Spreading Seth Godin’s Random rules for ideas worth spreading
I know that reference to this Seth Godin article “Random rules for ideas worth spreading” has gone across the blogosphere a billion times already (and retweeted 10 times that.)
(How’s THAT for illustrating the spreading power of his own ideas?!)
As I mentioned on this blog a year ago, the thought leader in the realm of business, sales, and marketing that he is makes Seth Godin the proverbial E. F. Hutton of our day.
I’m not gonna lie: That’s why I shamelessly offer Seth’s Random Rules here.
His blog is famously comment-free, but mine isn’t! Let me know what you think about Seth’s Rules for Worthwhile Ideas That Spread.
Don’t we all want our ideas to spread?
Here’s what Seth Godin has to say (What say you?):
- You can name your idea anything you like, but a google-friendly name is always better than one that isn’t.
- Don’t plan on appearing on a reality show as the best way to launch your idea.
- Waiting for inspiration is another way of saying that you’re stalling. You don’t wait for inspiration, you command it to appear.
- Don’t poll your friends. It’s your art, not an election.
- Never pay a non-lawyer who promises to get you a patent.
- Avoid powerful people. Great ideas aren’t anointed, they spread through a groundswell of support.
- Spamming strangers doesn’t work. Spamming friends doesn’t work so well either, but it’s certainly better than spamming strangers.
- The hard part is finishing, so enjoy the starting part.
- Powerful organizations adore the status quo, so expect no help from them if your idea challenges the very thing they adore.
- Figure out how long your idea will take to spread, and multiply by 4.
- Be prepared for the Dip.
- Seek out apostles, not partners. People who benefit from spreading your idea, not people who need to own it.
- Keep your overhead low and don’t quit your day job until your idea can absorb your time.
- Think big. Bigger than that.
- Are you a serial idea-starting person? If so, what can you change to end that cycle? The goal is to be an idea-shipping person.
- Try not to confuse confidence with delusion.
- Prefer dry, useful but dull ideas to consumer-friendly ‘I would buy that’ sort of things. A lot less competition and a lot more upside in the long run.
- Pick a budget. Pick a ship date. Honor both. Don’t ignore either. No slippage, no overruns.
- Surround yourself with encouraging voices and incisive critics. It’s okay if they’re not the same people. Ignore both camps on occasion.
- Be grateful.
- Rise up to the opportunity, and do the idea justice.
11 powerful reasons why your sales suck
If you’re having a challenge consistently making sales and feeling good about selling, you could be replicating one or more of the following mistakes ineffective sales professionals tend to make.
Do you recognize any of these in you?
What small step can you begin to make today to improve?
- You are desperate to make the sale. Just like the poor old (or young!) sap in the dark corner of the seedy bar starving for a date tonight, the desperate sales professional is guaranteed to go home alone.
- You hate being sold. Buying and selling are two sides of the same coin. People hate feeling manipulated, but LOVE being sold what they want and/or need.
- You have low self-esteem. If this is your challenge, you’re not alone. Check out my article on The Rapunzel Complex that drives the behavior of many business owners and sales professionals.
- You do not truthfully see (or are not able to clearly articulate) the enormous value of the product or service you are selling. Without a high level of belief in your product or service, selling it consistently is not sustainable long-term.
- You fail to understand or embrace the concept that selling can be a spiritual practice.
- You refuse to define your ideal clients and target market because your service or product “can help everyone.” This philosophy/approach wastes time, money, and energy.
- You are learning (and relying on) sales tricks and closing techniques at the expense of real connection and relationship-building.
- You feel squeamish about ‘asking for the sale.’
- You don’t want to “bother people,” so you fail to follow-up consistently or at all.
- You don’t have a clear point of differentiation, so you find yourself always having to justify or compete on price.
- You have a poor or nonexistent sales process.
Why using “negative” emotions are not the best way to get more sales
Last month, my colleague and good friend, Caelan Huntress, authored a video blog post called Negative Emotions Working for More Sales.
