? Why or why not? About the Author: Brian Clark is Executive Editor of Copyblogger and co-founder of DIY Themes. Get more from Brian on Twitter. • Email to a friend • Related • View comments • Track comments • •

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[Copyblogger] Is Your Tribe Holding You Down?

Is Your Tribe Holding You Down? Is Your Tribe Holding You Down? There’s a great divide in the online marketing world at the moment. On one side is the Tribe of the Cool Kids. They’re part of The Conversation. They use the niftiest open-source tools. They have trendy haircuts. They’re about voice and influence and attention. They’re getting as close as they can to a benign Borg, plugging themselves into the collective consciousness. They spend more time updating the collective about what they’re doing than they spend actually doing anything. On the other side is the Internet Marketing Tribe. They drive the flashiest cars. They have great abs. They’re about tactics and money and staying ahead of trouble. They’re more like the Zion rebels from The Matrix, flying outside the system but jacking into it to get what they need. In Dean Hunt’s great phrase, they spend 16 hours a day working so they can make money while they sleep. Clearly one of these tribes is lame and the other one is smart. But which is which? What it’s like to be a Cool Kid At the top of the Cool Kids Tribe you’ll find some folks who are very comfortable. Some of them cashed out big before the Dot-Bomb implosion, some have put together cushy consulting gigs, some are enjoying the money and attention that come from top-dollar speaking careers. The middle of the tribe is having a pretty good time. They might be freelancing, or they might have a corporate gig somewhere. Maybe they have a neat title like “relationship manager.” They work a lot of hours, their boss/clients can be clueless asshats, and the trainwreck economy is starting to freak them out a little (”Relationship managers” tend to be first in line for layoffs). But they have a lot of connections, they make a decent living, and mostly they’re doing fine. Then there’s a big band of Cool Kids who are broke. They’ve figured out how to get attention, but they don’t know what to do with it. They have 4,999 Facebook friends, 34,278 Twitter followers, and $12 in the bank. Obviously there’s no way the Cool Kids can learn anything from the Internet Marketing Tribe. Those guys are cheesy and creepy and they do things that Google doesn’t like. And living in your parents’ basement isn’t so bad. Have you seen the new case for my iPhone 3G? It’s pretty sweet. What it’s like to be an IMer At the top of the Internet Marketing crowd you’ll find some folks who make truly staggering amounts of money. Some of them are selling garbage. Some of them are selling solidly useful stuff. It’s all packaged about the same way, which makes it hard to tell the difference. They’ll tell you that the toughest decision of the day is whether to drive the Lambo to Lauderdale or fly the private jet down to Cabo to party with the hot girlfriend. That’s a pose. These guys work, and they work hard. The smartest have built strong, sustainable businesses by providing real value to their customers. The part about having a Lambo, a private jet, and a hot girlfriend is true, though. The middle of the tribe is having a pretty good time. They make the same money that a successful small to mid-sized “real world” business makes, with considerably less hassle. They’re a long way from the Lambo, but they can pay their bills and buy decent stuff and spend time with their kids. Their only problem is that they feel like a failure because they’re not doing 8 or 9 figures. That, and their wives have definitively nixed the hot girlfriend thing. Then there’s a big band of IMers who are broke. They spend tens of thousands of dollars on magic bullets, while their day jobs grind them to dust. In the middle of trying to figure out pay-per-click arbitrage, someone pitches them a product on how to flip domains and they’re digging out the credit card again. There’s also a small band of IMers who are broke because the Federal Trade Commission took everything they had. They kept the Black Hat on a little too long and they’re paying a steep price for it. Obviously there’s no way IMers can learn anything from the Cool Kids Tribe. Those guys are snobs and eggheads and they don’t make any money. And having your wife kick you out of the house isn’t that bad. Have you seen the Lambo I’m gonna buy some day? As soon as the DVDs get here for this seriously killer product, I’m going to pull it all together. She’ll be sorry then. Obviously there’s no way for these two to meet If you care about quality content, about your relationship with your community, and your reputation, you couldn’t possibly learn anything from someone in the IM tribe. They have yellow highlighting on their sales letters. Clearly they are Bad People and should be shunned. If you care about making money, about building a sustainable business online, and about turning your 1,000 true fans into customers, you definitely can’t learn anything from the Cool Kids. They’re elitist communists who couldn’t ask for the order if you held a gun to their head. Clearly they are Bad People and should be shunned. I wonder, though, if there’s any possible way a tribe could come together that was about building real businesses online without being cheesy, sleazy, or tacky? Could a tribe form around ethical business practices, effective persuasive communication that actually sells something, respectful relationships with customers, and a commitment to keeping the White Hat on at all times? Could that tribe actually come to terms with getting paid for the work they put in? Could they be willing to learn to create businesses that don’t require a superhuman effort to get off the ground? Not necessarily getting rich quick, but getting rich without killing yourself? Is it possible for these two tribes to actually learn from one another? To find the greatest value, satisfaction and success at the intersection of the crossroads? Could we actually pretend that we’re done with high school and create a tribe that embraces the best of both worlds? I don’t know, sounds like a pipe dream to me. How about you, what do you think? About the Author: Sonia Simone is Senior Editor of Copyblogger and the founder of Remarkable Communication. • Email to a friend • Related • View comments • Track comments • •

