Brains on Fire

• 

  Lifting others up. Part two or three. Or four. Who knows.

  Posted on August 17th, 2010 by Robbin and currently 12 commenting.

  
  This photo is from my friend Libby Williams. She took it in my sunroom. WE love her. Check out her blog.

  “Victory in marketing doesn’t happen when you sell something, but when you cultivate advocates for your brand” – Steve Knox

  Steve Knox made a huge, beautiful impact on me at the FIRE session. And set this thought rolling around in my heart and my head.

  He said that the goal of a company should be to create Trusted Advocacy. And while he spent a lot of time talking about disrupting schemas (which was awesome cool), he said something else that got my wheels spinning and really validated a lesson we have learned.

  Lesson number 9 in the Brains on Fire book to be exact.
  
  “Movements make advocates feel like rock stars.” (Okay, I have said it before. Maybe rock star is not the best term, but you get the gist.)

  Steve said one of the ways to create trust is to give without expecting anything in return. (Side note: what makes a remarkable company also seems to make a great person, have you noticed that?)
  
  We call it lifting others up. So many companies these days want to start a community of fans. But think about it. Do we really admire those among us who are looking for fans to be their advocates or are we drawn to people who genuinely lift us up…without expecting anything in return.

  I’ll be honest, I know who I’d rather have dinner with.

  It’s a fine line.

  Don’t go searching for people (fans) to lift your business up, lift them up first. Be famous for the people who love you, for the way you love them.

  Love and recognition form a circular transaction. If you give it out, it’ll always come back to you. Trust it.

  We all on some gut level know that first hand. It flat out works in relationships and it works in business. And finally, finally we as marketers and leaders are starting to embrace the fact that creating a remarkable business is all about relationships.

  We are so very jazzed that those of your reading the Brains on Fire book are reaching out to us by email and such. It’s really a dream come true for me personally. Another dream of mine is to return the concept of love back to the corporate world. Because love is a good thing. Here’s a comment to us by email from DeRay McKesson. Who by the way gave us a ton of constructive feedback we will address soon. But here is a comment from him I cherish:

  + Love. It’s an easy topic/word to avoid and difficult to engage meaningfully. I appreciate that you did not hide behind “passion” but instead let passion co-mingle with its partner “love” throughout the text. At each point, you acknowledged the feeling part of the work of spreading messages in a way that came across as authentic. Solid.

  I woke up one morning recently to this email and it changed my life. It started like this: Dear Brains on Fire, This love is real. So yeah. Not naming names DOUGLAS, but you think we all work harder when you share that sort of thing? Well, guess what? WE all do. Whether we are abolishing sex slavery in the world, reforming high school education or selling diapers. Or scissors.

  You toss bits of love out into the universe and they come back to you. Every. Single. Time. Stay close. WE are crazy mad in love with all of you who are taking your precious time to to read this blog today. Pass it on. Will ya?

  Love and much, much gratitude,
  Robbin

  Tags: Brains on Fire Book, FIRE Sessions, Fiskars, Green Dot Public Schools, Love, love146, P&G, Steve Knox
• 

  Movements and ownership - employees and customers behind the wheel

  Posted on July 22nd, 2010 by Eric Dodds and currently 2 commenting.

  On Monday we talked about why movements require ownership - putting employees and customers behind the wheel. Today we’re gonna look at a few really practical examples.

  First, if you missed the last episode, here are a few highlights:

  • So many well-meaning businesses initiate use of social media tools and conversation with their employees and customers, but never let them out of the passenger seat.
  • If you want to build real community, though, you can’t just invite your advocates along for the ride, you have to let them get behind the wheel at some point.
  • Without letting them drive, you’ll never see your employees or customers let out their full potential - which also happens to be the full potential of your brand.
  Ok, on to a few practical examples. There are lots of them out there, but I picked a few different ones that look at ownership from different angles. We’d love to hear about some more examples from you.

  

  Example 1: Engineering and letting the people who use your products help design them.

  Fiskars is an amazing client of ours. Their willingness to let the people who love them most play an active role in the brand continually amazes us. One of the coolest examples, though, is the magic that happened when the brand let some of their biggest fans meet the product engineers - and tell them what they liked and disliked about old products and what they’d like to see in new products.

  That’s right - Fiskars let the people who use their products on a daily basis get together with the engineers to help them brainstorm on how the products could be better. And the engineers loved it - end users giving them practical and useful product improvement ideas. What’s more, one of their meetings even resulted in a new product.

  

  Example 2: Using customer artwork in company marketing.

  Pabst Blue Ribbon has held an annual art contest for the past 4 years. The rules are pretty simple: any art created had to have the Pabst Blue Ribbon can or logo and any sculptures created had to be constructed solely of empty PBR cans. How’s that putting customers behind the wheel?

