1. Answering the God questions are the most important pursuits in life.
2. Faith is not the opposite of doubt, it is the opposite of fear.
3. My wife is my life partner.
4. Being a father is the most meaningful work that I will ever do.
5. You measure love by the degree to which you are willing to be inconvenienced.
6. Forgiveness helps you more than the person you are forgiving.
7. Saying “I’m sorry” is the best weapon in any relationship – especially your marriage.
8. The Bible is an awesome book of books.
9. Dreams happen in your head, life happens out here with everybody.
10. If something is worth doing, then it is worth doing right.
11. Writing equals thinking. Writing well equals clear thinking. It is the hardest work you will do, and the pursuit of writing well is lifelong.
12. Some things you just have to experience to learn.
13. God loves more and better than I do.
14. Marrying well is a blessing that words cannot describe.
15. My emotions can (and will) betray me.
16. Being deceived means you don’t realize you are wrong – if you know you are wrong, then that’s just being stupid (or euphemisms like willful or stubborn).
17. Having only one word for love hurts us English speakers.
18. If I don’t love myself, then I won’t love anyone else very well. It is “love your neighbor the way you love yourself,” which I now think is a warning and not a command. You will love others the same way you love yourself.
19. There’s a little arrow on most gas gauges to tell you which side the pump is on.
20. Most people don’t care what you think, but they sure will watch what you do.
21. Money is a great tool, but a terrible master.
22. Financial debt shackles your future to its service.
23. Make decisions today based on what you want to be true 10, 20 or 40 years from now.
24. What I do every day is more important than what I do every now and then.
25. My calendar and my checkbook tell the world what I value.
26. Verbs transform sentences. Use them. Adverbs definitely clog sentences. Delete them.
27. There are two products that are for everyone – air and water. One is tasteless, the other one is invisible. Don’t make your products for everyone.
28. Simple trumps complex.
29. When everyone is going the same way as you, it might be a sign to turn around.
30. If three people tell you the same thing, pay attention.
31. Crawl, walk, then run is the best approach to business partnerships.
32. Always push back in a negotiation (even if you love the offer), otherwise people feel like they got a bad deal.
33. If the CEO isn’t preaching the change, then it won’t happen no matter who is telling you it will.
34. There is more to life than just what we see.
35. Relationships are all we take out of this life.
36. Success is taking the next step of obedience.
37. Your sins will find you out.
38. When you get caught, confess. Hiding makes me a coward (see #37).
39. People love stories more than lectures. Learning to tell them well is worth the effort.
40. Getting outside of yourself is the only way to engage an audience. The fearless inspire.
41. Never let your career outpace your character.
42. You are never to old for a significant change in your life.
43. The older I get, the less I know.

That cleared my head. Ready for the lessons of year 44. Bring it on.

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Okay, so every now and then something comes along that you cannot help but comment on. The new CDC blog post about what to do in case of a Zombie Apocalypse is brilliant in so many ways.

First, it understood that it did not have an chance in the world at getting people to come to their website as is. Who has been to the CDC? Yes, public health professionals and people traveling to distant and disease-ridden climes, but how about you? Been there lately? Me either. Until today.

Second, it looked for an insight in culture that they could tap into. For whatever reason, Zombies are back. You can argue with me that they never left, but to be sure, the amount of money generated by Zombie content has never been greater. Thank you, Resident Evil and its ilk. Of course viral outbreaks that result in Zombie-like activity (ala 28 Days Later) or actual Zombies back from the dead (ala George Romero) are both public health disasters and relevant to the CDC. Brilliant.

Third, they took a really, freaking, big risk. This is, after all, a very serious government agency that deals with life and death issues on a significant scale for the public at large. But in our uber-connected, attention economy, this is exactly the kind of thing you must do to get above the fray: align your problem with a big cultural insight and then step off the cliff. You cannot get attention by playing it safe, and isn’t doing the same old thing a bigger risk and waste of dollars.

I am sure there will be critics of this approach. But in my humble opinion, this is advertising done well and the resulting traffic and awareness of the core message (being prepared for any disaster) is spot on.

