In marketing, it’s difficult to grasp the scale of things, and once you grasp the scale it’s difficult to know where to aim. It’s possible to build a life long business around 1000 true fans as originally outlined by Kevin Kelly – but it’d be completely impossible to build a business with any reasonable economies of scale at that size, and businesses like Coca Cola count their users in the billions – and they’re still aiming for more....
Context – At the time of writing, I lead a team that’s gone from 3 people to 15 and growing in less than 2 years. We’ve gone from a fully flat hierarchy to the creation of 4 distinct units with separate responsibilities and contributions to the delivery of our strategy. It’s amazing for so many reasons, but we’ve also started to experience the teething problems that accompany team expansions. Projects get stalled out, it’s unclear who should run with what, units deliver some of the same work twice, things fall between chairs, and it’s hard for team members to deeply understand the contributions from other units....
The two scariest parts of flying are when you’re closest to the ground. That’s strange enough all by itself – but what’s even weirder is how well it maps to the rest of life. The scariest parts of anything tends to be the start and the end. Kicking off a new project requires such bravery – and calling something finished, final, complete, is terrifying. But it’s the only way to go anywhere!...
Diverge before you converge – the trick to getting more good ideas is to just get more ideas on the board. Go lateral – you can’t dig a new hole by digging the same hole twice. Illegal, immoral, grounds for firing. It’s easier to make an innovative/impactful idea feasible than it is to make a feasible idea innovative/impactful. Use tools and processes. It’ll feel forced the first few times. Design thinking, or any other innovation/ideation process....
If I spend X on brand marketing, I will create Y lift in awareness, which will drive Z revenue for the business. Now what!? - Every poor soul ever tasked to evaluate the prospective performance of an upcoming branding initiative. Intro Brand spend can be placed for two business-mechanical reasons. To drive increased consumption from an existing audience (by changing perceptions or gaining an increased top-of-mind or unaided awareness) To drive consumption outside the existing audience by gaining awareness with new buyers....