Wednesday, July 31, 2024

The Hidden Factor in Leadership: How Trauma Impacts Your Team

The Hidden Factor in Leadership: How Trauma Impacts Your Team written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

The Duct Tape Marketing Podcast with Kelly Campbell

In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interviewed Kelly Campbell, a trauma-informed leadership coach and the author of Heal to Lead: Revolutionizing Leadership Through Trauma Healing. Kelly Campbell specializes in guiding leaders to integrate trauma awareness into their leadership styles, fostering supportive and effective team environments.

With a deep understanding of how unprocessed trauma can influence behavior and leadership dynamics, They offer an interesting perspective and a novel lens for transforming workplace culture.

 

Key Takeaways

What is Trauma, and do we have enough (that’s right) enough of it?

Kelly Campbell defines trauma as “unintegrated energy and information” that overwhelms the nervous system, affecting how leaders respond to stress and interact with their teams. We discuss the critical role of trauma-informed leadership in creating a supportive and innovative work environment. By acknowledging and addressing personal and collective trauma, leaders can enhance trust, collaboration, and psychological safety within their organizations.

We probably won’t go as far as to call it a “safe space” as, according to them, only your employees can determine that. But a “supportive environment,” for sure.

T – Trauma

L – Leadership

C – Consciousness

Kelly Campbell emphasizes the importance of self-awareness in leadership. They explain that many leaders unconsciously exhibit people-pleasing or controlling behaviors, which can undermine team morale and productivity. Through self-reflection and trauma healing, leaders can shift from reactive to responsive behaviors, understand their internal biases, and foster a culture of openness and growth.

Understanding and integrating trauma-informed leadership practices improves individual well-being and drives organizational success by enhancing employee engagement, innovation, and retention.

 

Questions I ask Kelly Campbell:

[01:42] How would you define Trauma?

[03:29] Could you discuss the prevalence of trauma and its impact on leadership roles?[06:16] Can you share examples of how trauma has influenced leadership behavior in both positive and negative ways?

[05:42] What are some organizational benefits of implementing trauma-informed leadership practices?

[07:57] In your experience, how can organizations better equip their leaders with the necessary skills beyond technical abilities?

[16:02] How do you address the challenges faced by leaders who lack exposure to diverse experiences and knowledge?

[19:04] Why do you compare some of your methods to therapy, and how do leaders typically respond to this approach?

[21:13] Where can listeners connect with you and learn more about your Heal to Lead program?

 

More About Kelly Campbell:

 

 

Like this show? Click on over and give us a review on iTunes, please!

Connect with John Jantsch on LinkedIn

 

 

Testimonial (00:00): I was like, I found it. I found it. This is what I've been looking for. I can honestly say it has genuinely changed the way I run my business. It's changed the results that I'm seeing. It's changed my engagement with clients. It's changed my engagement with the team. I couldn't be happier. Honestly. It's the best investment I ever made. What

John Jantsch (00:17): You just heard was a testimonial from a recent graduate of the Duct Tape Marketing certification intensive program for fractional CMOs marketing agencies and consultants just like them. You could choose our system to move from vendor to trusted advisor, attract only ideal clients, and confidently present your strategies to build monthly recurring revenue. Visit DTM world slash scale to book your free advisory call and learn more. It's time to transform your approach. Book your call today, DTM World slash scale.

(01:03): Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch. My guest today is Kelly Campbell. Kelly speaks and writes about trauma, leadership and consciousness, something she calls the new TLC. She's also the author of Heal to Lead, revolutionizing Leadership Through Trauma Healing. Kelly is a trauma-informed leadership coach to emerging and established leaders who know they're meant for more. So Kelly, welcome to the show.

Kelly Campbell (01:33): Hey John. Thank you so much for having me.

John Jantsch (01:35): Alright, so we're going to talk a lot about trauma, pretty weighty topic perhaps, but let's maybe start with how do you define trauma?

Kelly Campbell (01:44): Yeah, that's a great place to start because I think that there's a lot of misconception around that. A lot of people have this idea that it has to be something that's really big and really impactful, and that's not actually true. So trauma, the way that, or the definition that I've come across that I love the most is really just unintegrated energy and information. So I'll say that a different way just for everyone to wrap their heads around When we have situations or experiences where our nervous system doesn't have the ability to cope with them, that becomes trauma and that's how trauma is stored in our body. So it's really just an overwhelm of the nervous system, and so when I say it's unintegrated information, the nervous system's inability to integrate what it's being given or what it's on the receiving end of, that's where if that remains unresolved or unprocessed, that's where we get into tricky territory and where it becomes problematic because then it's kind of floating around and coming back and really causing some maladaptive behaviors. But we'll get into all of that as we continue to talk.

John Jantsch (02:52): It sounds like when you talk about energy that is lucid almost sounds like the electrical cord that's frayed in some places and it's like you never know what kind of damage it's going to cause. Right?

Kelly Campbell (03:04): That's a great analogy. That really is a great analogy when a cord that's electrified gets cut and it almost has a mind of its own, right? Yeah. Something else driving you. And so that's why sometimes you might have a reaction or a response that feels to the other person very just not in line with what the reaction should be or what they're expecting, and sometimes it's because of that loose wire that you're talking about.

John Jantsch (03:29): I don't want to be a complete downer, but I'm getting ready to be the statistics on some horrible things that happen to people that cause trauma are pretty sad. But as a whole, especially since you've definitely broadened the definition of trauma, how many in 10 people that are in, especially as you apply to leadership, leadership roles, I mean, is this really impact how big a deal is this, I guess is what I was saying?

Kelly Campbell (03:54): Yeah, 10 out of 10.

John Jantsch (03:56): Yeah,

Kelly Campbell (03:56): It's 10 out of 10 because here's the deal, none of us have had a perfect childhood, and this isn't about blaming your caregivers or your parents. This is about really understanding how trauma impacts all of us, and that could be what some people call Big T trauma, those big impactful, more obvious things. Maybe being in a household where your parents were getting divorced or maybe you grew up in a war torn country where safety, physical safety was a big deal and not available to you. So things that have shaped your worldview that were very impactful, that's what we typically call big T trauma. We think about those things along the lines of the ACEs study, the CDC and Kaiser Permanente study from the late 1990s, and it kind of gave us a framework of 10 to 12 things, two of which I just mentioned, but that's not where it stops.

(04:51): So if it stopped there, then maybe we could say, all right, well that might've impacted two thirds of people. If we broaden that a little bit and understand the reality of the situation. My nervous system and your nervous system are two different nervous systems. So what might be impactful to you might not be to me and vice versa. So when we're younger and we have what we might call small t traumas, things where or experiences where we're made to feel embarrassed or shame or abandoned or betrayed or humiliated, all of these other, I would call them maybe like death by a thousand paper cuts, right on their own, they might be impactful, but many times the small T traumas are continuous. And so that's where it really starts to erode our sense of self and really becomes the foundation for how we see ourselves in the world.

John Jantsch (05:42): Well, I've always felt that leadership, good and bad is really an act of or lack of self-awareness. And there's a whole lot of people that I suspect listen to this. I threw myself in this category, frankly, say, nothing really bad happened to me. I mean, I can't identify really anything, and I was never hungry. I was never bullied, those kinds of things. So somebody who maybe is thinking that, how do you uncover the fact that you've said every single one of us has this at some level?

