My friend Andy Crestodina recommended that I watch a 2009 TEDx Talk given by Simon Sinek. I kept putting off watching the video because it was almost twenty minutes long and I usually only consume short videos online. But after I finally decided to view the talk I wished I had not waited so long.

Focus On Why

The main point of Simon’s talk is that great leaders inspire action by focusing on the “why.” Simon repeatedly states that people don’t buy WHAT you are doing, they buy WHY you are doing it.

It’s an interesting theory and he makes a lot of good points. And you can hardly ever go wrong by using Apple as an example of how to inspire followers.

But while Simon may be vastly oversimplifying how great leaders inspire action, I do believe understanding WHY you do what you do is a very important first step when trying to attract and/or inspire followers to your cause.

Watch the video and let me know what you think.

I read a lot of books written by people a lot smarter than me. Unfortunately, I don’t always remember the great lessons I learn after I have completed a book.

To help fix that problem I decided to start jotting down the things that I find particularly memorable.

So now I’m taking notes as I read. And every so often I feel I should share with you the things that interest me the most.

This is not meant to be a book review.  It’s just a list of some easy to digest nuggets that I pulled from the book I’m reading. I hope that you find some of them useful.

The Book

I’m currently reading a book by Bob Pearson, Chief Technology  & Media Officer for WCG, called Pre-Commerce: How Companies and Customers Are Transforming Business Together.

I’m halfway through the book, and here are the tidbits that I felt I needed to highlight.

NOTE: The items in quotes are taken verbatim from the book. The items without quotes are my interpretations of ideas from the book.

• “The Pre-Commerce world demands a new interpretation of the Four Ps.”  The new model consists of the Four As – awareness, assessment, action, and ambassadors.

• “The web is the greatest research tool ever built.”

• “Your story is no longer the most important message. What matters is how your audience discusses and validates your story.”

• The 80/20 rule, where 20% of the people do 80% of the work, does not apply online. On the internet, roughly 1% of the people are original content producers, about 9% of the people are the content distributors, and the remaining 90% are the lurk-and-learn crowd.

• “The topic is more important than the brand.”

• “Customers don’t care about your carefully crafted story; they care about the one piece of it that interests them. The topic is where influence happens.”

• “Your customers live in a meme-driven world. If you don’t identify and research your own brand memes, you’ll never know who’s influencing your customers and how.”

• “Your company needs to capture more than content; it needs to navigate the entire river of influence.”

• When researching content producers in your industry or product space, you should “track their reach, relevance, and ability to syndicate content on a particular topic.”

• “Conversations end due to a lack of content, not a lack of passion.”

Final Thoughts

Did any of these resonate with you? I really love that last one about why conversations end.

Oh and I definitely plan on sharing more insights from the second half of the book once I have finished reading it.

Before I go, I have to ask…what are you reading?

“It’s nice to be important…but it’s more important to be nice.”

My dad said that often when I was growing up. I think about that idea a lot, especially as it relates to the business world. But it should not matter just in the business world. It should be applied to all aspects of our lives.

Just. Be. Nice.

Does your business have a people strategy?

It should.  And being nice needs to be at the core of that strategy.

Be Nice to Everyone

Be nice to your family. Be nice to your friends. Be nice to your co-workers. Be nice to your customers. Treat everyone you encounter with respect, even if they don’t deserve it. I know, I know, easier said than done. I agree, but try it anyway.

You Can’t Pick and Choose

However, I’m not in favor of  choosing when to be nice and who to be nice to. Being nice only when it is convenient or benefits you, tells me a lot about the kind of person you choose to be. It tells me that ultimately everything is about YOU.

In the end that kind of thinking does not pay off, in business or in life.

Be nice. It’s not that hard. And it’s so much better than…you know…NOT being nice.

Image by: SeanbJack via Creative Commons License

We as consumers get bombarded with stats constantly in order to influence our preferences. And while many stats are in fact true, they can also be very misleading if you are not paying close attention.