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[Copyblogger] The Doctor McCoy Guide to Healing Sick Content

The Doctor McCoy Guide to Healing Sick Content The Doctor McCoy Guide to Healing Sick Content Is your content ailing and in desperate need of medical attention? Is it vibrant, powerful and compelling or is it dull, weak, and boring? Does it have acute or chronic symptoms of illness? Can you save the patient or is it time to pull the plug and give your work a proper burial? Perhaps you need some direction from “Bones”. No, I’m not referring to the lovely and talented Emily Deschanel. I mean the real McCoy. Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy of Star Trek was the greatest fictional medical doctor of all time, crushing today’s champ Dr. Gregory House with better technology, skills, and bedside manner. McCoy had a heart of gold beneath his irritable exterior. By contrast, nobody’s found House’s heart yet, and he seems to have selective amnesia when it comes to the Hippocratic Oath. You might not need the real McCoy on staff, though. You can follow his example. There’s a doctor in your house, right now, that can help cure many problems with your content, with the help of some knowledge and skills. And that’s you… equipped with the knowledge in this post. Stick to what you know or limit your grasp to adjacent verticals “I’m a doctor, not a bricklayer!” was a classic McCoy line. In The Devil In The Dark, he needed to heal a wounded rock creature (the Horta), but he had no experience with that kind of alien physiology. He was terrified of harming the Horta through his lack of knowledge or experience. You need a certain amount of knowledge and experience with your subject matter to write compelling and useful copy. If you’re going to write about the mortgage industry, you’d better understand terms, rates, renewals, asset values, insurance and many other important items that pertain to this industry. Otherwise, you’re going to harm your reader by giving them poor information, and ultimately you’re going to harm yourself. Fortunately for the Horta, McCoy was able to work out a means to treat the Horta through the use of 23rd century concrete to patch the creature’s wound, much like you might fix chipped or cracked sidewalk. He came up with a workable solution by drawing a reasonable conclusion about the physiology of a rock being. If you can find parallels between your normal subject matter and similar, but different topics, you can bridge the gap of understanding and create good work. If you’re a golf writer, maybe you can branch into archery or billiards, which are sports that focus on individual competitors. Don’t always let logic and reason override emotion Dr. McCoy and Mr. Spock were, on the surface, polar opposites. McCoy was a creature of feeling and compassion while Mr. Spock seemed to rely solely on logic and reason in handling any situation. When you look at their relationship with Captain Kirk, you can see that his two closest counselors offered him a balance of opinions when dealing with any crisis. Clearly, logic and reason are extremely important, but when you’re dealing with human beings you’ve got to understand, if not embrace, feelings and irrationality. It’s true that writing has to have an underlying logic and flow behind it so that the reader can understand it without bursting some brain cells. Structure, facts, grammar, spelling, and punctuation play important roles in creating good content. However, great content resonates with emotions, challenges the reader, and can lead to a powerful call to action. Content without feeling is as good as dead. There has to be some kind of logic directing the call to action in your copy, but it also needs to have some underlying emotion. Unless it can provoke an emotional response, the reader just won’t care. Follow your conscience and do the right thing Dr. McCoy had a strong streak of decency and respect for