Kelly Campbell (06:14): Yeah. Well, you've touched upon it a little bit already. You are automatically thinking, I never went hungry. I was never neglected. I never maybe had physical abuse. Those are only big T traumas. So you're not thinking about all of the other times when

John Jantsch (06:29): I did have a teacher that told me I would never amount to anything one time, I do remember that one. And

Kelly Campbell (06:33): The fact that you can recall that lets me know that actually did impact you. And there might've been other things along those lines where even if they were just verbal, we tend to downplay, oh, well, it was just verbal or get over it kid, or that made you tougher or you had to overcome something. This whole resilience culture, those things over time really do impact. And so what you touched upon before about self-awareness, if you're self-aware enough to understand that when you get feedback, for example as a leader and all of a sudden you feel angry, you feel defensive, you want to be right, you want to challenge it. That might indicate that there might be something in your past where that a similar situation had occurred and maybe you feel like you're being, I don't know, accused of something that isn't true. So I would kind of maybe try to trace that back. If it's me, I'm going to try to trace that back a local functional detective, but that's not really what matters. What matters more is, are the ways in which you're showing up as a leader creating psychological safety for other people? Are you showing up in ways where you're inviting curiosity and innovation and collaboration with your teams? And if you're reactive versus responsive to different things, then you're not creating those environments. So that self-awareness piece is really important.

John Jantsch (08:00): So how have you seen some of the things we're talking about show up in maybe good ways and bad ways for people that are either aspire to be leaders or in some cases thrust into leadership roles?

Kelly Campbell (08:12): Yeah, yeah. I mean, emerging and established leaders we're all human, so it's just one has a little bit more experience than the other. Some of the ways I see this sort of manifest, and I talk about in the book, I talk about this bifurcation between, or not even bifurcation. It's really a spectrum between people, pleasing leaders and people controlling leaders. And you and I can be each of these things or pieces of these things on any given day. So people pleasing might look like taking on a lot on your plate, maybe because you're taking so much on and you're trying to make sure that everyone else has a great experience, making sure everyone's happy on your team, you're going to take on so much that some things are inevitably going to fall, and so you become a little unreliable. You might also be pleasing to other people with a little bit of an underlying motivation.

(09:09): Again, this is subconscious. You're not doing this consciously, but you want the attention or praise or gratitude from your employees. And so if you don't get that, if you're pleasing and trying to make their lives happier and you don't get that respect or even reciprocation, you might start to get resentful, then you might become a little passive aggressive. There's all of these really interesting and very nuanced ways. Sometimes they're not as visible as others. So that's more on the people pleasing end, on the people controlling end of the spectrum. It's a lot more obvious and it's a lot more predictable. So these are your authoritative, get over it. We don't have time for those emotions in the workplace. Taking credit for other people's work, making sure that some people don't get promoted because they maybe are too much of a threat to your authority or your power. Speaking down to other people, making sure that you keep that balance of power at all times. Again, sometimes these things can be conscious, but most times they're not. So lots and lots of ways that shows up. And then of course that trickles down into the organization, whatever kind of organization you run.

John Jantsch (10:25): Would you say that these trait traits, behaviors that you're describing, I mean aren't unique to the workplace? I mean, they show up at the little league manager and they show up at church. I mean, it's kind of just people being who they are, conscious or unconscious. Would you say that's true?

Kelly Campbell (10:43): A hundred percent. And that's a great point is that this isn't just relegated to a boardroom or something like that. This really is the little league coach who's power hungry and yelling at the kids. We've all seen these things and many times we have been these things or are these things. So it's easy to see it in other people. It's a little harder to recognize it in yourself.

John Jantsch (11:10): So far, at least we've probably been talking about at the personal level. Let's talk a little bit at the organizational level. People bring you into organizations to maybe work with folks that maybe they've identified something that needs to be worked on, or maybe it's just, Hey, we know we'll all be better people with this work. But organizationally, what have you seen have been some of the benefits of people really saying, Hey, our leaders, they don't just need to know how to run good meetings. They also have some of the, do we still call 'em soft skills that show up or don't show up? What have you seen organizationally?

Kelly Campbell (11:49): Yeah, so leaders who, in general, leaders who are more self-aware, who are actively working on their own healing, their own trauma, they do create more supportive environments. Some people say psychologically safe. I try to lean away from terms safe spaces because my personal belief is that I cannot create a safe space for another person. I can create a supportive growth environment for my team or my employees. They are the ones who say whether they feel safe in that environment or not. So I'll just say that. But creating those or those supportive environments really comes with that and that work that you're doing on yourself. Therefore, in the organization, those employees are going to feel more like they can bring their full selves. They can maybe voice opinions, voice risks, voice threats, voice feedback without repercussion. So now you have more trust created inside of the environment.

(12:49): When you have more trust created, you've got more collaboration, more innovation. That all trickles down to the bottom line if you run a for-profit organization. So we see this in so many different ways. It could be everything from employee retention and employee engagement to innovative new ideas kind of think tank mentality where again, it's all rooted in trust. And so if I feel like I can really be myself and I can voice the things in a very conscious way that I think are going to improve the team, the work, whatever the things are that we do here, then the whole organization just feels different. And when you say soft skills, and I talk about feeling these things have been historically pushed away for such a long time because we came from the industrial revolution where everything was productivity focused factory. If somebody got sick or couldn't do a job, then we just remove them. But that's very expensive today, and it's also just not the right way to do business. I think part of that also comes from this different level of consciousness that we're bringing to business. That business in general is not there solely to make money. We're here to develop relationships, to develop our people, to see the sustainability of an organization over time. And that shortsighted, very, that older, more antiquated mindset didn't think that way. It was like short term decisions get to the bottom of it.

John Jantsch (14:31): People were assets,

Kelly Campbell (14:33): People were assets or yeah, you could say it that way. You could say it that way. But yeah, I mean there's a million benefits of this work.

John Jantsch (14:42): So as fortunately, companies have become much more intentional about diversity and inclusion, has that presented challenges for leaders who that's a new environment for them?

Kelly Campbell (14:58): Sure, sure. Of course. I mean, I think I would be remiss if we didn't talk about that for people who have benefited from the systems that we have been in for a very long time, hundreds of years. It's a new environment. And especially some of the leaders that I work with that are cisgender, heterosexual male, it is a new environment for them. And so again, they have to encounter their own biases, their own prejudices. That's part of the healing work. That's part, there's so many different aspects of trauma and so many different aspects of how we become who we are as leaders, and we're just gathering lots and lots of information from the time that we were born up until the time of right now when we're in our leadership role. So that is something that can be challenging for them. And also, again, they have to be willing and courageous to encounter that and to engage with it if they're going to change

John Jantsch (16:00): And do cisgender white 60-year-old male. Right. So I think you were talking about me in some regards. Do you find that some of it's just lack of exposure, lack of experience, lack of knowledge? Certainly an openness, but in some cases just I've never, it's almost like I don't know how to respond or react or even operate in this environment. Yeah,

Kelly Campbell (16:22): I think two things come to mind mean on the extreme level, it's hard to hate up close. So the more that you have exposure and the more that you feel connected to and start to understand and empathize with other people who are different from you, you're going to start to see them as human and not this other. And so I think that's just part of it to your exposure question. For sure, for sure. There are a lot of people, leaders who maybe have employees who have different pronouns than they're used to. If I'm encountering people like that where it's like, oh, I just want to be honest. These pronouns, they're hard for me. It's like, okay, well then all you're lacking is practice, right? Because you use they and them and their all the time in your language. So let's talk about that. Let's practice that. My pronouns are they, she. So let's talk about that.