Who’d of thought that a government agency would be schooling us on how to do it right?

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If you haven’t heard (or don’t really care about such things), then let me be the first to tell you. GAP has a hideous new logo. No one knows why GAP changed their iconic brand. And it seems that no one likes it.

I’m not a fan. Here’s why:

1. Rule One in Brand: DO NOT CHANGE WHAT WORKS. The original GAP logo is iconic, fresh and relevant even after all these years. In retail, the merchandise is everything. And only a brand struggling with its image either because of consumer perception or because it just feels dated should do anything about it. I challenge anyone to find one thing wrong with their previous logo. It was near perfect.
2. The GAP brand stands for classics and the logo was a classic. This new version is a nod to…digital(?), update(?), shift in…I got nothing. It does seem like the fall collection is a departure from the fresh, relevant classics that they built their brand upon…remember when Old Navy tried this? Denim, khakis, white shirts and black T’s are the Gap. And the brand served as a neutral container for their apparel…now it is just getting in the way. The white studio like walls replaces with brand logo as artwork that is distracting…but I digress.
3. You cannot just sneak out a new logo. The fact that the company is not saying anything about it, and just emailed out the new logo on promotional emails without explanation or fanfare shows that at least the marketing department at the GAP may be out of touch with the new realities of marketing. Like the fact that the web is buzzing about it, and GAP is not at the party. Perhaps this is the most telling thing in all of it, and the reason why we might expect this kind of base-less left turn.

I’m a fan of brand refreshing, but for the right reasons, at the right time, and with the right rollout. This seems to be none of the above.

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• Gap’s new logo: a social-media experiment? (adweek.blogs.com)
• Gap Gets A New Logo (PHOTOS, POLL) (huffingtonpost.com)
• Gap rolls out (terrible) new logo (holykaw.alltop.com)

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Design story: The Decanter from Landor Associates on Vimeo. My friends over at DOXA turned me onto this video. I am struck my a number of things in it:

1. There is nothing new under the sun.

“At the moment of truth at the store” was spoken by Walter Landor in the film some 50 years ago. This is the bedrock of Shopper Marketing, which I spent 10+ years working in thinking that P&G’s A.G. Lafley was to be credited for this idea – or at least popularizing it. This entire video is the exact same process for great packaging design that exists today. They even have a simulated store environment to walk shoppers through to research in context!

2. How well dressed EVERYONE is in this film.

Yes, I’ve seen this a thousand times and Mad Men is awakening everyone to the fact all over again, but I was surprised by the shop guys. An ascot, ties and great watches abound. The couples in the focus group rooms are dressed to the nines. I know from traveling abroad that Americans are usually perceived as consistently underdressed because of our love of denim. I don’t know, but seeing real people (not actors on TV) at band saws and turning lathes in a shirt and tie. They seemed to be working on something important. It made their work seem special. Somehow more significant and dignified, even if it was just a glass decanter.

3. The craftsmen involved in all of this seemed to have great jobs.

All of the handwork involved in the making of models, and the tools and skills needed (french curve anyone?). These hand skills are fast waning in our digital age, if they are not gone already. Watching this reminded me of watching a Swiss watchmaker at work. It also made me thankful that the best design schools in the country still require hand skill development as a foundation of design. Yes, the computer has taken much of the tedium out of so many parts of the design business, and it has even given us capabilities we never dreamed of, but in the world of visual thinking, hand skills are paramount. Perhaps it’s just wistful nostalgia, but we seem lesser for the loss of them.

4. How much of the process has remained the same.

The film is dated in terms of shooting style, soundtrack and narration to be sure. And even the end solution package designs seem quaint. But make no mistake, the strategy, the philosophy and the process have not changed. Without passing judgement on the merits of this particular product, you can still marvel at how sophisticated the mechanism of product development and advertising was back in the golden age. It seems that all our advances on the media side of the business have not yielded much advancement in terms of approach or process. I find that very interesting.

