Brains on Fire

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  You Don’t Know It All

  Posted on October 30th, 2009 by Spike and currently 2 commenting.

  This is a post to expand on Geno’s post last month.

  It’s okay. The world isn’t going to crumble if you don’t have the answer. Because you don’t have all the answers. And the beautiful thing is, you can always go find them.

  If you haven’t noticed by now, it absolutely drives me insane when “experts” spout all this advice based on, well, nothing. It sounds smart. It sounds like it makes sense. But not only do you come to realize later that these folks are preachers and are dedicated to growing their influence by preaching more and more and more, you also find out that when they do try and help a company, they are afraid to admit (and never do) that they don’t have all the answers.

  Half of our entire process in igniting movements is based on having conversations with people. Now your mind just went to online conversations. Blogs and message boards and exchanging tweets. But you are wrong. We go talk to people (wait for it, wait for it) face-to-face. Spend time in their presence. Walk a mile or two in their shoes. Listen to the words that come out of their mouths. That’s where the success of the movement takes root on so many levels. It’s not about what YOU think. It’s not about your philosophies or your gut or what your blog post is going to say. It’s about what you don’t know. The hidden nuggets the lie deep within the real, honest, transparent conversations that you have. Not interviews. Not focus groups. Not surveys. Real words. Coming out of real people’s mouths.

  The best path to success runs through admitting that you don’t know what you don’t know. And the sooner you humble yourself and realize that you’re not an expert at what your clients do, the better. Because then you can start take off your marketing hat and wear no hats – just be a human being. Talking to human beings. And learning from those that are living it. That’s where the movement begins.

  Tags: conversations, don't know it all, know it all, Movements, real people, we don't know what we don't know
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  The power of thank you.

  Posted on October 29th, 2009 by Robbin and currently 5 commenting.

  Seems like daily I am reminded of this lesson. I know I have written about it before on our blog, so bear with me as I choose this topic yet AGAIN.

  Work for me, and Brains on Fire, is not simply about money. (Although I do want our business to be a profitable and growing one. Because let’s face it, if you don’t exist you can’t make a difference in the world.)

  Every day I get up and say this: Please let me use my words and my time wisely in work that matters. Work that is meaningful and purposeful. And we are lucky that we can do just that most days. We take our work personally. We try and elevate the task at hand and lift up the people we touch. We’re not always perfect at it for sure. But we try hard to keep this front and center.

  I also have to admit sometimes I flat out forget to thank the people who team up with us — our clients who trust us, and our “extended tribe” as we like to call them.

  We choose our partners carefully. We have to surround ourselves with people who want to create powerful, meaningful work in the world alongside of us.

  I believe and have long believed that a bit of gratitude and acknowledgment goes a long way. Sometimes in our busy business lives, I simply forget the power thank you. Yesterday I was caught off guard and bluntly reminded of how we don’t want to treat our treasured partners. I will carry this particular conversation with me for quite a while and use it as an example to my team.

  Love is circular transaction and you get back what you give in this world. Let us all remember and practice that with our partners and our clients as often as we can.

  Tags: Love, Thank You, Valuing your busines associates
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  Whose Passion is Greater?

  Posted on October 28th, 2009 by Spike and currently 5 commenting.

  Ya know, “passion” is a word that’s about to go into the overused marketing trash bin for me, but until we find one to replace it…

  If you’re doing some things right and your company has made it through the past year, then you just might have some fans out there. And fans have passion – it kinda comes along with the territory. Passion is a great thing to have, but lemme ask you this: is it a lop-sided kind of love? In other words, do your customers love your company/product/service more than you and your employees do?

  Because if they do, you might be in trouble. Passion needs to be a mirror. It needs to be equal inside a company and outside a company. And if it’s lop-sided, you may want to find out why.

  In our experience, if there’s passion inside the company – from the very top to the good folks on the front lines – then you’re easily going to find passion outside your company. But if your people are coming to work to collect a paycheck, then I’m thinking that you’re not finding much passion inside or outside your walls.