John Jantsch (17:17): And I think that's a helpful dialogue, no question. Especially

Kelly Campbell (17:20): When there's no judgment coming from either party, right?

John Jantsch (17:25): Yeah, that's one of my favorite Mr. Rogers quotes. It's hard not to someone once you know their story.

Kelly Campbell (17:30): That's

John Jantsch (17:30): It.

Kelly Campbell (17:32): I just got chills. I love Mr. Rogers did a lot of good for us.

John Jantsch (17:35): Who does? So tell me how you work with somebody. It's just typically somebody, probably, there are a variety of ways, but what's a typical engagement that somebody would say we need to bring Kelly in?

Kelly Campbell (17:46): So I mean, it really depends. There could be some among a leadership team, and in some cases I'm working with the entire leadership team. In those situations, I'm coaching each of the leadership team members individually, and we're also doing group sessions, depending upon where they are. The group sessions sometimes can be in person, and I'm pretty close to New York City. So if that is available, then we will do that for part of the in-person group team sessions. But it's really about, in the one-on-one sessions, it feels more like therapy than anything else because we're talking about the business, but we're talking about how does the leader show up in ways that they aren't necessarily proud of or that they would like to change? Or if they're complaining about someone, we flip that around and we say, okay, well, how is that situation mirroring some way in which you want to be different? Or why is that the behavior of this employee or this other leadership team member? Why is that actually rubbing on you? What is it about them that you actually see in yourself? And they're like, and think about that. And so in order to have those kinds of conversations, again, you just need to be willing and courageous.

John Jantsch (19:04): It's interesting, you referred to it as therapy, and I imagine in a lot of ways it is for people because we don't often get the opportunity to actually look at that, to have somebody question us on, well, have you thought about why that exists? I mean because just a bundle of reactions half the time. And so the idea that somebody's asking us to think about how something occurred and how it could be different, I'm sure you get two types. I'm sure you get some resistance to that. And I'm sure you also get people that are like, this is the first time I've been able to explore this.

Kelly Campbell (19:37): I think more often it's the latter, only because by the time someone is seeking out coaching, and particularly the kind of coaching that I do enough to say, I think the problem might be me. And I really think that in order to work through this conflict or help the organization as a whole, we need to change. Or maybe they're in a period of transformation with the company or the organization. They're enough to say, yeah, I think part of the stumbling block or part of what needs to actually evolve here is me. And that's the interesting thing about coaching is I'm not doing anything. This is not right.

John Jantsch (20:19): I'm not fixing, you're not prescribing,

Kelly Campbell (20:21): Definitely not prescribing. That's psychiatry, but not fixing. I'm holding these clients as whole and complete and perfect as exactly who they are. What I'm doing is empowering them to figure out what they want to change and how they want to get there, what that looks like for them. And I'm really just holding that space and asking them very poignant questions to try to get them to think differently without an agenda. So sometimes a leader might come to me and say, I don't know which way I want to go. Do I want to stay in this organization, or do I want to actually exit? And I say from the beginning, I don't have an agenda here. Whichever way you go, that's what I'm supporting. And we navigate that together and sometimes we're together anywhere from six months to 18 months. Wow.

John Jantsch (21:10): Well, Kelly, I appreciate you taking a few moments to stop by the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. Is there someplace you would invite people to connect with you and obviously find out more about Heal to Lead?

Kelly Campbell (21:18): I mean, everything about my work and the book is all on my website. Obviously with my background in marketing, I wanted to make that easy. So website is just klcampbell.com.

John Jantsch (21:28): Awesome. Well, again, I appreciate you. Hopefully we'll run into you one of these days out there on the road.



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Saturday, July 27, 2024

Weekend Favs July 27

Weekend Favs July 27 written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

My weekend blog post routine includes posting links to a handful of tools or great content I ran across during the week.

I don’t go into depth about the finds, but I encourage you to check them out if they sound interesting. The photo in the post is a favorite for the week from an online source or one I took on the road.

  • Unifire: Think of Unifire as your all-in-one marketing tool that helps you manage and optimize your social media, ads, and customer interactions in one place. It’s like having a marketing assistant that keeps everything organized and running smoothly.
  • Afforai: Afforai is all about making AI accessible and affordable for businesses. It provides AI solutions that help with tasks like customer service and data analysis, so you can work smarter without breaking the bank.
  • Reelcraft: Reelcraft focuses on video marketing. It helps you create, manage, and distribute video content effectively, making it easier to engage your audience with compelling visuals.

These are my weekend favs; I would love to hear about some of yours – Connect with me on Linkedin!

If you want to check out more Weekend Favs you can find them here.



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Thursday, July 25, 2024

Embracing Mortality: How to Live a Life Without Regret

Embracing Mortality: How to Live a Life Without Regret written by John Jantsch read more at Duct Tape Marketing

The Duct Tape Marketing Podcast with Jodi Wellman

 

In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interviewed Jodi Wellman, an expert in positive psychology and author of You Only Die Once: How to Make it to the End with No Regrets. Wellman is known for her unique approach to living a life free from regrets by embracing our mortality and using it as a catalyst for meaningful change. Her insights offer a fresh perspective on how to live a life that is not only full but astonishingly alive.

Jodi Wellman’s journey into existential exploration and positive psychology provides listeners practical tools and motivational strategies for making the most of every moment. She emphasizes that confronting our mortality can lead to a profound shift in prioritizing and approaching our lives. This episode is a must-listen for anyone seeking a more intentional and regret-free life.

Key Takeaways

You’re only young once, says John Craige, but I often wonder: How often are you old? Alluring, yet taboo. Compared to other cultures, On this side of the planet, we’re usually weird about the subject of Death.

According to this episode’s guest, It all starts with our denial. In her Tibetan Book of Death but with humor, Jodi Wellman reveals how embracing our mortality can be a powerful motivator for living fully without regrets with You Only Die Once. She emphasizes balancing vitality with meaning, setting anticipatory goals, and the importance of community and accountability in achieving a fulfilling life. Stick with us and learn how we can transform our lives into an astonishingly vibrant journey by making bold choices and integrating pleasure and purpose into our routines.

 

Questions I ask Jodi Wellman:

[01:42] How do people typically react when confronted with the idea of their mortality, especially in cultures where discussing death is less common?

[03:48] How can someone break free from the rut of monotonous routines, as illustrated by your stapler analogy?

[06:57] Why do you think people find the fear of leaving a situation—whether it’s a job or relationship—so much greater than staying in it?

[08:50] Are there recent trends or events driving people to think more about mortality and make changes, or have you just noticed it more recently?

[11:00] Does the idea of not living a squandered life give people the freedom to pursue their own happiness, regardless of other considerations?

[13:14] When someone feels stuck or unfulfilled, how do you help them explore and redirect their life path?

[15:46] What insights have you gained from observing people who have made significant life changes?

[17:13] How do you translate complex academic concepts into practical advice that resonates with people’s emotions?

[19:58] Where can people connect with you and find a copy of your book, “You Only Die Once”?

 

More About Jodi Wellman:

 

Like this show? Click on over and give us a review on iTunes, please!