Related posts:

1. DIY web 2.0 agency presence (without a staff or an agency)

I just saw a question about branding from the inside-out on LinkedIn‘s Future Trends group, and I felt compelled to submit my two cents into the dialog. I’m including here for any who are not in that group.

******* ******* ******* ******* *******

Inside-out branding is the only way.

It all starts with identity — the core identity — of the organization. What is its reason for being. Because every company ships its culture. And culture is built from a shared identity and vision. Otherwise, why would a company exist? It is a group with a shared set of operating assumptions (i.e. values and identity) rallied around a common cause (i.e. a vision). When that identity and vision captures the imagination of anyone outside the company, a brand is born.

I think consumers today are craving authenticity in branding, but they are not getting it much. I think they are in places like TOMS Shoes or charity: water or Every Monday Matters, but they are not getting from the P&G‘s of the world and you are seeing subtle rumblings today that are going to trigger a tsunami at some point in the near future. But when a company knows who they are and where they are going, then they have a great chance.

Of course, there are tons of market dynamics that need to be overlaid onto this regarding consumer needs, attitudes and behavior. Then there’s competitive issues regarding the category the brand is entering. But these are technical issues and secondary to Identity and Vision.

The problem with the practice of branding is that the practice of branding today spends too much time on consumer and category dynamics and ignores Identity and Vision. In fact, it thinks of Identity purely in terms of logo and collateral design. Those are secondary. Get the foundation right, and the house has a better chance of standing.

It is interesting to see how many people are responding to the LinkedIn question with answers about Social Media. Granted, most of them are social media consultants who are looking for a way to promote their business. But this kind of student body left thinking is what the Adjective Marketing business is all about. Bring out a new book – everyone follows. Here comes a new media vehicle – everybody jumps on-board.

Social Media is a sets of sites and tools that empower anyone to listen and engage in conversations with an audience. Brand-building is a discipline born out of the Identity and Vision of an organization. These are not the same thing. I guess the marketing profession will keep answering every question with social media until something new comes along.

Related posts:

1. Office culture as social media (aka. how-to become part of a culture)
2. Communication Architecture
3. Now What?

Steve Rubel’s recent post on the ubiquity of social networking, and how all luxury brands need to figure it out NOW misses two fundamental issues. One about social and the other about luxury.

He starts out by talking some very common ideas about how social is taking over the web. If you read Steve for any amount of time, then you’ll know his thoughts on Facebook swallowing the web whole. He talked about how the social web started out as “things” but will soon become “everything” and this is where he runs astray.

Things on the web are Social Objects. It is the stuff that we talk about online. These social objects become the currency for the online ecosystem. Sometimes it is an event we all know about and we get a sense of shared experience; sometimes it is an event that only you know about and you get a sense of being “in the know.”

Either way, the technology is not what is important here, the social dynamics are and the web is just facilitating those NOT creating them. It’s like we just met other human beings once Facebook arrived.

Second issue is luxury. This is economics 101 – supply and demand. If everyone can get a piece of Tiffany & Co, then guess what? It’s called Zales or “every kiss begins with K.” It will lose its cache and all of its brand power will flit out the window.

His screenshot of Tiffany’s fan page is shameful. I don’t know who at Tiffany thought that everyone needed to Fan them, but that is NOT a “Fan-able” brand. Starbucks is. Tiffany is not. Oh sure, they’ll have loads of fans, but none of that will translate into sales. And it is worse than just allowing window shopping. They have given their brand over to a co-promotion with Facebook.

If your brand does not fit with Facebook, then you should not be on Facebook. It’s a bad idea. Figure out another way to make luxury social. Take a note or two from the Sartorialist...oh, nevermind. He’s on there, too. Somebody make it stop.

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I met Scott Belsky last fall at a conference and then spent a little time with him in NYC recently. He was kind enough to send me an advance copy of his new book, Making Ideas Happen.

I have not had a book lay my soul bare like this one did in a long, long time. It held a mirror up to me, and basically said “here’s everything that’s keeping your from moving projects, work and life forward.” Many aha moments, and many painful moments to be completely honest.

