bwagy, the blog of Ben Young

You see it’s super easy to get started, it’s also just as easy to leave something to the wayside (quitting without acknowledging your quitting) which is what most people do.

It is hard to say “I quit” and consciously end something.  Yet it’s very refreshing. If you can do this – excellent.

However the value is in finishing, going along the journey and achieving the idea.  It may not be what you originally thought but it’s what you learn along the way.

Also developing a habit of doing what you say means you end up in all sorts of places, promotes credibility and makes you second guess what you’re going to say.

If you’d like to read an excellent little book on this, it’s called The Dip, it’s excellent.

What do people hunger for?

What do they really thirst for?

Imagine their current state is desperation, your product is the answer, what do are they desperate for?

—

[Note: Written whilst hungry]

It’s the tagline of the Freakonomics Podcast (which is excellent).

And it’s a great mantra to have, ‘to discover the hidden side of everything’.

Once you’ve identified it you can ruthlessly attack and achieve the objective.

But if you haven’t identified it what are you achieving?

In action today

Well getting back into the swing of things

Honeymoon was excellent; Bora Bora Tahiti is well recommended!

Blogging shall resume Monday.

-Ben

Just a note to say I’m off, on a whole new adventure, marriage that is.

Esther and I will be tying the knot in Auckland then off for an island honeymoon.

So I’ll be back in action early December.

Thanks everyone for reading, your support and ongoing feedback.

—
Photo Credit: JSMoral

They’re going to let you loan books.

Digital books that is.

Suddenly they have overcome probably the second highest sales objection to digital books (first being you can’t replace a book, which people rapidly get over once they see a Kindle).

But what they’ve changed is, there is now a cost to loaning someone a book, in the past you could loan a cd and still enjoy the software of music yourself. Now you won’t be able to.

It’s that cost which will keep ebook prices up, get more people on board, but change consumers perception of digital goods.

They will have more tangibility and perceived value.

If you haven’t yet, consider what digital goods, tokens, experiences you could offer to make your service more compelling. Or consider maybe what you are giving away at the moment is vastly undervalued.

—

PS this blog is available on Kindle, for a couple of bucks a month, that’s their charge not mine.

A story is made up of pieces of information all pulled together.

How a story is pulled together depends on what we do as much as others.

For example if an artist releases an album and it sells millions, and the second doesn’t, they would be called a flop. This can be enough that the artist quits and gives up.

That is if the story ended there.

If they carried on, pulled through, released another album, and does well? A comeback!

It’s that extra element we can add to mould the story, extend it, make it our own.

Whether it’s your product, service, experience or even opinion.

It’s once others experience what you have uniquely created that you realise the potential value.

However it’s just before sharing that we stop.  We don’t release the product as we don’t think it’s good enough yet, we hide from voicing our opinions or sharing our experiences.

It’s not till you do, you take that final step, that you find the real value.

All the more reason to ship.

Often it’s not achievable, so we give up, it’s not perfect!

You could however just get started, start with 20% of the vision, give it a go, then keep adding to it.

You’ll get buy in along the way, make some money but also give you some time to refine the vision to the market.

Don’t be disheartned if it’s not perfect, just remember you’re always wrong, your aim is to just be less wrong than you were yesterday.

Can be a fruitful habit.  It’s easy to slip into doing more, more of this, more of that.

I’ve often met founders of companies who said the best thing that happened to them was when they left the business for a week – and it was all ok.

It’s easy to meddle, slow things down, request approval, add new things tot the mix.  But you need to know when to stop.

A mentor helps – or just testing, what happens if we stopping adding new things? Do it.  Try it. Stop doing something today.

Google is excellent at distracting its competition with flares, Google Reader, Buzz, News.

Ultimately they still make all all of their revenue through advertising, yet these flares work, they seek to distract competitors from what they really do.

We also create our own flares, I can’t start that project till I have the right software, or I can’t do that without the right camera. Really it’s hogwash.

We just need to bite the bullet, what’s the goal? And why aren’t we there yet? Then destroy any barriers that are in the way.’

The same way that basketball players spin around their opponents we need to spin around the barriers, acknowledging them but turning them to the wayside and springboard off them towards the goal.

That’s how great ideas happen.

Consumers hold grudges, someone treated them badly, someone was rude to them or the food wasn’t that good.

It’s unreasonable but who said consumers are rational? And why shouldn’t they be a bit unreasonable with their hard earned money and attention.

That’s why firms need to ask forgiveness, ‘under new management’ signs signal that things have changed, maybe time for a revisit.

Surveying, asking people who didn’t buy, why didn’t you? And just listening (rather than defending) any issues they had. This helps the grudges disappear and the last bad experience replaced with a great experience, one that they will have no grudges about.

This is the mark of a great company if you can identify and overcome consumer grudges.

Via FreshPeel.com I came across this excellent short documentary looking at influencers, how brands & creativity become contagious.  Watch it. Now.

INFLUENCERS FULL VERSION from R+I creative on Vimeo.

It’s what artists do, to inspire themselves, to experiment, to do something new.

Yet we don’t do it enough, seriously we don’t but we should.

I’ll admit I haven’t done enough goofing about of recent, have you?