Match.com Marriages

For example, in recent television ads for Match.com, the online dating site claims that more marriages have occurred through couples meeting on Match.com than any other dating site.

Wow that’s awesome!

Since Match.com dates/relationships have resulted in the most marriages then they have to be the best at “Matching” people, right?

Not necessarily.

Taking a Closer Look

I think most people would agree that Match.com has one of the biggest, if not the biggest, subscription bases of any online dating site in the U.S. So when they claim to have the  most marriages from their service that could solely be a result of their site having the biggest subscription base.

The statement that “Match.com has produced the most marriages” could be factually correct, but it is misleading because you don’t know how successful they are (by percentage) at converting their customers from singles to married couples.

And wouldn’t that be useful information to have?

One Possible Scenario

Let’s look at an example with some numbers that I’m completely making up.

In this example I will compare Match.com with the “next best” dating site called SomeOtherDatingSite.com.

Let’s define a successful outcome of using Match.com or SomeOtherDatingSite.com as a relationship that results in a marriage.

Match.com                   SomeOtherDatingSite.com

Users                          100,000                       50,000

Resulting Marriages      10,000                         9500

Success Rate                10%                             19%

Who is Better?

In this oversimplified case we see that Match.com has indeed produced more marriages (500 more to be exact) than the next best online dating site.

But SomeOtherDatingSite.com has almost double the success rate (19% vs. 10%) of Match.com.

So which site is actually the better dating site?

The site that has resulted in more total marriages or the site that has a higher rate of success?

Ignoring this fictional example for a moment, it is very possible that Match.com’s service has produced the most marriages of any online dating site AND has the highest conversion rate of any online data site.  But we do not know about that second part because the company makes no mention of it in their television ads.

What’s the Point?

My point is that you as a consumer should not take stats at face value. And as a smart consumer you have every right to question the data that is presented to you.

Businesses always present stats in the most favorable light possible to persuade you to purchase their product or service.  I explained here how Match.com tries to convince you they are the best online dating service because they have produced the most marriages.

But you need to think about what companies are really saying (or not saying) in their ads. Stats that use %’s are different than stats that are simply quantifying the amount of something.

Just because your service produces the MOST positive outcomes does not mean that your service is the BEST at producing that outcome.  That’s all I’m saying.

So what statistics have you found to be misleading? Let me know in the comments.

Every January since 2006 Chris Brogan has challenged people to forego the idea of New Year’s resolutions and instead focus on three words that will help you set clearer goals and guide your experiences for the coming year.

I wanted to come up with my own set of three words since I have never been big on creating New Year’s resolutions for myself.

Now I realize that it is already the middle of February, but there’s never a bad time to bring better focus into your life, right?

My Three Words for 2012

Here are the three words I am using to guide me in 2012.

Action

I’m a man of ideas. Big ideas, small ideas, good ideas, bad ideas. I’ve got tons of ‘em. The problem is that most of these ideas never turn into anything more than ideas, for many reasons that can (and just might) fill future blog posts. All these ideas just become fodder for lists and help to fill my brain with thoughts that keep me up at night.

So the “idea” this year is to focus on action, as in taking action. Execute on the things that I come up with. I want to create value from all of these ideas, at least the good ones, that I have sitting out there just waiting to take on some concrete form.

Chances

For those who don’t know me, and for those who think they know me but perhaps really don’t, here’s the real scoop. I’m pretty open-minded in my beliefs about how I and others should be able to lead their lives.

But while my many of my beliefs are liberal, my actions have, with few exceptions, been very conservative. I have lived most of my life without taking a lot of risks. I did everything the way you are “supposed to.”

Finish high school, go to college, work 40+ years for a company, retire, play golf, watch Matlock reruns, die.

Ok, I just turned 40 so most of that last sentence is pure conjecture. But I was already well on my way down that path. I worked for Motorola for 16 years before my recent layoff and was living a life best described as Same S***, Different Day.

In his book the Art of Non-Conformity, Chris Guillebeau described someone like me as a sleepwalker. Looking back I view myself as having lived in the Matrix.

