Mastering Authenticity in Your Content Strategy
Authenticity isn’t (just) a way to get what you want. Still, the “A” word has been a running theme in my discussions with clients about 2024. It’s generally a good principle. People trust people. Authenticity can anchor thought leadership, storytelling, community building, and connection. Content that is actually about what we have to say in […]
The Synergy Between Ideas and Stories
Seth Godin calls it story. I call it ideas. They function in many similar ways. They amplify each other. They spread. “The reason that our attention has been strip-mined is that the system that evolved seems to reward short-term players that take the direct, easy, and lazy way out. While it seems like we have […]
To Redistribute or To Derive?: Unmasking the Contradiction
It’s “wrong” to seek redistribution, right? Yet, somehow, accumulation, appropriate, and derivation are a “success story.” An example: It would be absurd if someone called for big tech companies to pay out the entirety of their profits to people around the world. Of course. But it’s brilliant that these same companies ingest our creativity and […]
The Art of Mindful Living
When do your lights flash red? Do you have a way to manage them? People often describe me as calm, reassuring, steady, focused, unbothered, and empathetic. It’s not inaccurate, but almost no one knows about my clenched fists and feet, my tight jaw muscles, my hypervigilance, my inner hermit always looking for the exits and […]
How Marketing Can Embrace Conservation Science Wisdom
Marketing could learn a lot from conservation science.
Humanizing Marketing
Marketers have a basic humanity problem. They see people as targets. They talk about people as targets. This mindset must end. The sad part is that most marketers I know are fantastically good people. Warm, humane, and thoughtful. I’m honored to work with them. But all of those qualities get lost in the mix of […]
Serving Up Success
Not every content strategy you read about is healthy or nutritious. Sometimes, it’s just gross—chewed-up scraps that won’t make anybody feel good. You might think you’re being thrifty or efficient by serving up your leftovers with some chips, but it’s not often all that appetizing. Or nourishing. Regurgitation often just makes people gag (just like […]
Decoding Decision States
Something unexpected happens when you market at very small scales. Many of the rules change. Your buyers exist in a superposition of decision states until they are engaged, at which point they collapse into a single state.
Against the Ideology of Stupid
I was bullied through most of school. A lot. Not just for being a non-conformist—eyeliner, torn clothes safety pins, as early 80s as you can imagine. Not just for being gay. Not just for coming from a single-parent household. There was a much deeper stigma… I was effortlessly, unstudiously, and unapologetically smart (i.e., good at […]
The Anti-Intellectual Cult of Writing Advice
Too much writing advice is just good old-fashioned tent-revival anti-intellectual crap. Writing experts intone their points with the cynical piety of anyone who broadcasts truisms—cynical because it positions those experts as having the solution to redeem people from their doomed attempts at thinking. I’m old enough to remember when dogma dictated we should write for […]