Connect with John Jantsch on LinkedIn

 

This episode of The Duct Tape Marketing Podcast is brought to you by ActiveCampaign

Try ActiveCampaign free for 14 days with our special offer. Exclusive to new customers—upgrade and grow your business with ActiveCampaign today!

 

 

Testimonial (00:00): I was like, I found it. I found it. This is what I've been looking for. I can honestly say it has genuinely changed the way I run my business. It's changed the results that I'm seeing. It's changed my engagement with clients. It's changed my engagement with the team. I couldn't be happier. Honestly. It's the best investment I ever made

John Jantsch (00:16): .

(00:16): What you just heard was a testimonial from a recent graduate of the Duct Tape Marketing certification intensive program for fractional CMOs marketing agencies and consultants just like them. You could choose our system to move from vendor to trusted advisor, attract only ideal clients, and confidently present your strategies to build monthly recurring revenue. Visit DTM.world/scale to book your free advisory call and learn more. It's time to transform your approach. Book your call today, DTM World/scale.

(01:03): Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch, my guest, today's Jodi Wellman. She's a speaker, author, assistant instructor in the Master of applied Positive Psychology program at the University of Pennsylvania and founder of 4,000 Mondays. She really just wants people to live squander free lives without deathbed regrets. And we're going to talk about her book that deals with that very topic. You only die once, how to make it to the end with no regrets. So Jodi, welcome to the show.

Jodi Wellman (01:34): Oh, thanks. I'm excited to be here with you.

John Jantsch (01:36): So obviously the point of the book is no regrets, right? Or how to make it to the end without regrets. The hook, of course, is to shake people and say you're going to die. So how do you find that people take that? I mean, especially Americans, we don't like to talk about death. I mean, in Eastern cultures it's actually a very common practice. How do you find particularly people on this side of the ocean taking to this idea of you telling 'em they're going to die?

Jodi Wellman (02:06): Yeah, we are really weird about it. And yet it's a funny thing because on one hand there is the eyebrow raised. I mean, right now half of people listening are like, do I keep listening? What am I doing here? Wait, I'm kind of all lured. What do I do? And so I've noticed this really kind of cool, wait, tell me more. And yet we're scared and it's okay. We come by. Our denial, honestly, especially like you said, Western cultures, we don't really want to talk about it, and yet we do want to talk about it deep down where it gets a taboo and it's like, therefore it's alluring. And so it's this kind of neat dance between don't talk about it, but can you whisper it? And so for me, I mean, I make fun of it. I clearly, I use a tone that's irreverent and which I couldn't not do, but I doodle about it. If you can doodle the grim reaper, I mean, you can talk about anything if you could doodle it.

John Jantsch (02:54): So I am sure you've done a lot of, there are a lot of texts that have dealt with this. One of my actual favorites is, it's going to sound really creepy, but the Tibetan Book of Death is actually an amazing work. And I feel like your book is kind of the Tibetan book of death with humor.

Jodi Wellman (03:09): You know what? I'm going to log that one. That's the compliment I've received of the week woman.

John Jantsch (03:13): So I suggest if folks want to pick up Jodi's book, I suggest you get the audio book because it's basically a standup routine.

Jodi Wellman (03:21): Thank you for saying that. We do have a lot of fun. There are a lot of F-bombs. And I mean, if we're talking about the fact that we're all totally going to die, and I think you're hinting at this, we're talking about death in a way that is not just to talk about death, even though it is sensational and ridiculous, it's in service of carpe diem of living before we die. But we need the prod, we need the cattle prod, or else we do just take life for granted. Do you find that?

John Jantsch (03:46): Yeah, and I think particularly, so you talk about 4,000 Mondays. I'm on the three digits probably of Mondays. So it's certainly been a wake up for me. And I think a lot of people in my position in life, I do think a lot of people particularly, I mean we don't think about it all. The first 1000, right? 2000 through 3000. I think that's where everybody gets stuck in, well, this is what I'm doing. You use the stapler idea that maybe you could actually recount that story in your own unique way to talk about that idea of just being stuck.

Jodi Wellman (04:17): Yes. Well, here I was in my corporate existence, things were good, but they weren't really adding up how you're in life and you're like, why am I not happier? The trappings of success. I wanted to make a change, but I didn't know what to do. And so I remember being at my desk and I was stapling stuff together, and lo and behold, I run out of staples. That's no big deal. All right? I get up, I go find the storage room, I get a row of staples, and I replace it in my stapler. And I distinctly remember saying to myself, if I'm still here, by the time this row of staples is here, I better not be. And I felt encouraged by this notion like, oh, I've got a 200 staple deadline only. The thing is, John, is I did nothing about it. So about a year goes by, I'm at my desk again, ready to blow my head off, but pretending everyone thought I was engaged. And then I stapled more pages together and my stapler runs out, and I felt sick to my stomach, but obviously I was hoping to be saved. I was hoping someone would headhunt me and pluck me out of this quiet life of desperation when oh my gosh, I had to learn that lesson. And the truth is, I reloaded that stapler like three times

John Jantsch (05:23): Before, and staplers weren't exactly having a day still, right? I mean, there weren't a lot of things that we were stapling anymore.

Jodi Wellman (05:30): No, yes, this is an indication of several years. But I needed to learn that in a way, holy, why can we have agency? We have to clue in sometimes to where we are feeling like we are settling in life. That for me, is a real warning sign if we're settling and tolerating for long. Oh my gosh, back to this idea that life's short. Let's do the thing even though it's hard to just take the plunge and take the risk to shake it up and find more happiness.

John Jantsch (05:56): So there are a lot of examples, and you have some in the book, near death certainly wakes people up, right? Going bankrupt wakes people up. I mean, there are a lot of things where comfort is actually kind of like the enemy, right?

Jodi Wellman (06:09): Oh, you said it so well. I mean, I love a good comfort zone. Give me a fleece blanket and I, I'm under it. And it doesn't do much for making stuff happen in life. So these are called boundary situations in psychology where it could be a big birthday, it could be retirement, it could be a loss of a job. Any rite of passage in life that jolts us a little bit to go, whoa, my world has been moved. Maybe it is a bit of an existential reminder when you have the big birthday, but those are important to be super honest. I mean, a lot of us in the science of positive psychology, we talk, it's like a crappy reality, but it's the crappy stuff that elicits the most meaning in life. And most of us will, we need the impetus, we need the inciting event, and we're just not motivated enough to do it on our own accord.

John Jantsch (06:57): So I mean, the person that you described is stuck in a job, stuck in a marriage, stuck in whatever. Is the fear of leaving that so much scarier than just staying put? That's kind of a vice, isn't it?

Jodi Wellman (07:10): Absolutely is. And this notion, as I said in my TEDx talk, this line I still think is really important. And it's like our fear of death is rivaled only by our fear of living. Most of us are not pleased about the idea of death or of public speaking, but we can at least deny and get around that. But the idea to commit and participate and maybe make some bold choices, even though we know they're the ones that are probably going to be the best for us, the ones that, again, back to regret, you started our conversation by outlining the books about avoiding regret. It's like when you're lying there, hopefully lots of morphine coursing through your veins at the end would be there with their vein thing where you're like, I just regret not doing that. And if that could be the case, now's your chance to course correct it and maybe take action on it. Literally starting this afternoon,

John Jantsch (08:01): And I'm probably guessing it is not. I just wished I would've worked a few more hours,

Jodi Wellman (08:07): Only I'd answered more emails.

