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When you can do a lot of things, your tendency is… to do a lot of things.

But in so many cases, doing a few things well is better than doing many things poorly.

Complexity leads to breakdown, stress, and resource depletion. Simplification leads to focus and results.

This principle applies almost anywhere else you look. But I see it most often in people’s marketing strategies.

It starts small. But eventually, there becomes too much noise and activity.

You begin to lose focus. Everyone is exhausted. Things stop working.

So what do you do if you find complexity creeping into you or your clients’ marketing program?

Evaluate it from an 80/20 perspective.

There’s always something that is bringing 80% of the results for 20% of the effort. Do more of that if it aligns with your goals.

On the flip side, there’s always something causing 80% of the headaches making up 20% of your time, energy, or resources. Stop those things immediately, even if it hurts.

When you find complexity creeping in, and it always does, look for the 80/20.

And then as Stephen King says, kill your darlings.

Every year around this time, I reflect on the last twelve months to determine what worked and what didn’t.

This year is no different, but I’m also looking at it from new perspectives.

At a high level, I’m reflecting on things like:

• where most of my revenue came from
• where and how I spent money (and if it was spent wisely)
• which projects I enjoyed working on vs. ones I didn’t
• what my wins and lessons were for the year
• what kind of work gave me energy vs. depleted it
• what made me feel good vs. what made me feel bad

Ultimately, I’m looking for ways to make my business better.

So what does a “better business” look like?

For me, it looks like continuing to focus on higher-income activities, more leveraged products and services, more energy-producing work, and generally seeking to enjoy most of the work I choose to do.

If it were up to me, I would do mostly mentoring and teaching. And yet, those things are the least “profitable” to me right now.

Nonetheless, I’m seeing signs of life with Mindshare and I enjoy it a lot, so I plan to follow that.

But I also have to make sure I’m in a good financial position, which means analyzing the best business opportunities while balancing the more subjective targets.

My plan for the new year

My plan for the new year is to continue focusing on the few clients who bring in the most money (multi-location coworking spaces), give me the most energy (mentoring work), all while doing work that aligns with what I want for my future.

Each part is important, but the last part is probably the smartest area to focus on.

We get so caught up in the days, weeks, and months that we forget to look five to ten years down the line to make sure we’re aiming in the right direction.

I also want to spend more time tinkering. One of my early mentors was a big tinkerer and he still runs a highly profitable consulting business around his free time.

I’m a big believer that tinkering and learning is good for business—especially one dependent on your expertise.

Too many people neglect that part, I think. And that’s what makes this year’s takeaways a bit different than most.

So that’s my thought process. It’s a blend of rational and qualitative. Just like real life.

What’s your year in review looking like? Hit me up on Twitter.

I used to go running first thing every morning.

I’d get up early, put on my running shoes and appropriate clothing, and get running. I’d be on the road before my brain even realized what was happening.

No matter what happened, I ran. I ran through rain, shine, show, ice and everything in between. Usually in the dark.

I did that for the better part of 6 months without skipping a day. I look back at photos from that time and I was noticeably leaner than other periods before or after.

The results were showing. Consistency was working for me.

The trick to running daily was to do without thinking too much about it. I would just put on the clothes and run for at least 20 minutes. That was the rule.

And because I did it every day, I didn’t have to think about it. I just did it.

I now see similarities with daily writing. It’s Christmas Day, and I’m writing this letter to you because that’s what I’ve committed to do. I don’t have to think about it.

This is day 48 of my streak. It works because I don’t overthink it, I just write and publish. The results will follow. I know it.

If you want to write daily, the trick is simple: don’t overthink it.

Keep it simple, keep showing up, do it no matter what (even on Christmas) and see what happens. You can’t help but create opportunities and if nothing else, it’s a fun challenge.

There are at least two ways to do marketing: the legitimate, straightforward, integrity-focused way, and the fly-by-night, bloated, hacky, and shortcuts way.

Below is an excerpt from a great little website by Brad Frost called Death to Bullshit that articulates exactly these two extremes.

I highly recommend checking it out and clicking the “Turn bullshit on?” link in the upper right to get the full experience.