Now it is time to put that era to rest. This year I choose to take more chances.

I want to… no… NEED to… push myself out of my comfort zone.

No more sleepwalking for me.

Simplicity

Over the last few months I’ve felt a growing desire to simplify every aspect of my life. To simplify my life to the core elements that matter the most to me: people, planet and prosperity.

I add unnecessary levels of complexity to my life all the time. The complexity clouds my mind, distracts me, makes me less efficient and limits my output. And I don’t like it anymore. I need to reclaim some simplicity in my life by reducing everything I can.

Reduce the clutter in my living space, reduce the ideas bouncing around my head, reduce the amount of crappy food I eat, reduce the new skills I’m learning and focus on the most important ones, reduce the time I waste on low output activities, reduce my distractions, reduce my carbon footprint, etc.

By reducing the many complexities in my life I hope to gain a clearer focus on the things that truly motivate me. And take action on a higher percentage of them than I ever have before.

Action. Chances. Simplicity.

This is the first time I have done this exercise and I’m excited to see how closely I end up aligning my activities this year with these three words.

So what three words are guiding you this year?

*NOTE*

You may wonder why I did not choose “reduce” or “reduction” instead of “simplicity” as my third word. For me the goal is achieving simplicity, the strategy to get there is through reduction. So I’d rather focus on the goal and not the strategy.

The Bad: It’s been a long time since I posted anything here. It’s really hard to gain any momentum and build a following if one does not, you know, publish anything. I plan on creating much more regular content here in 2012 and I’m having a few close friends help provide some accountability on that front.

The Good: I have not gone completely off the grid, however. I’ve been doing all sorts of digital marketing activities, including creating content for some Chicago based web design firms.  I did a number of posts in 2011 for the Mightybytes blog while working there part time.  I also contributed a guest post for the Orbit Media blog.

Below I’ve listed some of the highlights. Hopefully these hold you over for a bit until I follow through on my commitment to get new content up on this site.

Web Analytics

Measure What Matters: Defining Goals to Get More from Google Analytics

Measuring activity on your site means more than just counting the number of page views. By setting up goals early on, you can gain deep insights into how your customers or visitors interact with your site.

Measure What Matters: Using Funnel Paths in Google Analytics

By using Funnel Paths in Google Analytics, you can see exactly how your visitors enter and exit pages on your website. The conversion rates calculated for each stage of the funnel will show you exactly how well each page is performing and will make it easy for you to identify and make changes to pages that need improvement.

Measure What Matters: Using Goals and Funnels in Google Analytics to Optimize Website Performance

Use the combined power of Google Analytics’ goals and funnels data to remove a lot of the guesswork that may have been a part of your previous online marketing efforts.

Social Media

Building Brand Awareness with Social Media: A Chicago Case Study

You don’t always need PR campaigns to increase awareness of your brand. Discover how Jennifer Lucente, New Media Manager for the Chicago Architecture Foundation (CAF), used social media to promote the CAF’s “Around Chicago in 85 Tours” challenge. Her efforts resulted in record CAF attendance and revenue figures for the year.

Get the Led Out: Social Media Lessons from Led Zeppelin

One of the greatest rock ‘n’ roll bands of all time was secretly doling out social media advice well before its time.

Content Strategy

Five Essential Actions for a Successful Online Content Marketing Strategy

Are you investing time and money in an online content marketing strategy? Focus on these five essential actions to get the most out of your efforts.

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I recently attended a lecture about personal branding.  As someone looking for full time employment, this is a topic close to my heart.  But personal branding is not just for those looking for a new job.

Personal branding is important for everyone who strives for career success.  You might be looking to change job function, change industries or land a more senior position in your current company. In all of these cases your personal brand will play a crucial role in your ability to achieve your goal.

What is My Personal Brand?

Your personal brand is your reputation.  It is comprised of your thoughts, beliefs, words, and actions.  It is all the unique factors that differentiate you from everyone else.