John Jantsch (08:09): So you have some quotes in here. One of my favorites in this topic, I believe is attributed to EE Cummings, the poet, and he said, most of us will regret on our deathbeds, not our sins of commission, but our sins of omission. And I think that to me beautifully wraps that up. The things we didn't do, not the bad things we did, but the things we just didn't get around to.

Jodi Wellman (08:29): It's so true.

John Jantsch (08:30): Yeah. So you cite, there's a lot of literature really on this. Ryan Holidays stoics, you put Mente Maori in there. That's been a symbol that he's used in his writing. I had Oliver Berkman on the show, 4,000 weeks, I think it is. And so is there something going on that is causing people more to consider this, to write about this, or have I just noticed it more recently?

Jodi Wellman (08:58): Yeah, you're just tuned into it with those triple digits.

John Jantsch (09:00): That's right.

Jodi Wellman (09:01): Yeah. No. Well, I believe that there has been, again, this equal kind of repelling and yet fascination with death. But let's just be honest. I mean nothing like a global pandemic to wake us up to our temporary nature. So I do think that has tuned us in a little bit more to, whoa, whoa. The things I thought were, we do this delusional thing where we like to think, oh, I'll have time to do it later and later is very elusive and it's very comforting and fuzzy. And now whether it was the pandemic did help us go, wait, I want to reorganize my priorities, and maybe now that means that I have to take it more seriously. Yeah,

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Jodi Wellman (11:13): Yeah, I mean, that would be one hell of a month

John Jantsch (11:16): Because

Jodi Wellman (11:17): I think you would whoa, the party and then you would drain your bank account and you would probably ostracize yourself from all of your friends potentially, and certainly your partner. And yeah, here's where I look at this. There is a potential for some people who maybe are a little more impulsive and maybe don't have as good of a self-management skills about the idea, do I go and spend more money now to enjoy my life and then maybe risk not having as much later, or do I save every penny I have so that I make sure I'm comfortable in retirement and live life then, which we all know is, but then I'm going to be, again, wasting my life and living small. Now, it's always going to be the awkward balancing act. And my shortcut to finding the answer to that is about asking yourself what you would regret and what you would regret doing and not doing.

(12:07): So there's one woman I know who is, she's planning a really big expensive family reunion trip. She's going to finance it and take her family on a really fabulous cruise. And she said, I've done the math, and her grandma's about to die. So there's a bit of a sense of urgency, nothing like death to prod us along again there, John. So she's like, I've done this and I've calculated it. It's a big deal for me to do this financially and with time off. And she's like, I would regret not doing it. But she also knows that by doing it, she's not going to compromise her retirement or she's not going to not pay the mortgage for seven months because she took her family on this cruise. So these are about choices where it's like, am I on the verge? Is it still technically responsible, or is this going to cause more anxiety and peril because well, wow, on a whim, kids, we're just going to move to the Croatian coast, but you haven't planned any immigration stuff and next thing you know, that's going to be a bigger problem. So I do think it's always about what would I regret doing and what would I regret not doing, and am I going to blow up my life later?

John Jantsch (13:08): So the middle ground, I suppose, is living astonishingly alive. Perhaps somebody comes to you and says, they probably just come to you saying, I have a feeling I feel stuck, or I feel like something's missing or whatever. How do you help them unpack and find and reroute the course, I guess?

Jodi Wellman (13:29): Yeah, I like that term. Well, the number one thing is to diagnose the dead zones. Lots of tools and ways in the book. It's in a pre-mortem, which is like, let's look at your life today, what's working, what's not? And it's about saying, whoa, now that I do this thing, I realize my social life or my lack thereof, or the fun and recreation category. Whoa, I didn't realize that had flatlined as much as it had, and that, wow, I think I might want to pick up a hobby again. And so sometimes it's about identifying in, you can't unsee it ways about where your life is feeling dead. That gives you a starting point to know where that you might want to throw yourself a fricking buoy in the water and say, well, what would that look like? I also look at life in two dimensions.

(14:12): So it's wider with vitality, which is the fun and the pleasure and the neat fun experiences. And then it's deepening it with meaning, and that's having a sense of purpose and good meaningful relationships, and maybe spirituality if you want, but it's deeper stuff. And so for most of us, we do have a sense of whether we want more of the vitality and or more of the meaning. And again, that's a diagnosis of like, no, my life is meaningful enough. I've got a job that makes me feel like there's purpose, but I am just so freaking bored. I might want to add in a little more fun. What would that look like? And again, all we can ever do is one thing at a time. So would maybe in this example, hypothetically, what would one thing be? Can I get nosy and ask you if you're thinking about your life widening with vitality, deepening with meaning, is there a dimension that stands out to you that you might want a little more of, even if it's already

John Jantsch (15:01): Good? No, mainly because I'm very intentional about this. The one thing I will say that's lacking a little bit, and this is just I have a distributed team. I'm here in the mountains in Colorado, in a rural area. I can go for literally weeks without seeing another human being besides my wife. And so probably forcing some of that interaction that, and I think some of us have just developed that habit because of this stupid thing called zoom. We don't even have to go see clients anymore. It's amazing. So I would say that's probably the area that would come to mind first.

Jodi Wellman (15:33): Maybe just a touch more of the social side. Yeah, yeah. The antis shining situation.

John Jantsch (15:38): Yep. Yep. So you, I'm assuming that because you work with people, you've had a couple successes with people breaking through a little bit. What are some of the things you've learned actually from seeing people make a change?

Jodi Wellman (15:52): I love this question. Well, I think about in workshops I do, which is mostly the case now doing keynotes and workshops with groups and teams and events. And it's like there's something that's really cool that happens when you socialize your regrets that you might be having or your desires for more vitality and or meaning and bucket list stuff. People love to learn and go, oh, oh, that's right. I wanted to learn how to speak Italian too. And all of a sudden, everyone's adding to their lists. There was a group I worked with recently that did this really cool thing, which is kind of what I advocate, but they actually did it, which is what if you supported each other in living these full lives? Oh, outside of the confines of work. Because the presumption, and this is based in research, which I go into in a hopefully not boring way, is about how if you're happy and well-rounded and fulfilled outside of work, you're going to be way better when you're in work and more productive and more creative and this, so this group all committed to things that they were going to do to either feel widening, deepening, and they held each other accountable.

(16:53): So then I came back around one quarter later and it was like, someone's like, oh, wait, what a rafting. I'm so proud I did it. And someone else was so excited because they rekindled their music habit. Someone else was really excited because, well, this person did the orientation to be a volunteer at the local whatever, because you have to go through all the steps. So they were actually holding each other accountable and high fiving each other for not just the work outcomes, but for living. And that was a pretty cool thing that again, builds trust on a team. Then you're all supportive of each other's lives in a broader sense.

John Jantsch (17:25): Yeah, you start seeing 'em as people. Oh my gosh, that's got to be against some HR policy somewhere. So I think I said actually, sorry, instructor of master of applied Positive Psychology. So how do you take that academia and bring it down to practical applications for human emotions?