We’re bombarded by more information than ever before. With the rise of all this information comes a rise of the amount of bullshit we’re exposed to. Death to Bullshit is a rallying cry to rid the world of bullshit and demand experiences that respect people and their time.

What is bullshit?

Bullshit lies on a spectrum somewhere between ineptitude and outright deception. Bullshit can be characterized in a few different ways:

• Superfluous or unnecessary
• Cluttered, clunky, or needlessly complex
• Intentionally deceptive or insincere

Popups, jargon, junk mail, anti-patterns, sensationalism, begging for likes, tracking scripts, marketing spam, dark patterns, unskippable ads, clickbait, linkbait, listicles, seizure-inducing banners, captchas, QR codes, barely-visible unsubscribe buttons, 24-hour news networks, carousels, auto-playing audio, bloatware, sudden redirects to the App Store, telemarketing, ticked-by-default subscribe buttons, “your call is important to us”, pageview-gaming galleries, native advertising, the list of bullshit goes on and on and on. This bullshit assaults our senses in a desperate attempt to capture our attention.

People’s capacity for bullshit is rapidly diminishing.

“When information is cheap, attention becomes expensive.” —James Gleick

We as human beings are trying to maximize our signal and minimize the amount of noise we’re exposed to. Our willingness to be inconvenienced, interrupted, and insulted is dwindling. We’re finding more ways to circumvent bullshit, whether it’s through tools like ad-blockers or actions like cutting cable.

As the landslide of bullshit surges down the mountain, people will increasingly gravitate toward genuinely useful, well-crafted products, services, and experiences that respect them and their time. So we as creators have a decision to make: do we want to be part of the 90% of noise out there, or do we want to be part of the 10% of signal? It’s quite simple really:

• Respect people and their time.
• Respect your craft.
• Be sincere.
• Create genuinely useful things.

This site and accompanying blog explore the themes of information, bullshit, and craft. Enjoy.

Love,
Brad

When you first get started in marketing, you might have a tendency to throw tactics on the wall until things work. Or if you are feeling desperate, you might try some “hacks” to get people to use your thing.

It starts small. It looks like a new feature or idea. Next thing you know, you’re laying on piles of BS until you can’t even call what you’re doing marketing anymore.

It’s good to be hyper-aware of this slippery slope. To remember that good marketing is about service, value, and simplicity. Not hacks, gimmicks, or shortcuts.

There are no short-cuts and the cream always rises to the top. Avoid BS like a hawk.

 

P.S. Be sure to visit the main site and turn on the BS to get the full experience. 🙂

Something I’ve realized lately in my consulting work is that every company has a “lemon factor”. Mine is no exception, by the way.

And if you don’t quickly get clear on what it is, it will come back to haunt you.

Now that I’m aware of this truth, I ask my clients the question up front, what is your lemon factor?

They won’t always know or be able to accurately assess it themselves, so it’s my job to investigate just to be sure.

This knowledge is crucial for helping companies grow. Most of us are partially or completely blind to them. We get used to them.

What is a lemon factor?

A lemon factor is basically your biggest weakness. It’s why people shouldn’t or don’t buy from you most often.

Maybe you’re in an undesirable part of town or maybe you’re a jack-of-all-trades and master of none.

Whatever it is, it’s crucial you know what’s your lemon factor is so you know how to compensate for it.

What is the best way to compensate for it?

Double down on your X factor.

Your X factor is the thing that gives your company an edge. It’s your competitive advantage and the thing that makes you uniquely compelling.

Both the X factor and the lemon factor are essential things to be aware of so you can mitigate risks and compensate by focusing on what you do best.

You can’t ignore the lemon factor—both in your own business and your clients’. All businesses have them.

If you do ignore the lemon factor, it will become a blind spot in your work that will severely limit your potential down the line.

Know your lemon factor and compensate with an equally strong (or stronger) X factor.

Most of my work has come to me as a result of content marketing—over a million dollars’ worth over the past 5 years.

The problem with content marketing when you’re a solo consultant is it can be difficult to find time (energy) to create content on a consistent basis.

