“I’d rather have ten people who are mad for it than ten thousand who aren’t.” – Peter Hook, Born Feb. 13, 1956. Who wants a lukewarm audience? Who wants readers with only a tepid interest in your topic? Who wants fair weather followers who can take you or leave you? I want people to either… Read More →
The Super Ultimate Overnight “Baby Steps” Guru Transformation Technique (LOL)
“If you want to succeed in the world, you don’t have to be much cleverer than other people. You just have to be one day earlier.” – Leo Szilard, Born Feb. 11, 1898. I’m not about to give you some early bird bullshit. No rise and grind asshattery. No 10x crushing it. To be “early”… Read More →
Why Mistakes Are More Valuable Than Gold (When You Wrangle Them Properly)
“Intelligence is not to make no mistakes, but quickly to see how to make them good.” – Bertolt Brecht, Born Feb. 10, 1898. If you want to be seen as a leader in your market, it’s not about always winning. It’s about never losing. And if you can make a loss into a win, you’ll… Read More →
If You Don’t Care About Your Thing The MOST, No One Else Will Care At All.
“I’m not here for your amusement. You’re here for mine.” – John Lydon, Born Jan. 31, 1956. It’s a very important attitude to have toward your audience and your chosen topic as a writer. Though most people would get this backwards. “You’re here for the customer! The customer is always right! The customer is king!”… Read More →
How to Warp to the Next Level Without Beating the Boss
“Players like to know that they’ve discovered things that even the designers didn’t know were in the game.” – Will Wright, Born Jan. 20, 1960. People who grew up in the original Nintendo Entertainment System era have a unique insight into persuasive language. In particular, an advantage when it comes to the framing of information… Read More →
The Value of Having Haters Is…
“If all printers were determined not to print anything till they were sure it would offend nobody, there would be very little printed.” – Benjamin Franklin, Born Jan. 17, 1706. What I love about this is that back in Ben’s time, printing was expensive, and a huge pain in the ass. A press was a… Read More →
This Blog Post is +2 Against Ridicule and Embarassment
“People don’t mind being mean; but they never want to be ridiculous.” – Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, aka Moliere, Born Jan. 15, 1622. To make people into allies, make them an accomplice. If you can get them to indulge in complaint and insult (even in private) against their enemies, you create a kinship. Paint those enemies as… Read More →
Leadership is About Follow-ability. Are You Followable?
“Example is not the main thing in influencing others. It is the only thing.” “Do something wonderful, people may imitate it.” – Albert Schweitzer, Born Jan. 14, 1875. This is a two-for. Two quotes from the same guy, but I think they are interrelated. If you want to influence people, you may have heard the… Read More →
Content Hack: Go Screw Something Up Really Bad. (Then Fix It.)
“Life is very interesting if you make mistakes.” – Georges Carpentier, Born Jan. 12, 1894. The secret to success is building an audience. The secret to building an audience is to be interesting. The secret to being interesting is having something valuable to talk about. This last one intimidates many, who mistakenly think that only… Read More →
Consistency is Uncommon, But It’s a Shortcut to Success
“When you can do the common things of life in an uncommon way, you will command the attention of the world.” – George Washington Carver, Born Jan. 10, 1864. One of the simplest secrets of success at I know is to do just do the simple things well. Unfortunately, that is uncommon. Show up every… Read More →