all life. He lived the oath “do no harm” consistently in his role as chief medical officer of the U.S.S. Enterprise. He wasn’t afraid to take his captain to task, in public or in private, whenever other beings were at risk of pain or death. In Star Trek VI (The Undiscovered Country) McCoy makes a valiant attempt to save the life of the wounded Klingon Chancellor Gorkon even though the Klingons and the Federation were barely restrained enemies. Similarly, you must do the right thing for your audience. Tell the truth, give them the facts, and “omit unnecessary words” – even when it makes your job more difficult. Challenge the reader to understand your message and to take action, but don’t make their job too hard by hiding important thoughts, steps, or information. Technology has its own place – too much isn’t always a good thing Technology has its proper place and time. On one hand, McCoy always jumped at the chance to use new medical techniques and technology. On the other hand, he hated transporters and their unnatural “scrambling of molecules”. But he had to tolerate them in order to do his job. As a content creator, it’s becoming increasingly important to stay abreast of digital technologies. You don’t need to know them all, though, and you need to realize that poorly applied technology can make existing problems much worse. On the other hand, if we were still using quill pens and parchment, humanity would not have “transported” itself towards the technologies that make our lives easier. Have the right skills for the job What do you do when you’re sick? You go see a doctor. They have the knowledge and skills to fix most ailments. Failing that, you educate yourself to take care of basic problems and reserve your money for those times when you need a specialist. What do you do when your content is sick? You could try to take some direction from the example of Doctor McCoy and see if your own skills can do the trick. In more dire cases, you might need to hire a top-tier copywriter – just like in medicine, sometimes it takes a surgeon’s skill to get rid of the illness. He’s dead, Jim – move on to the next patient Sometimes a great idea falls flat upon execution and it just won’t work. Maybe you just can’t write compelling copy about rare elephant steaks, diesel dish detergent, or abrasive paper towel. Perhaps you’ve taken the wrong tack and your message is lost in a mess of leaking adjectives, inflamed adverbs, and a chronic clarity deficiency. In some situations, it’s time from the captain to order up a new “red shirt” (aka an expendable crew member or generic blog post) to replace a killed crew member. For you, the aspiring copywriter, this means that it may be necessary to start over again if nothing else is working. Sometimes you just have to pull the sheet over the patient’s face and try to find a way to save the next sick person. Or content. Healthy content is good content McCoy worked hard to keep the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise healthy and productive. Similarly, you as a creator and/or editor need to create the best, healthiest, and most functional content that you possibly can. Don’t be afraid to examine your content, check its pulse and temperature, and provide treatment when it ails. Call in the experts if you’re in a jam. Start over if you must. Your readers will thank you for it. And somewhere in the distant future, an old country doctor with a knowing smile just might tip his Mint Julep in your direction, acknowledging that you’d make a pretty darn good content doctor. About the Author: Mark Dykeman respects the health and wellness of his words at Broadcasting Brain, using cognitive surplus to create uncanny content. Tune your communicator to his Twitter feed for the shorter, timelier stuff. • Email to a friend • Related • View comments • Track comments • •

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[Copyblogger] How to Dominate Your Niche