And it was dead on.

But this is not a theoretical book. It is a book based on hours and hours of research with world class creative people WHO GET STUFF DONE. He talked to them about their personal habits and methods for getting their projects from idea (fun!) to reality (work!), and the insights are inspiring. I’ve linked to some more robust reviews below, but I wanted to make the reco here, and give some topline takeaways. I’ll probably detail it more as I reflect and re-read certain points.

For the lifehackers and GTD fans out there. This offers a better solution and toolset for creative people because it is Project-based (i.e. the way creatives work) instead of Context-based (i.e. at work, at home, in car) like David Allen‘s methods.

Here are my top 10 takeaways from the book:

1. Less creative people who do more things will have a bigger impact than the genius who does nothing.
2. Doing trumps dreaming, but only if you care about making an impact in your life.
3. Every creative person will battle the tendency to just come up with ideas and never act on them because that’s the fun part.
4. You need constraints to be creative AND you need constraints to be productive. So, constrain yourself.
5. Quit taking so many notes! And especially stop filing them! Just capture Action Items, References and Backburner. Trash the rest.
6. Share your ideas with your community — the accountability will drive you to action.
7. Be transparent with your community — their feedback will give you insight into what ideas are right to pursue.
8. Creative people must learn to lead. Well, you do if you want to do anything great.
9. Dreamers need to partner with Doers to get anything done — not as obvious as it sounds; at least not in practice.
10. You have to be strategic about what to focus energy on, and then relentless in moving it forward.
11. (bonus) It really does come down to working hard on your idea(s) every single day and never, ever giving up until it is realized.

That’s just the 10 that stuck with me immediately. The book is a joy to read, and packed full of practical real-world tips, hacks and advice. It is available on amazon.com this Thursday the 15th.

You can find Making Ideas Happen here.

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• Making Ideas Happen (ducttapemarketing.com)
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• Illustrating Rework (800ceoread.com)

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1. How Ideas Take Shape
2. Deconstruction instead of brainstorming
3. Now What?

So, my tray table on US Air has this hideous ad. Some questions:

1. Was my flight cheaper because of this?
2. Who sells this for them – the in flight magazine?
3. What is an anti-microbial tray liner? It was the most interesting part of the ad, but no mention of any details.
4. Why remind me of all the germs floating around this super-dry and now super-infected air?
5. Who thought this was a good idea?

Sincerely,

Annoyed in 21A

Posted via email from Sean Womack’s Stream

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Been thinking about what to write next and have too many ideas, so I’ll just put them all out here, and see if anyone is reading and cares:

1. The Seven Brand Archetypes
2. How Ideas Take Shape
3. Communication Architecture (con’t)
4. The Top 10 Book & Thinkers on Ideas (IMHO)
5. Deconstruction (con’t)
6. The 3 Things Social Media Is
7. The 3 Things Social Media Isn’t
8. How to pick an agency
9. Top 10 on Pitching business
10. Creativity vs. Innovation
11. Experts vs. the Child-like
12. APE = Ask, Play & Engage

Anybody care to read any of these? Give me a top 3.
Or anyone want to talk about any thing else?

I’m all ears.

Related posts:

1. Communication Architecture
2. Doing versus thinking…
3. Social Media does not a Brand Make…

You’ve probably heard more than you care to about the Dunbar number – the idea in sociology that you cannot maintain more than 150 real friendships. I began to wonder about myself. How many people do I really contact in a given period of time – say a month? This started me on revealing a journey into my own social graph.

Your social graph is all of the people that you are connected to online. I keep profiles on a number of social sites, but I only really keep up my LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter accounts. What I realized is that many of the people that I talk to day-in and day-out are not on these sites – or at least we don’t use them to stay in touch. Perhaps this is a function of my age (>40), or some other factor, but my curiosity grew regarding the Dunbar number, how it related to me and how it might impact us all as our number of “friends” (i.e. our social graph) continues to grow. So, I decided to turn the analysis around on myself.

