Here in Western Washington the weather is changing, the days are shorter and cool wind blows in from the ocean. I don’t have much to say about marketing this round. Not that anything hasn’t happened in the world of marketing, we are just feeling the pinch of a pandemic that has no signs of slowing down as we approach the second year of tenuous family gatherings for our birthday and holiday season. Plus, the industry I primarily work in is notoriously slow through the winter.
This means I’ve been spending a lot of time thinking about the end of the year and after so many stressful months, I’m feeling exhausted.
I think acknowledging this is important for me as a marketer. Not only is it crucial for me to take care of my own health, it is also how many of the people we are trying to reach are feeling right now, too. The next four months are going to be hard for a lot of people.
This doesn’t mean we should all start making sappy brand videos about “these trying times”. But, you should probably pull back on those emails, social posts, and ads that are to “emotionally connect” with your customers. Give the people what they need and keep doing it, consistently. The last thing everyone needs in their life right now is more emotion.
In fact, let’s stop trying to use emotion in marketing. Saying you leverage emotion in your marketing is a polite way of saying you emotionally manipulate people. Brands don’t have emotions. Brands aren’t people.
Talk straight.
I want to hear from you. How are you feeling going into the final stretch of 2021? What do you want to still get done? What can you do with the next 122 days? How can you take care of yourself? How can I help?
Hit reply, let me know. So, it is a short newsletter this time.
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Twitter Interlude
Remote work thoughts
Quick side note, and something I will write about a lot more in the coming weeks, about remote work. Many people are being called back into the office, with many more bosses chomping at the bit to recall everyone. Here is what is on the top of my mind as I read more and more about remote work coming to an end for so many:
- Boss culture is a real thing. Traditionally, bosses exist to enforce compliance and that is much more powerful when you boss can come to your desk at any moment. Remote work pushes more power to employees, which is why bosses will push for workers to be called back into the office.
- Car culture sucks. Commute culture is awful. For years I followed self-driving tech closely, thinking of all the productivity gains by a car that can drive itself so I can do other things. But, we had the solution already and that is not having to commute at all. Instead we are inventing self-driving cars to maintain status quo and be in compliance.
- Time at home is better for families. This is why I will never work in an office ever again. I have begged to be home with my family for decades. I have missed so much and now that I have it, I’m never giving that up again.
Hard Work Doesn’t Fix a Bad Strategy – Get Better Everyday
Hustle culture trains us that the solution to lagging metrics, under-performance, and downward trends is to just do more. Posting on Facebook once a day? Post 3. Recording a video a week? Make it 5.
But longer hours, more effort, and working harder doesn’t fix a bad strategy.
This is why having an overall vision is important. Where are we going? Does what I’m doing lead me to that vision? It is okay to take a different route, to change, to take one step back to later take 3 steps forward.
Read the full transcript to this video here.