Jodi Wellman (17:47): Yeah. Well, everything that do, every intervention, every recommendation is rooted somewhere in the science. And it's typically positive psychology, but it could be other branches of social psychology or cognitive or other parts of psychology. And so for example, if I'm talking to somebody about one little life tip, if you will, I call it like this, the lowest hanging fruit is anticipation. It's having something to look forward to. And so I have this very simple intervention where it's like, take out your calendar and you want to have something to look forward to one week in advance, one month in advance, and one year in advance. And these can be big or small, I don't care. But that is all rooted in the science of savoring. And so I don't need to necessarily give people the references or details, but I will let them know at the beginning of every workshop that it's rooted in the science. And when I'm writing my blog posts, I will post it. I will give the reference. But I'm glad you asked that question because it matters to me that things are generally empirically based, not just like an instinct. Not that those things don't also deliver for some people. There are some people I know who swear by putting out manifesting, and that's really great. And if that works for you, do it all the time. And I don't have the evidence necessarily on some topics, and so I just would not go there personally. Yeah,

John Jantsch (19:01): Yeah, absolutely. So it is funny, as I listen to you talk about the anticipation, I remember, that's certainly advice people give when I have aging parents and things that my father passed. It's been a few years now, but I remember them actually talking about saying, make sure that he's got something to look forward to. And obviously that works at all ages of life, but I imagine it's probably even more dramatic in a case where somebody feels like they don't have much going on.

Jodi Wellman (19:32): It's a really good point. It also has applications for people who have more of clinical issue in terms of mental health issues, depression, just having that little thing on the calendar that might be just a glimmer, and we're just really simple creatures at the end of the day. Right? It's like, just tell me I've got a good meal coming on Saturday night and I'll live for it.

John Jantsch (19:49): Yeah, it's our subconscious completely controlling us. So Jodi, I appreciate you taking a few moments to stop by. The Duct Tape Marketing Podcast is there's someplace you'd actually invite people to connect with you and find a copy of. You Only Die Once.

Jodi Wellman (20:05): Oh, well, thank you for asking. I am over@four.com and the book's there and fun stuff. Resources, you can calculate how many monies you have left there. So no excuses not to do your mortality math.

John Jantsch (20:15): Yeah, there's a lyric in a song that I heard the other day that I thought was so funny. The artist goes on and says, if you're only young once, how often are you old? And thought that's really like a lot of people say, oh, you're only young once, right? And I thought, well, okay, how often are you old? I think you ought incorporate that in somehow.

Jodi Wellman (20:35): Thank you. I'm writing that down on my yellow sticky. Thank

John Jantsch (20:37): You. John Craigy is the artist, so go look him up. He's hysterical. Too alive. Well, again, Jodi, I appreciate you taking a few moments and hopefully we will run into you one of these days out there on the road.



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Wednesday, July 24, 2024

Marketing For Supervillains

Marketing For Supervillains written by Tosin Jerugba read more at Duct Tape Marketing

The Duct Tape Marketing Podcast with Jesse Wroblewski

In this episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast, I interviewed Jesse Wroblewski, the founder and CEO of a New York-based marketing agency and the author of Marketing for Supervillains: Diabolical Tips on Differentiation, Decommoditization, and World Domination. He has close to 30 years of experience in the marketing industry and has been featured in prominent media outlets like Rolling Stone and Fangoria. Known for his offbeat yet practical approach, he shares proven differentiation strategies that help businesses stand out in any market.

Key Takeaways

Jesse Wroblewski highlights the importance of adopting a supervillain mindset to differentiate your brand. He explains that smaller businesses should use creativity and wit to compete with more prominent, established brands rather than trying to outspend them. He emphasizes the value of polarization in marketing, stating that being loved by a few is better than being mediocre to many. He also introduces his “universe of differentiation” concept, outlining practical ways to stand out in a crowded market.

Authenticity is crucial for successful differentiation, and brands should align their unique selling propositions with their core values and strengths.

 

Questions I ask Jesse Wroblewski:

[01:29] Can you elaborate on using supervillains as role models in our marketing?
[03:20] When can polarization be beneficial in marketing?
[06:16] There are numerous Japanese references in your work. What draws you to Japanese culture?
[07:26] Could you highlight a few of your 12 differentiation methods?
[09:34] What’s more important to consumers: being better or different?
[11:56] How can conservative brands embrace differentiation without fear?
[13:02] What common traps do new clients fall into when trying to differentiate?
[14:27] How does authenticity impact marketing, positively and negatively?
[16:12] How can we stay current with trends without looking like we’re chasing every idea?
[18:43] What outdated marketing practices should be discarded immediately?
[21:04] Where can people connect with you or get your new book, “Marketing For SuperVillains: Diabolical Tips on Differentiation, Decommoditization, and World Domination”?

 

More About Jesse Wroblewski:

 

Like this show? Click on over and give us a review on iTunes, please!

Connect with John Jantsch on LinkedIn

 

 

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John Jantsch (00:17): You just heard was a testimonial from a recent graduate of the Duct Tape Marketing certification intensive program for fractional CMOs marketing agencies and consultants just like them. You could choose our system to move from vendor to trusted advisor, attract only ideal clients, and confidently present your strategies to build monthly recurring revenue. Visit DTMworld/scale to book your free advisory call and learn more. It's time to transform your approach. Book your call today, DTM World slash scale.

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Duct Tape Marketing Podcast. This is John Jantsch My guest today is Jesse Wroblewski. He has been at the helm of a New York marketing agency for close to three decades, is often offbeat work has been featured in Rolling Stone, the book by five weirdest websites ever, and fan Gora, as well as a plethora of other media outlets. He's also the author of a book we're going to talk about today, marketing for Supervillains, diabolical Tips on Differentiation, de commoditization, and World Domination. So Jesse, welcome to the show.

Jesse Wroblewski (01:39): Thank you so much. I figured my last name was long enough, so I decided to make all my intros and my titles even longer. So mouthful. Well done.

John Jantsch (01:50): Yeah, there was some hard words in there, that one. But speaking of names right, I usually ask us ahead of time. Did I nail the pronunciation?

Jesse Wroblewski (01:58): You did it well, absolutely.

John Jantsch (02:00): Awesome. Alright, so my first question is, what's a supervillain got that we need to be using as a role model?

Jesse Wroblewski (02:08): Sure, sure. So there's actually a lot of parallels. The first parallel, obviously being after 25 years of being in marketing, I think we all a little mad sometimes. So it's some cynical takes on what's going on in marketing. But what the real mantra was when you are a challenger entering a market, there's usually always a mega brand, a name brand in the vertical, and that name brand is kind of like a superhero. They have huge public favor, they have huge muscles, which in marketing equates to huge budgets. And for a smaller guy entering the market, it's almost a recipe for disaster to try and go head to head with them and try to out be more popular or spend more money. So if you think about movies, the supervi usually doesn't have all the resources a superhero has. They certainly rarely have the same muscle tone, so they have to use their cutting wit and brains to outstart the bigger guy. So a lot of the book comes from an underdog mentality, a challenger brand mentality, and using things that the tried and true marketing that everybody else is doing, where you might not be able to compete on social media or SEO or pay-per-click going where the other guys,

John Jantsch (03:21): I noticed quite often with supervillain, there's a bit of polarization too. I mean, a lot of people love the supervi in a movie, and of course a lot of people really hate them. Is there an element of that in our marketing that is actually kind of good to be a little polarizing?