My first task (and problem) was how to find my own Dunbar number?

How do I connect to the people that I know and talk to on a regular basis? That part was easy. I email, talk on the phone and text (in rank order). What’s not easy is getting to the data. Well, getting to the data was easy because my phone bills are online, and so are all my emails, but porting the data is another issue. It cannot be exported into any form that allows me to analyze it. You have to get it all by hand. So, after a little cut-and-paste I had my calls and texts in Excel, but it was just a long line of dates, times, phone numbers, lengths of calls and total messages sent.

Isn’t this my data? Shouldn’t it be easier for me to analyze? Wouldn’t the phone company be doing me a service by at least allowing me to pull the feed into some kind of analytic tools ala Mint (if they are not going to serve me by looking at it for me and offering better products and services to meet my needs)? But I digress…literally back into my useless data set.

Faced with a useless mass of data, I needed to cull it down, sift and sort it, and then find an apples-to-apples way to compare the people I call the most (quantitative) and to factor in the way that I am contacting them (qualitative).

So, I created my own personal Dunbar Index.

I looked in detail at my phone calls and consolidated them down to how many calls I made/received and the total minutes of talk time. I also logged how many text messages that I send. Because I call more people than I text, texting needed to rank differently. In fact, I only text a certain people that I know better, so I needed to weight the texts more heavily. I chose an arbitrary 2.5 factor. Next, I created a very simple index out of the two numbers and matched them to my phone list. I made the actual numbers anonymous and then charted them.

Click on the charts to enlarge them.

Total Call/Text Index

Dunbar Graph sans top 3

You can see in the first one that the index has a long tail. Out of 80-ish phone calls and texts, only less than 10 make up the bulk of the volume. Even when I factor out the top 3 (second chart) because they are my spouse/home and my Google Voice voice mail and Calendar contacting me, you can see that the bulk of my calls are under 30 minutes for the month (the red line). I was surprised how many total people that I called, and how much I talked to just a few people. But this is only part of the story.

What about email?

I am a gmail user, and I love the service, but I cannot figure out an automated way to count how many emails that I sent and to whom during these same 30 days besides just counting by hand. And I’ve looked. If anyone has any ideas about how to do this, I’m all ears. Otherwise, I’ll try and hand count (it’s just a 30 day period), and then factor it into my index. This would give me realistic look at my own Social Graph using the media that I prefer to communicate with them.

So, how does this compare to my online Social Graph? And what (if anything) does this mean?

As I mentioned, I keep up my profiles and contacts via LinkedIn (tends to be more professional), Facebook (tends to be more personal), Twitter (tends to be…random), and now Buzz (just a few people). But my use of these sites is different, and has left me wondering how it integrates into my daily communication habits and patterns. And this has me wondering about all of the people that my clients are trying to reach about their varied products and services.

Markets diverge. Plain and simple. There will not be a universal device. You are going to have 4 and then 5 and then 6 screens in your life with apps and data running on all of them. Getting to all of your data – it is yours and mine after all – but getting to your data and porting it to other services (like Mint or Trip-It for example) will be important in order to realize all the possibilities that the ecosystem of networked screens affords to you.

My data is stored across so many different databases and interfaces that it is almost impossible for me to consolidate all of it. All of our data is this way. It is locked away in multiple different locations, which makes any kind of macro-level analysis impossible or incredibly labor intensive. Imagine trying to do this with 100K names or 100MM. This is a big challenge for marketers today, and it is only going to get worse.

As more sites spring up asking us to create profiles we just keep perpetuating the problem; compounding it. The freedom of this data, or at least the portability of it is a key feature of the much promised, but yet-to-be-realized Web 3.0. The web of data that can be ported, sifted, sorted, repurposed and mashed-up into all kinds of useful ways is right now just a pipe dream. But I think we are all hoping for it, and looking forward not to the freedom of our data, but the benefits that it will give to us from financial analysis and truly virtual assistants to things that will not be imagined until this future becomes just a bit more real.

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