(You can view Caelan’s 3-minute-52 second video by clicking the link above or by accessing it here below this blog entry.)
This is an intriguing thought because of its apparent paradox.
Caelan subscribes to the now-familiar-but-ancient-school-of-thought described as The Law of Attraction, the surface understanding of which holds that “like attracts like.”
Is it possible, then, to focus on certain negative emotions (which theoretically a person does not want) and manifest more sales (something that same person probably does want) as a result?
Caelan answers affirmatively to this question, using a personal example to drive the point home.
As he explains in the video, he was working toward a sales award, called Liberty Leaders, that should he accomplish the various prescriptive sales goals by the end of the year, he would receive a sizable monetary award and a trip to Southern California.
Caelan enjoys selling, but absolutely dislikes (It might be safe to say that he HATES it) the subsequent paperwork his company requires that he does in order to actually complete the sale.
He asserts that he’s been focusing so heavily on how distressing the paperwork is to him that he ended up selling 6 insurance policies at once, resulting in him having to come into the office on Saturday to spend 4 hours completing paperwork.
In this way, explains Caelan, he was able to concentrate on what he didn’t want in order to get what he did want (My interpretation).
The first thing I want to say is that resisting negative emotions is never a good thing. In fact, there is nothing “negative” about any emotions. They just are what the are.
It is when we resist them and judge them instead of allowing them to naturally flow through us is when we run into problems.
It’s more accurate (and helpful) to think in terms of an outcome that we desire as opposed to one we would rather not have.
What happens when our thoughts and emotions are aligned with what we want is that we perceive corresponding people, things or events that allow us to easily, almost miraculously achieve our desired result.
Focusing on a certain way for what we want to happen (what coaches call “being attached to the outcome”, or labeling an emotion as bad or negative, or concentrating on a result that we do not want in efforts to obtain something else we do want is a recipe for disaster.
First, it sends a signal of confusion to the Universe, and secondly, it runs the risk of setting up contrary intentions (also called “psychological reversal”) which results in a neutral result.
So, was Caelan’s experience an example of using negative emotions to get more sales?
Well, all of us manifest multiple things on an ongoing basis. We are creating some kind of experience every minute of the day.
In my view, Caelan was more likely using so-called “negative” emotions toward what he didn’t want in order to attract to him more of what he didn’t want, in this case, more paperwork.
He also created more sales. But that is more likely attributable to his love of sales. The love of sales naturally led him to situations, events and circumstances that presented him with the opportunity to manifest more of that “loving feeling.” 
The truth is (Well, “my truth,” to be exact) that the best, most efficient (and reliable) place from which to manifest is from a place of clean, unencumbered energy.
From this place, the Magnetic Entrepreneur who operates from a place of joy knows exactly what to expect and easily attracts perfect clients and perfect sales/selling experiences.
Here’s Caelan’s video:
What’s YOUR take on the matter?
How are you using emotions in the act of creating more sales?
What’s Inner Genius Got to Do with Business & Selling Success?
Did you catch yesterday’s Sales Success Series Tele-Call with Coach Iyabo on how to tap into “Inner Genius” for business and sales success?
Today I’m committed to relaxing and essentially doing a whole lot of nothing (It’s my birthday! Happy Birthday to me!!!), but first I wanted to share with a couple of key take-aways from Iyabo Asani’s awesome interview.
At first glance, any talk of “Inner Genius” appears on the surface as New Agey, wu-wu, or “out there.” Certainly, it seems a bit far-fetched to equate something called “Inner Genius” with success in business and sales.
That’s why I was intrigued with what Coach Iyabo would say on the matter, especially from the perspective of someone who practiced law for over 16 years!
(Not exactly a touchy-feeling occupation!)
In essence, what Iyabo is talking about when she uses the term “Inner Genius,” is accessing the whole person in everything we do. In other words, using Whole Brain and Whole Body Wisdom to make decisions and execute based on them.
Most people, Iyabo says, are working their businesses (and their lives) based almost entirely on information received from the Left Brain. This source of information includes our reasoned directives on how and in what way we should sell our products or services.