How to Dominate Your Niche How to Dominate Your Niche Blogging is a lot like high school… have you noticed? There are the popular kids (A-list), class rank (Technorati) and endless other clique rankings (Ad Age Power 150, Techmeme Leaderboard, Cat Blogging Superstars, etc.). All of this makes for the same ol' hierarchical crap that tends to unnecessarily discourage people who are outside the power structure. I guess social media is a tad less revolutionary and more like regular ol' society than some blogging idealists want to admit. What did you expect? The answer to this reality is much the same as it was in high school. The smart kids ignore the hierarchy and concentrate on defining their own space. Forget Hierarchies and Get Territorial Here's the deal: people who succeed in social media these days don't think hierarchically… they think territorially. Ranking on someone's silly social media list may be nice, but it's a lot nicer to nail down a defensible position in a profitable niche. Trust me… there are a lot of broke people obsessed with their position on various hierarchical lists, when they should be focusing on creating a real business. The fact that they don't means there's plenty of opportunity for you. When you think territorially, you're aiming to carve out a space that is uniquely your own. And if the unique aspect that makes the territory yours also makes it difficult or impossible to dislodge you from that position… even better. Don't be Obscure Now, when people start talking about "dominating" a niche, they're usually fantasizing about discovering some brand new tiny gold mine that no one else has thought about. While new niches pop up all the time, it's folly to think you're the only genius on the planet who's spotted any particular one. More likely, it's not a niche that anyone wants to bother with. Sure, you can "own" the Total Quality Management for Peruvian Goat Herders niche, but who cares? You've got no traffic and less revenue. That's not what we're aiming for here. In fact, more often than not, you want to enter a nasty competitive niche. Why? Because that's where the money is. Intensify Your Niche and Carve Out a Territory All niches—no matter how competitive—go through various phases of evolution. Brand new and mature niches alike will evolve as the audience grows weary of the same ol’ same ol’, opening the door to new players with novel angles and unique voices. Ideally, a new player wants to come in with a fresh approach that doesn't necessarily threaten the existing hierarchy. This allows you to develop an audience by sharing with existing players, not necessarily competing with them. What you're looking to do is intensify the niche by doing something more, or differently (or maybe even better) than the existing players. You do this by first evaluating and understanding where the niche is currently, and position your content in a way that pushes the envelope. Let's look at a couple of examples. Positioning Strategies for Niche Intensification One of the most effective intensification strategies involves personality positioning. By emphasizing authentic and even flawed personality traits, a publisher or marketer can form a strong bond based on the audiences ability to identify with the publisher. For example, Internet marketing and work-at-home business advice are two heavily saturated markets (because there's lots of money involved). People like Frank Kern and Naomi Dunford use extreme "anti-marketing" personalities (combined with damn good marketing) to create extremely loyal audiences. While bigger players aim for advertising dollars based on impersonal eyeballs, personality positioning allows you to make more with fewer people thanks to the power of personal identification. It's the same principle behind celebrity endorsements and lifestyle marketing in the big leagues, and it works even better in social media. The downside of personality positioning is you often have to get extreme to get noticed in the first place. That might not only backfire, but it's not something everyone feels comfortable with. Here's an alternate approach. Back in 2005 when I was considering starting a blog, I was fascinated by blogging itself. As someone who had been creating online content since 1998, I viewed commercial blogging not as some idealistic movement, but as a more powerful version of what I'd already been doing for 7 years. At the time, there were two primary players in the niche—Problogger and Performancing. I had no desire to be #3 in a niche someone else had defined, because that's just not smart. Instead, I realized that the two main players at the time were talking about blogging without historical context; in other words, as if it were a completely new discipline. It only took a couple of posts about titles (headlines) for me to realize that they were trying to teach people copywriting without having studied the subject. I had. So, Copyblogger was born. Not only did I intensify the niche by drilling down deeper and teaching the root skills necessary for blogging, I started an educational process that allowed me to take readers beyond blogging for ad dollars and teach them to start converting readers to customers and clients. By taking that approach, Copyblogger was a complement to Problogger and Performancing, not a competitor. And by drilling deeper and wider, the approach also allowed Copyblogger to expand well beyond the confines of the "blogging about blogging" niche. Become #1 or #2 in Your Territory In last week's post about Jack Welch, some people took his philosophy of "Be #1 or #2 in your niche or don't bother" a little too literally. That's hierarchical thinking, and that's going to hold you down. The key is to become #1 or #2 in your own territory. Does it take creativity and a lot of good old-fashioned critical thinking and courage to carve out your own territory? Of course it does. Otherwise anyone could do it. About the Author: Brian Clark is Executive Editor of Copyblogger and co-founder of DIY Themes. Get more from Brian on Twitter. • Email to a friend • Related • View comments • Track comments • •