  Passion is contagious. It’s exciting. It fuels word of mouth. And we’ve talked about how it’s no longer a product conversation – it’s no longer about you and what you can do. It’s a passion conversation – it’s about how you fit into people’s lives and how you can be a conduit to their passion. You’re the enabler, not the destination.

  So follow the passion. It’ll let you know really quickly what’s working. And what’s not.

  Tags: passion, passion conversation, product conversation, who's passion is greater?, WOM, WOMM, Word of Mouth, word of mouth marketing
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  The “WE” moment

  Posted on October 27th, 2009 by Spike and currently 6 commenting.

  Have you ever noticed when a company screws you over, it’s always what “they” did to you? They didn’t come on time. They messed up my order. They have no idea what they are doing. It’s “us” and “them.”

  (As a quick aside, Geno once pointed out to me that a lot of old school Southerners – who think it’s impolite to criticize people – will say that “I don’t know them” if they nothing good to say about someone.)

  But when we feel a part of something bigger than ourselves, it’s no longer “they.” It’s “we.” Think about your favorite sports team. You watch the game and then talk about it with fellow fans. What word do you use? More than likely, it’s “we.” “We played great.” Or even, “we sucked.” And then there’s the good ol’ “We’re number one!”

  This also happens with companies and brands. When you’re doing it right – and by doing it right I mean opening the kimono and including your fans in everything you do – you begin to create a culture of “we.”

  But WHEN does that happen for you? When do you cross over and start using the “we” instead of the “me” and “them?” What makes it happen? Is it a defining moment? Or an eventual move towards it?

  But what I really think is that maybe we should stop trying to figure out how to get our customers to get into the “we” mentality and start trying to figure out how to get ourselves into a “we” metality. We need to embrace them before they embrace us. Only then can we start doing business like we’re all in this together.

  Tags: the we moment, us versus them, us vs. them, We mentality
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  Why you don’t care about KFC’s free grilled chicken day.

  Posted on October 26th, 2009 by Spike and currently 5 commenting.

  Remember back in May all the hoopla around Oprah and KFC teaming up to promote the new grilled chicken offering? All you had to do is print out a coupon and wa-lah: free grilled chicken. So many people cashed in on the deal that most of the KFCs ran out of chicken. Oops.

  A couple of months later, they did it AGAIN.

  Third time’s a charm, right? Because today is – you guessed it – free grilled chicken day at your local KFC. And this time you don’t even have to bring in a coupon. Just walk in and ask for a piece of grilled chicken and it’s yours. Apparently there will be extra staff and, of course, a lot of extra chicken on hand.

  So why is KFC giving away chicken for the third time? I know I didn’t go the first two times, so why would I change my mind and go this time?

  Look, I can see why you would do the promotion once. And since they ran out of chicken the first time and had a bunch of angry “free lunch” customers on their hands, I can see why they would do it a second time to make up for it. But a third time? Come on. Now you’re just telling the rest of us that you don’t value your new offering, so why should we? There’s a KFC about a mile from the Brains on Fire world headquarters, but even though it’s free, KFC is still not going to make its way into my realm of consideration.

  Free is a trap. (And we’ve talked about it before.) Sure, it generates attention. But what next? From a previous post: Because just like the donkey, if you dangle that free carrot, it will do the minimal amount of work it has to do to get its prize. And then it’s done. At least until you dangle another carrot.

  The kids at Chick-fil-A gave away chicken strips a while back, but at least you had to work for it in that you couldn’t get the freebie unless you were wearing the logo of your favorite sports team. That creates some community support. That enforces some fandom. And it’s so Chick-fil-A.

  If nothing else, KFC will be making a buch of college kids happy (for the third time), but folks like that will always go where the freebie is. So KFC, good luck with that. I’m headed down the street to spend my dollars with the local guys anyway.

  Tags: free, grilled chicken, KFC, Oprah, the problem with free