Speed.In marketing there are a couple of other ways of looking at it. Many wait until too late to do something. They fear rushing in. They don’t know how to manage speed. Speed kills, they say.
I have a different point of view. About right now is better than exactly right later. Fear of failure gets people into the mindset that they need to keep doing market research, fiddling with figures, and carefully mapping out strategy.
In the mean time, I’m out doing, making mistakes, learning from them and eventually getting it right. That “eventually” has some advantages. Eventually you learn the skills to do it right the first time and do it right quickly.
A long time ago in 1984, I was at a reception in Washington, DC. These are dreadful affairs with everyone wanting to be seen with someone special. I was semi-enjoying a mindless Tuesday evening when Neal Blair, my partner in political grime (we were lobbyists), came up to me with Phyllis Schlafly. The Equal Rights Amendment has spent years being rejected by state legislatures and the time had run out for the amendment process. But, die-hard supporters were trying to change the rules and grant it an extended time so they could get their way. Both parties participate in such shenanigans.
Mrs. Schlafly told Neal that she needed a commercial written that could convince the 17 wavering congressmen to spike the bill once and for all. Neal magnanimously told Schlafly that I would be happy to write a commercial for her. I nearly croaked on my Sprite. I managed to say I’d give it a try. She said, “Good. We must have it Thursday morning.” Blair said, “No problem.” I could have strangled him.
So I went home that night and wrote the script; a little one minute play about two GI Janes in a fox hole leading a platoon of Marines and saying that their congressman assured them that if the ERA passed it would not mean a mandatory equal draft. Even if you didn’t agree, it was quite funny and hard to refute.
The next morning, Wednesday, I was at the sound studio. Before leaving I called the producer and read him the script (we didn’t have faxes, cell phones, scanners or computers). By the time I arrived he had assembled five actors who grabbed my script and started rehearsing. By 5 PM we were finished. The producer spent the evening squeezing everything into the 1 minute spot. The next morning, Thursday, Schlafly had her 17 cassettes, each with the ad that named that congressman by name as the person that voted to force Mom to be a Marine.
By Thursday afternoon Schlafly had walked into all 17 congressmen’s offices and played the commercial “that will air Monday here and in your district if you vote to give an unfair extension of time to the ERA.”
On Friday morning all 17 voted against the extension and it killed the ERA once and for all.
Speed matters. Getting the job done quickly is a must.
Many other successful marketers are out doing exactly the same thing. In the mean time the careful plodders are still trying to make it perfect.
They really fear failure. Afraid yet another person will find a reason to reject them. Marketing is so much about learning from the rejections and turning them into opportunities.
To those fine people and everyone else struggling to get started, understand that anything worth doing well is worth doing poorly to start. Grow into it by doing something today. Make a fool of yourself just because. Now that it is out of your system, and you didn’t get eaten by a bystander viewing you, it’s time to get on with the task of accomplishing your dreams.
Speed. Go to it. Do it now. Don’t wait another minute.
Marketing thought for the day: Only God is not in marketing. The rest of us rely upon customer satisfaction to validate our fiscal existence.
Marketing tip: Collect today 10 email addresses you don’t have. Add them to your “house list.” Do the same tomorrow. Soon, you’ll have a database of people who know you. If you can’t figure out what to do next... stay tuned.
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