The act of personal branding then is how you market yourself to others.  This branding hinges on people’s perception of you.

Unfortunately, we are not able to control they way people perceive us.  We are only able to influence the way we are perceived. So it is critical to know your brand and to clearly communicate it to others so their perception of your brand is as close to the reality as possible.

Why is a Personal Brand so important?

Gone are the days when you would work for the same company for 20 years.  Whether by choice or necessity people are changing jobs much more frequently than ever before.  These days it is normal for workers to only stay at a company for 1-3 years.

Technological advances, commoditization of work in many sectors, mass outsourcing of jobs, and unstable markets have all led to more people fighting for fewer jobs.

Therefore, in order to differentiate yourself in such a highly competitive work environment you have to have a strong personal brand that describes who you are, what you are about, and what makes you valuable.

With so many candidates available and so little time or resources to evaluate their talents, the person with the strongest personal brand is the usually the one who is chosen from all the faces in the crowd.

So what exactly are you doing to build a strong personal brand?

Warm weather has finally arrived in Chicago! So to celebrate here  is another round of marketing thoughts from around town.

Topics covered this time around include: small business tips for surveying customers, states of grief experienced by companies adopting social media, signs of a great word of mouth topic, and reasons why online video is great for increasing your site’s conversion rates.  Enjoy!

• Mike Sampson at crowdSPRING discusses 10 tips small businesses can use when surveying customers.

• Amber Naslund at Brass Tack Thinking details how businesses adopting Social Media go through stages closely resembling the traditional stages of grief experienced in people’s personal lives during times of loss.

• The folks over at GasPedal tell you 3 signs indicating you have discovered a great word of mouth topic.

• Marcel Media makes a great case for why online video is one of the most powerful marketing tools for increasing your site’s conversion rate.

So who around town do you like to follow?

What marketing thought leaders do you repeatedly learn from?

Drop me a line in the comments so I can include their work in the future.

Photo by Seth Anderson

As a new Twitter record was being set Sunday night due to the news of Osama Bin Laden’s death, did anyone else notice the people/companies sending out automated tweets?

One of the biggest stories of the year was happening and yet there were still tweets about “10 Ways to Improve Your SEO” and other miscellaneous topics.

By my highly unscientific estimation, about 90% of tweets late Sunday night dealt with the topic of Osama Bin Laden’s death. Therefore, any tweet at that time about another subject really stuck out like a sore thumb.

I would not call it an epic fail, but it did make the automatic tweeters look a little, I don’t know, out of touch.

What To Do?

Perhaps they could have temporarily shut off the scheduled tweets? But that would have required someone to have been monitoring Twitter late Sunday night.  I’m sure it’s not standard practice for most people/companies to monitor Twitter late on Sunday evenings to make sure that no major world events are unfolding.

You never know when a big news story will break on Twitter, but when it does you better hope that it happens during your normal work hours so that you can be a part of the relevant conversation AND keep from sending out messages that make you look unaware, disinterested, or both.

What do you think?

Once again I present you with a sampling of marketing thoughts from around the Second City.

This week’s topics include YouTube’s new analytics, online reputation management services, live streams and the Twitter app, Buffer.  Enjoy.

• Dan O’Halloran of Sprout Social helps you get to know YouTube’s new analytics features.

• Chris Campbell of Lakeshore Branding discusses services you can use to manage your online reputation.

• Joey DiFranco from Orbit Media Studios writes about live streaming and how your company can benefit from using it.

• In a guest post over at Liz Strauss’ Successful Blog, Leo Widrich explains how to get more done on Twitter using the Buffer app.

P.S.  SOBCon Chicago 2011 begins this weekend.  Check the full schedule to learn more about the event.

If you are in the area you might also consider attending the SOBCon Kick Off Party Thursday night in the Gold Cost Room at the Drake Hotel.

The Social Media Club Chicago is hosting so you will have the opportunity to meet lots of great people from the Chicago Social Media community in addition to SOBCon Founder Liz Strauss and Co-Founder Terry Starbucker.

Hope to see you there!