And yet, it’s the consistency that matters more than one-off great content. At least in terms of attracting opportunities to you.

If you’re not creating content, my best advice to you is to just start. Create something and make it better later.

Starting is the surest way to force yourself to build the habit and improve the work you put out.

It won’t be great at first, but that’s fine. It just needs to become a habit so you can become consistent.

Once you have mastered consistency, then try to make your content excellent.

There are countless examples of people who put out imperfect content that adds value and thus serves its purpose. Their content may not win awards, but it’s consistent and valuable, which is what counts most.

The alternative is to try to make everything you produce perfect from the get-go. The best it could possibly be.

But more often than not, it leads to either procrastination or sporadic content—which isn’t a great strategy.

To be clear, there is nothing wrong with wanting to create only the best possible content. Go for it if you think you can do it consistently from a standstill.

But for most people, getting started is the path to publishing great content. They just need to put in the reps first before they can get there.

If you want business results, get consistent and then increase the quality.

This year has been a whirlwind for all of us.

The uncertainty that took us by storm at the beginning of 2020 and then the long year that followed has left many of us tired and beleaguered.

When the pandemic first hit, I thought I’d see my business get crushed. More than half of my revenue comes from the coworking industry, after all.

Luckily, I was able to sustain a full deck of clients for most of the year, resulting in by far my best year yet.

But with all that busy-ness, I haven’t had time to think about my own business. To plan strategically about what I want 2021 to look like. I’ve even let a lot of my marketing slide for my coworking consultancy, too.

Not to mention,  I’ve almost completely neglected my own personal needs—as I’m sure you and many others may have done also to some extent. I’m extremely grateful for my health, family, new son, and fortunate business results for the year, but it’s taken a toll.

So, my plan is to unwind over the holidays and zoom out from my business a bit. To spend time away from the computer, letting my mind wander and regain the creative energy it needs. To nurture the soul.

There’s nothing like separation from your work (and long walks) to give you perspective on what you want your next steps to look like. This year has been a stressful one, so I think we all need and deserve some time to think and recharge.

That’s my plan, I hope and encourage you to do the same.

When you create something new, you rarely know if it will work.

The best thing you can do is look for early signs of life and build around them.

I launched Mindshare a few months ago. It’s a private mentorship podcast with resources and a community for marketing consultants.

I don’t know if it will work yet. But I’m noticing early signs of life.

There are 17 current members so far. Some I’ve never met before. Some I’ve met online. A few I know in person.

I sold most of the memberships via Twitter—the only place I talk about it aside from my personal blog. One person even came from a one-day trial run of Twitter ads.

There’s also a half dozen or more people who join the monthly coffee meetups on Zoom that we host. A decently high ratio given the number of people in the group.

I don’t know if the idea has legs yet, but I’m seeing signs of life and I’m personally enjoying it a lot.

There is still tons of work to do and it’s early days yet. For now, I’ll keep watching for signs of life and giving it the attention it needs to grow.

Are you starting something new? Look for the smallest signs of life and build around those.

It could be anything, from increased conversations to new introductions, your first paying client, or some new subscribers to your list.

All that matters is you build around the signs of life and keep doing that until you’ve reached your goals.

H/T to Mark Butler who shared this idea before on a podcast.

For the last 37 days, I’ve been posting one new short article a day.

At points, I feel tired or unable to come up with anything original. So I share something I found that day or express an idea that’s been bouncing around in my head.

Some days, I feel like not publishing something. Missing a day. It would be so easy.

I’m still in the process of finding my daily rhythm and voice with this blog. But there’s one thing I know for sure: it’s a lot easier to steer a moving car than a parked one.

My best advisory clients take action. They’re doing things, allocating time and resources to their marketing, learning what’s working, and iterating on the fly.

We don’t always know which ideas will gain the most traction or which will get the best results.

But I can guarantee one thing: not taking enough action is a surefire way to not reach your goal.

I’d rather be moving and fumbling than standing still.

Because after all, you can’t move forward while standing still. And you can’t steer a parked car, either.