Jesse Wroblewski (03:35): I think so. I think so. Being everything to everyone means you're nothing to anybody. So I think I'd rather be adored by a few than in the middle of the road with a lot of people.

John Jantsch (03:48): So there are a whole lot of industries out there that feel, again, emphasis on the word feel, what they do is a commodity. I mean, there's no way for me to differentiate except be the cheapest out there. What do you say? There might be occasionally a case where that's true, but not very often, quite frankly is what I've discovered. And so what do you say to somebody that just feels like, oh, I dunno, we're this kind of company and everybody's the same?

Jesse Wroblewski (04:16): Yeah, absolutely. Because the crux of the book, so in the book, excuse me, most marketing books will tell you, run out, find your differentiator, and then figure it out and tell it to the world nice and succinctly. And that's I meant task, right? That's not easy to

John Jantsch (04:31): Do.

Jesse Wroblewski (04:32): So in the book, I codified 12 different ways that brands throughout history have successfully differentiated themselves. And for those that say, I'm really not that special or I can't be, we're just like everybody else. I always hawken back to the ultimate commodity, which is water. So water in the developed world is free, and if the government came along and said, what you do for a living, the government's now going to offer for free. How would you continue to get people to pay a premium for something that can get for free? So rather than carrying a bucket of water around with you all day, which is free, you buy bottled water in the tune of 17, 18 billion a year, what are you really buying? Chances are you're buying convenience of not carrying that bucket around, or maybe you have a bottle of water in your car and you're buying refrigeration because it's cooler in the refrigerator. So there's a lot of byproducts for what we do. So you could say, I'm an accountant, I'm a marketer, I'm a this, I'm a that. But chances are you're not really selling accounting, you're not really selling marketing, you're selling peace of mind, you're selling convenience, you're selling all these things that are secondary, but in the back of people's minds, you're actually curing a lot of anxieties. So I say any brand, any product in the world can absolutely be differentiated if you have enough courage.

John Jantsch (05:52): Well, and I remember Perrier and Evian, those water were cream brands. It was like, oh, you're drinking that. Again, I think some of the shine has gone off of that, but I think at one point when it was unique, that was what they were selling was like, we're the trendy water.

Jesse Wroblewski (06:09): Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, and the water industry just keeps growing and growing and us suckers keep throwing money at it.

John Jantsch (06:17): I'm curious, there are numerous Japanese references and throughout your work, is there a particular interest in the culture?

Jesse Wroblewski (06:24): I'm a lifelong martial artist, so I guess coming from, I was always the smaller guy in school, smaller stature. I was in, I think the largest high school in the country with 2,600 students, and I was the smallest guy in the high school. So I guess that was some stem of me kind of joining the martial arts. And there are a lot of, I say parallels or a lot of things that don't equate to the English language, but are very relevant to lifestyle and marketing.

John Jantsch (06:54): Yeah, I think what's interesting for other cultures is a lot of times there's a word that literally means it doesn't mean anything, but it's a concept, if that makes sense. I never can remember it, but I live in the middle of a national forest and the Japanese word for forest bathing, which now I can't remember, but it's not a literal translation to that, but it's a concept. I don't know if we have many words like that in the English language that can't really be translated other than a concept or a feeling. So you started talking about the, I think you said 11 or 12 ways. Is that your universe of differentiation? So do you want to hit on a couple of those by name?

Jesse Wroblewski (07:37): Sure, sure. So on my website there is a download of what we call the universe of differentiation, and it's just a visual guide of 12 different planets that have each identified as a different way to successfully differentiate your business. And then once you figure out which differentiator resonates with you, your business, your brand history, then we kind of take a look at who lives on that planet. So who would be most attracted to that differentiator? So out of the 12, there are some common ones. So the first one that people are usually drawn to are definitives, differentiating by definitives. And you probably experienced this because this is the high time of differentiation for the summer. If you've ever seen an ad for a theme park, they use this differentiator like crazy, specifically talking about their rollercoaster. We have the tallest, the fastest, the scariest, the longest, the oldest, the most.

(08:34): The nice thing about differentiating by definitives is you rarely get challenged. So you can make pretty boastful claims, and there's usually not a metric to challenge it. So you metric becoming commoditized. As a general marketing agency owner, I felt that I was on the verge of becoming commoditized. So I felt that I was usually the driving factor. Even though a client paid me money, I was always driving to get them to launch their website, give me your copy, give me your approval. So I deemed myself the world's most proactive agency, the most proactive agency on earth, the no homework agency. So it's a fun little way, you might need some additional differentiators, but it's a fun exercise. Kind of say, Hey, I'm sticking a stake in the ground and this is my domain. I'm the blank industry.

John Jantsch (09:19): 25 years ago, I started calling Duct Tape Marketing, the world's most practical small business marketing brand. And same idea, I had heard a couple of people tell me, well, your stuff is just so practical, but you're right. I mean, nobody's going to say, show me the statistics on that. Right? We're more practical, better versus different. That's an argument. I think a lot of people is like, we have the best widgets and well, that's fine, but we have purple widgets. Which one of those do you think from a marketing standpoint is more important to a consumer?

Jesse Wroblewski (09:46): So I liken it back to differentiator versus USP unique sales proposition and people, they usually get them confused, and I'll give you the best analogy that I can figure out. So going back to the example of water, the ultimate commodity there is a brand, one of my favorite brands, not only for water, which tastes the same as all the other waters, but for a marketing in general, which is liquid death. Have

John Jantsch (10:10): You heard of it? Yeah. I mean it's absurd. So they have captured the imagination of the millennials like nobody else.

Jesse Wroblewski (10:18): Exactly, exactly. So while all the other brands are chasing their USP, Hey, we are hydrated more, we have a better delivery system, all these different things that tell you why their water is better, liquid death came along and just differentiated themselves and created a lifestyle brand to a very niche audience. And in my opinion, that differential blow away any USP that claims they're better at what everybody else does.

John Jantsch (10:47): Yeah. Oh, go ahead. I'm sorry. Go ahead after you, sir. I was just going to say, so to some extent is one of the real goals of differentiation to actually project emotion feeling. You said lifestyle, I mean that whoever you're trying to attract is actually more attracted to that than really any feature of the actual product or service.

Jesse Wroblewski (11:09): So I say finding your successful differentiator is the mic drop moment. So we, as marketers, and lucky for us, we get in bed with the company and it's a rebrand. So we got to get a new logo, and then the competitor gets a new logo and it's like, oh, we got to redesign our packaging, and then the competitor redesigns their packaging and we got to lower our prices and the competitor lowers their prices. If you could find that differentiator, that is the thing, here you go. No one can touch us. You can lower your prices, compete with us on a logo, the arms brace, that differentiator is checkmate. You can't copy, you can't clean up our dust. So I think that's kind of the checkmate moment in marketing.

John Jantsch (11:52): So over the years, I'm sure you've experienced this, I have as well, particularly maybe a little more buttoned up brand that feels like, well, we're architects, we're professional service providers. This is what everybody in our industry does, which to me is the ultimate opportunity for differentiating, but they're scared. I mean, wait, we don't want to be seen as how do you get somebody over that idea that that's actually screaming at you to be different?

