A morning with Seth Godin

Sound bites from the morning chat Attended via Business Chicks

10/09/14All Seth’s work – I just captured insights!

Quick history of Seth

• Has written many books• In 90s wrote a book

“Best of the Net” – it only sold about 1000 copies – why?

• Same time, many of same researchers also help build yahoo.com

• Seth didn’t look past his own comfort levels

What can I do?

• Henry Ford made the middle class possible by pioneering mass production

• People became interchangeable– If a supermarket checkout operator is sick, they are just replaced

by another.• Wedgewood took it further with mass production of pottery

– He made it nice by providing windows in his factories and they had health insurance

• He made so much money that he was able to later fund another great innovator– Charles Darwin who was his grandson

Marketing is…

• Interrupt as many as I can to sell my product• MORE– More likes, more followers, more noise, more

sales• But.. Another definition of everyone is average• Now we are solving a problem customers no

longer have!• Cheaper is the challenge

Clutter

• There is so much to choose from is your product going to be missed?

http://theavantguardian.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/supermarket1.jpg

Now: there is even more music made by more musicians than ever before yet “the music industry is dead”

Destroy Perfect, Enable Impossible

Seth’s solution to the death of mass marketing:

Treat different people differently

http://27gen.files.wordpress.com/2011/09/2011-bell-curve.jpg

The Internet

• The Internet lets us go to the edges– A woman who loves fly fishing would one go to a

shop and could only find maybe 2 fly rods– She now researches the ‘net, finds a site that sells

400 different fly rods and buys the bespoke, bamboo, etched, special weighted, gold inlaid fly rod as its different!

So what do we need to do?

Co-ordination Trust

Permission Exchange of ideas

Generosity Art

Work together horizontally and create

value

It should be a privilege to

connect

No one wants to connect with someone who is selfish or ‘a

taker’

Be valued, safe, open

Willingness to share, to let go, to empower others

Exciting and new – we don’t connect to

boring

Seth’s Circle of Marketing infographic

http://topnonprofits.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/circles-of-marketing-IMG-e1343994811502.png

Examples

Twitter• how did you find out about it?• Usually, someone told you as they wanted followers• Which is what you do too?

• Why bookshops fail?– They are not selling connections– They are only selling inventory

Connected Economy

• The connected economy is based on abundance… (so why do we hoard?)

Tribes

• Human beings like being in sync• We are wired for it• Find a tribe and lead them!

“A tribe is a group of people connected to one another, connected to a leader, and connected to an idea. For millions of years, human beings have been part of one tribe or another. A group needs only two things to be a tribe: a shared interest and a way to

communicate.”

FOLLOW ME

“The secret of leadership is simple: Do what you believe in. Paint a picture of the future. Go there. People will follow.” (Seth Godin)

We all hold a little bit back. That’s what we have been taught to do.

ART

• Living with the tension

Ideas…

• We need to be more comfortable about stealing them– We will change them– And we will connect them

http://changeagile.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/Seth-Godin-Go-make-something-happen.jpeg

FeedbackShun the unbelievers

Don’t listen

Ignore the 1 star reviews and the haters

Connected in an Abundance economy

• Give credit to your bosses and your peers• Take the blame, be responsible

SHIP• Bring your work to the market• Change things quietly until you bring your

work to market

Value

• People will realise the value of what you are doing and surprise you with what they are willing to do

• So, GO DO….• Whatever it is, go do it• Success is repeatedly failing until you connect

Salto Mortale

• The dangerous leap• Leaping with danger is the only

kind that matters• There is a difference between

ready and prepared• YOU WILL NEVER BE READY

http://www.scottyboxa.com/wp-content/uploads/68647_469415289762759_1012261733_n.png

http://krissacurran.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/wings.jpg

ICARUSOften depicted in art, Icarus and his father attempt to escape from Crete by means of wings that his father constructed from feathers and wax. Icarus' father warns him first of complacency and then of hubris, asking that he fly neither too low nor too high, because the sea's dampness would clog or the sun's heat would melt his wings.

• We’ve been taught not to fly too high• It is often forgotten that too low is also a risk

Important work often ships before it is ready!!

Fear

• It’s ok to have fear• It’s part of the point• Do it with the fear

DON’T STRIVE TO BE HEARD WHEN YOU’RE HERESTRIVE TO BE MISSED WHEN YOU ARE NOT

WE NEED YOU TO LEAD US

Are you going to matter?