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[Copyblogger] Is Your Copy Less Than Fresh?

Is Your Copy Less Than Fresh? Is Your Copy Less Than Fresh? Being flexible in today's business climate is imperative. Your target market’s needs change all the time, every day. What was hot for them yesterday might not be so important today, and what was only of mild interest last week might be tomorrow’s blazing success. You can influence those needs. You can give a boost to a service or product people have seemingly lost interest in, and you can create that success seller. All you need to do is revisit your message. The Times They Are A-Changin’ When you began your business, you probably did some target market research. You knew there was a demand, you figured out who would buy what you sell, and you decided on marketing tactics that worked with potential customers. Two years down the road, though, your target market has changed. They’re a little older, a little wiser, technology is different… the world changes and people change with it. The sales strategies you began your business with might no longer be as effective. Your marketing message persuades prospects that your business is the correct choice. But an outdated message or an overdone tactic you’ve been using for a year or two might not be working anymore to convince potential customers to buy. That’s normal, and it doesn’t mean people no longer want what you sell. It just means their needs have changed, and your message no longer resonates with them. Your business didn’t evolve as they did. It became frozen in time. Freshen Up Your Copy to Meet Current Needs and Desires So thaw it out. Fire it up with a new marketing message and get people paying attention again. Take a look at your content and the copy you use on your website and brochures. Does your message truly relate to what people want today? Or is it passé? Do the benefits you pushed back then still work with what people seek for solutions now? Are you tuned in to what turns your customers on? People don’t get turned on when businesses convey self-important messages. There’s a new generation of buyers out there, younger people entering consumer markets, and they have different generational values. They’re becoming your potential customers, and you need to be ready to meet their needs. Then there are other potential customers, the baby boomers who are living their own life changes as they leave careers and retire. Their interests are shifting, their needs as well and the result is that their desires adapt to their new lifestyle. A flexible business taps into their changing needs. So how do you make sure your business is flexible and adapting to your customers’ needs? Lose the Tired Fake Benefits Take a look at some messages that need to get with the times: “We offer full-service convenience…” Well, that’s nice, but a buyer looking for a specific result might not really care about convenience. How about revamping that message with a great benefit? - “Our full-service convenience lets you get results without wasting time chasing them.” “Our standards of quality go beyond the competition…” Great. So what? Everyone says they’re the best. That statement just doesn’t resonate with many people anymore. So why not convey a message that says why your quality counts? “Our high quality makes sure that your readers are impressed with your business - and become your clients.” “We’re your premier source…” Most people could care less whether the source is fantastic, marvelous or premier, as long as it works. Overhaul that message to relate to buyers more personally. “We make sure your business stays ahead of the competition and leads the pack.” How often should you revisit your marketing messages or overhaul your copy? As often as it takes to stay with the times, keep sales alive and respond to what people want today, not what they wanted last year. About the Author: For more tips and tricks to keep your business soaring, check out The Ultimate Freelancer, James Chartrand’s latest hot-item book on making more money while working less. • Email to a friend • Related • View comments • Track comments • •

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