Jesse Wroblewski (12:20): Absolutely, yeah. I mean, the common question I get asked, which you illustrated perfectly is different, is usually synonymous with odd or weird. But in the universe of differentiation, we have examples from brands like Rolex, Steinway, pianos, they all use the universe of differentiation to successfully differentiate themselves. And you may not associate Rolex with being different in your brain, but they're head and shoulders above the competition because they have successfully differentiated themselves. So it's not just for the outlandish or the guy that's not afraid to wear a weird shirt for everybody.

John Jantsch (13:02): So when you go to start work with somebody, or maybe you've just seen people do this, you may not be a client of yours, what are some of the biggest traps they fall into? They're like, drink the Kool-Aid. Yes, we need to be different. But then they screw it up.

Jesse Wroblewski (13:18): Everyone asks me, how do I get the client over that final hurdle? So everybody comes to the table, whether it's marketing or whether it's fitness, I want to get fit. I'll do anything. I'll get up at 5:00 AM I'll run 50 miles, and then five weeks from now you're sleeping in and in that discipline. So I tell my clients that I am great at branding and differentiating, but I suck at reading minds. So trying to get them to be vulnerable and look, we have at minimum 12 opportunities to differentiate If you say, Hey, you know what? I really don't feel like comedy or being approachable is synonymous with my brand, let's figure that out upfront. That way when we get to the finish line, I don't come up with you with this crazy outlandish head, and now you got to stay up at night. We'll get all the vulnerability out of the way in the beginning, and we could make great decisions leading up to the finish line. And then the rest is data. What is the data support? Then we pull the trigger. So it's never a frictionless effort, but I think setting the bar, setting the table properly can be very beneficial.

John Jantsch (14:27): What role do you think authenticity plays both for good and bad? I mean, we're a stodgy old brand, but we're going to do something to so those kids like us, and it just doesn't really come off. I mean, so how important is it that it not only be different, but it be real and true?

Jesse Wroblewski (14:46): Yeah, so I think it's a term that's thrown around too

John Jantsch (14:50): Completely.

Jesse Wroblewski (14:52): No one knows what the hell it means. But I say in my book, and I am absolutely guilty of this, I failed a bunch of times repositioning my agency, and it was great fodder for the book. And one of the ways I failed was I was 100% logical about my repositioning, which means I found an industry that had a problem that I could solve. They had a ton of money that they were throwing in marketing, and I basically said, Hey, I can come in and revolutionize this market, but when it came down to writing a blog about it or attending a trade show, I was like, it was homework. It was nothing I would've had rather done. So it really wasn't authentic to me. So I think it's not a pivotal ingredient, but if you can align it with your differentiator, that's such a huge leg up on your path to success. So if you are a differentiation pairs with your natural authenticity, it's going to be a huge headstart for you.

John Jantsch (15:50): Alright, let's talk a little bit about rebranding. You see a lot of companies out there that feel like, oh, it's been five years since we've done this, and sometimes they're sort of informed by trends. I mean the hottest business going, apparently today is an AI marketing agency, and 10 years ago it was a social media marketing agency. So how do we balance that idea of we want to stay current, but we also kind of look silly chasing the idea of the week?

Jesse Wroblewski (16:23): Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's a tough question that I don't necessarily have the answer to other than every pendulum is going to swing the other way. So we were actually contemplating at our agency as everybody's trying to be AI this AI that coming right out and saying, we are the 100% human agency, anti ai, everything you get will be created by a human with human feel, human emotion. So if you're thinking of chasing a trend and it doesn't feel authentic or it's rubbing you the wrong way, maybe the pendulum coming back the other way, you might be able to position yourself for the future.

John Jantsch (16:59): Yeah, I mean, once Twitter put out a user guide, all of those social media marketing agencies went out of business, didn't they? And I think it's important to really understand that fundamentally what we're here to do, you would probably agree with this in the marketing space, actually hasn't changed. I've been doing this for 30 years as well, and I think that's probably a point of view that people lose track of, isn't it?

Jesse Wroblewski (17:21): Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, I put out a video just kind of a lot of the perspective of my book is a cheerleading for our fellow marketers. So we as marketers have been through a ton of revolutions, and if I say, if your marketing agency didn't call you and try to get you to open your wallet for NFTs, clubhouse, the Metaverse, all these things, you should call them up and just thank them, right? Because as a salesman, I'm always looking for a chance to upsell, but I have a fiduciary responsibility to tell my client, Hey, you know what? Maybe we don't invest in Snapchat right now, or maybe we don't jump into the metaverse. And often distaste they kind of want it even though I tell them not to. So it takes a ton of integrity to be a marketer and that easy money in regards for your client's wellbeing.

John Jantsch (18:12): Yeah. The question that has served me well over the years is when some new tool has come along, I've said, how could this help me serve my existing clients better? And if I couldn't really see a practical way to do that, I mean, NFTs, I was drawn by the hype, but I just looked at it and went, what? How? Yeah.

Jesse Wroblewski (18:34): Yeah. And it's hard. You get those phone calls, Hey, I want to do an NFT, and it's easy money, but it's also you got to battle with your integrity. So yeah, I agree.

John Jantsch (18:44): Sitting where we are today in 2024, we're recording this. Are there any current shortcomings in traditional marketing practices that we all still see or have seen for the last 10 years that you think people need to immediately chuck?

Jesse Wroblewski (18:59): Yeah, I think exactly what you just touched upon. So I'm a big analogy guy. So I am not a party goer. I kind of go to the party, I make sure everybody sees me, I make my appearance, and then I bounce. So I could say I was there. I think a lot of businesses take that approach with social media. They just want to be in the conversation. They don't provide any value, they don't even provide a dialogue. It's more of a monologue, and they're just putting mindless content out there. And I think as I call it, commoditized content. As commoditized content grows, and now we're seeing a massive spike with ai, how much content, completely useless content is going to be swarming these social media platforms. There was an interesting stat that came out for the first time in human history. Something happened on the humankind level that people are willing to pay more for less meaning people have suddenly realized that instead of paying a hundred dollars to my cable company for 200 channels, which works out to 50 cents a channel, I'd rather pay $5 for one channel and get rid of all the crap.

(20:05): So I call it human climate change. We're changing the way we take in content because there's just so much of it. And I think that's unquestionably going to be in the form of marketing, particularly social media, where if you're putting out crap, people are not only going to ignore you, they're going to repel you and do whatever they can to get you out of their funnel of

John Jantsch (20:25): Well, and I think marketers for the last 10 years have gotten pretty lazy ad targeting. It's been pretty easy to do. Actually getting results in search engines has actually been pretty easy to do if you knew what you were doing, and I think it made a lot of marketers lazy when some of that goes away, I think a great deal of what you're talking about is going to be the thing that draws into specific businesses.

Jesse Wroblewski (20:49): Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, they just took away the middleman and now everybody can market and everybody shouldn't market. It's in our forum. I think we're going to finally start learning that again.

John Jantsch (20:59): Yeah, more than ever strategy. So Jesse, I appreciate you taking a moment to stop by. Is there someplace you'd invite people to connect with you or certainly pick up a copy of marketing for supervillains?

Jesse Wroblewski (21:09): Sure. I would love everyone to check it out. It's all available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and I tell everyone that I am at heart a frustrated filmmaker, so I put lots of explosions and lasers into my YouTube videos. So if you find me on commoditized on YouTube, I'm sure you're going to find a video on there that's entertaining and educational.

John Jantsch (21:31): Awesome. Well, again, I appreciate you spending a few moments with us. Hopefully we'll run into you one of these days out there on the road.



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