  Pabst uses a selection of the artwork to display on billboards (giving the original artist full credit). Lots of companies solicit user-generated-content from customers, and many of them display the work online. Pabst (and other companies with similar efforts) takes it a step further and actually involves artists’ work in the companies marketing and let’s the world know it.

  

  Example 3: Asking employees to be the brand of good customer service and putting your money where your mouth is.

  The Ritz Carlton has an incredibly strong commitment to the quality of their customer experience. That customer experience is delivered by their employees, so they obviously have very high standards for their workers. (Sidenote, their employee motto is really cool: “We are Ladies and Gentlemen serving Ladies and Gentlemen”.)

  But The Ritz doesn’t just ask make customer service a job requirement or simply ask their employees to provide an optimal stay for guests. They give them the power live the brand of customer service. With cash.

  …they’re empowered to deliver the level of service Ritz mandates… Sixty-seven percent of customers leave you because of indifference with how they’re treated. Customers judge the quality of the institution, he said, by the responsiveness of the first person they come in contact with to discuss their problem. Given that, the Ritz empowers and trains the front-line service to resolve conflicts. Part of this entails allowing employees to spend up to $2,000 per guest per day to “fix” any problems, as well as giving employees ongoing problem-resolution training.

  –Milla D’Antonio

  Tags: art, beer, Brains on Fire, Brand, Brands, customer service, customers, Employees, engineering, fiskaneers, Fiskars, Fiskateers, Marketing, ownership, pabst blue ribbon, PBR, Ritz Carlton, user generated content
• 

  8.19.10 - PRSA Webinar - Geno talks about How to Grow Word-of-Mouth Movements

  Posted on July 2nd, 2010 by Geno and currently 1 commenting.

  What does it take to build a movement of loud and proud brand ambassadors? More social media applications? Faster technology? Geno Church teaches you the seven lessons on how your brand can build and grow a movement, starting with how to treat people like fans, not customers, and how to allow your fans to share brand ownership. Learn the difference between a movement and a campaign, as well as how to measure ROI. Hear about word-of-mouth case studies, including the Fiskars Brands “Fiskateers” movement, which now has more than 5,000 members worldwide, and the Effie award-winning Rage Against the Haze youth anti-smoking initiative, which has more than 7,000 active teenagers involved despite a complete state program budget elimination.

  PRSA Webinar

  Thursday, August 19th

  3:00pm, EST

  Members $150 / Non-Members $250

  Register: http://www.prsa.org/Learning/Seminars/view/663/How_to_Grow_Word-of-Mouth_Movements

  Tags: ambassadors, Brains on Fire, Brand, EFFIE, Fiskars, Fiskateers, Geno, geno church, gold, Movement, people are the killer app, PRSA, Rage Against the Haze, Speaking, webinar, WOM, Word of Mouth
• 

  7.20.10 - Geno Speaks - Supergenius Conference, New York, NY

  Posted on June 23rd, 2010 by Eric Dodds and currently 0 commenting.

  Word of Mouth Supergenius: The “How to be Great at Word of Mouth Marketing” Conference

  • 12 how-to classes: simple, hands-on lessons on essential word of mouth skills
  • 12 real-world case studies: word of mouth success stories from great companies
    • Geno Church on how Brains on Fire created the amazing Fiskars fan community
  • 6 brilliant authors: small group discussions about the big ideas in word of mouth
  • 1 awesome keynote: Tony Hsien, author of “Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose” and CEO of Zappos
  Get yourself some more info: http://gaspedal.com/supergenius/nyc/
  Tags: Brains on Fire, Case Study, Conference, Fiskars, Geno, geno church, New York, new york city, NY, NYC, Speaking, supergenius
• 

  If you stare at a mountain long enough, it becomes unclimbable

  Posted on February 16th, 2010 by Robbin and currently 8 commenting.

  I’ve always had an easy time making decisions. I have this philosophy that “any decision is always better than no decision”.

  In fact, laboring over a decision makes me feel unsettled.

  I usually gather as much of the facts as possible, but I have to admit I have a pretty trustful gut and often that is all I need. We all have instinct. The decision we have to make is whether to use it or not.

  I’m also fascinated with how companies make decisions, it is one of the first things I try and figure out in a new business introduction. I used to think that the larger the company — the longer and more difficult the decision making process, but I have found that is not really the truth. I am in awe of companies like Fiskars and Best Buy and Ford; who have in my opinion embraced change and new ideas in pretty remarkable ways. They seem to have a culture with a mindset of wanting to try and do new things. A culture that empowers people to make things happen.

  I can’t lay my hands on it right now but I read somewhere that companies that have empowered employees have more loyal employees. Makes sense really. Shared ownership is a powerful thing.

  What mountains are you staring at today?

  Both personally and professionally? Empower yourself, give yourself permission to make a decision. Then put one foot forward. Climb that freakin’ mountain!

  Tags: Best Buy, Decisions, Fiskars, FORD