Left Brain information is sequential, orderly. It’s highly developed and where we do all of our learning.
However, says Iyabo, if we’re solely operating from the Left Brain Paradigm — which is based on our skills and talents and the acquisition of more skills and talents — we’re missing the boat because “Inner Genius” is comprised of 5 components, not just one.
They include:
- Left Brain: As noted above, the Left Brain is Scholastic, Logical, Linear. Its mode of learning is rational, analytical and sequential, and looks at constituent parts of a thing or idea or concept.
- Right Brain: Right Brain thinking is creative and non-sequential. It’s described as random, intuitive, subjective. It synthesizes holistically and looks at “wholes” of a thing rather than “parts”.
- Emotion: Emotion is more related to Right Brain than to Left Brain, but is not thought of as “Thinking” at all. It’s associated with feelings, in this “Inner Genius” paradigm.
- Body: Iyabo associates the Body Component with Energy Centers in the body called Chakras (“Chakra” comes from the Indian Sanskrit word meaning “wheel” or “turning”). Each Chakra corresponds to a Value, says Iyabo. So every decision or action in business or in life must also be aligned with the Body Component of Inner Genius.
- Spirit(uality): Iyabo offers that we are all spiritual beings and that ‘Connection with a Higher Being’ is essential to accessing all of each person’s Inner Genius in the business of business and sales and marketing.
Sound intriguing?
Want to learn how to more fully utilize Inner Genius in your life and business?
The replay recording is available online and as a free download at http://SalesSuccessSeries.com/iyabo/reg.html, where Coach Iyabo offers concrete examples of how to use Inner Genius and answers listener’s questions live on the call.
Now off to more birthday fun!
Emulating Martin Luther King by being bold, expansive, and magnetically service-oriented in life and work
If Martin Luther King, Jr. were alive today, I think he’d be a “Magnetic Entrepreneur” like us.
A person who is “magnetic” is naturally charismatic and attractive and humble. She or he proactively effects change, and people respond profoundly to that energetic movement.
The life of Dr. King demonstrated all of these characteristics, illustrating what is possible and desireable in terms of a genuine commitment to social justice and to service.
I think what contributed to his tremendous influence in America (and in the world) was his bold, expansive commitment to progressive change — not just in people’s behavior but also in changing people’s mindset and belief systems.
His work and ministry in the tradition of Ghandi was truly transformative.
Today, we commemorate Martin Luther King and his legacy on this great National Day of Service (He was actually born on January 15). Though Congress declared it a National Day of Service in 1994, I have to say (embarrassingly) that I had no idea until just last year when Michelle and then President-Elect Barack Obama breathed new life into it again.
This year, Obama declared that Dr. King’s work remains unfinished.
However, the work of being of service is not Dr. King’s work. It’s OUR work.
In 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. gave a sermon called “The Drum major Instinct.” He described how all of us want to be important. We want to be recognized as great at who we are and what we do.
What stops people stepping out and demonstrating their greatness is they start comparing themselves to other people. They think they are just Plain Jane and that “being great” requires some special skill or talent.
The way of the Socially-Conscious Magnetic Entrepreneur knows this isn’t so.
In that now-famous sermon, Dr. King stated:
“Everybody can be great, because everybody can serve. You don’t have to have a college degree to serve. You don’t have to have to make your subject and your verb agree to serve. You don’t have to know about Plato and Aristotle to serve. You don’t have to know Einstein’s ‘Theory of Relativity’ to serve. You don’t have to know the Second Theory of Thermal Dynamics in Physics to serve. You only need a heart full of grace, a soul generated by love, and you can be that servant.”
We have the opportunity to be bold, to be expansive, and to be committed to serving others — not just today, but incorporating this moral imperative in our daily lives…..seeking opportunities to serve in our families, in our neighborhoods and our communities, in our nation and our world.
Will you stand up and step out as expansive and BOLD in your life and in your business?
How will you do this?
When?
