We tell ourselves stories in order to live. ~ Joan Didion
This is marketing.
And
it’s a story.
And there’s
one word
behind that marketing,
one word
behind that story …
“Grit”.
Yes it’s Nike.
Yes they probably pay their creative/advertising team huge wages.
But those two principles can be applied to all marketing, everywhere.
And you can apply them no matter what your marketing budget.
What is your product/client story?
What is the one word behind your story, behind your marketing, behind your brand?
After that it just remains for you to find places to tell that story.
Our lives, our cultures, are composed of many overlapping stories. Novelist Chimamanda Adichie tells the story of how she found her authentic cultural voice — and warns that if we hear only a single story about another person or country, we risk a critical misunderstanding.
In Nigeria, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s novel Half of a Yellow Sun has helped inspire new, cross-generational communication about the Biafran war. In this and in her other works, she seeks to instill dignity into the finest details of each character, whether poor, middle class or rich, exposing along the way the deep scars of colonialism in the African landscape.
Adichie’s newest book, The Thing Around Your Neck, is a brilliant collection of stories about Nigerians struggling to cope with a corrupted context in their home country, and about the Nigerian immigrant experience.
Adichie builds on the literary tradition of Igbo literary giant Chinua Achebe—and when she found out that Achebe liked Half of a Yellow Sun, she says she cried for a whole day. What he said about her rings true: “We do not usually associate wisdom with beginners, but here is a new writer endowed with the gift of ancient storytellers.”
“When she turned 10 and read Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, about the clash between Igbo tradition and the British colonial way of life, everything changed: ‘I realized that people who looked like me could live in books.’ She has been writing about Africa ever since.” Washington Post
I love visiting waterfalls and creeks and swimming holes in the rainforest.
There is beauty.
There is peace.
But also a sense of activity as the water moves through its environment, trickling or roaring, making music of its own and changing the landscape as it goes.
This was a river, one of many, that we visited on our holiday last month, with all of the beauty and peace and movement.
It is a popular tourist place, with facilities for visitors including beautifully maintained walks and lookouts.
The river runs through huge rocks and the place is actually called “The Boulders”.
At many of the places we had visited before this one, there were swimming “holes” where people were swimming in the rivers, cold though the temperature was at the time, and other places where tour guides showed their clients how to inch across the rocks and slide safely with the water to a pool below.
It’s something that people do.
I have never swum in these water holes, but I like to see the joy and fun that people have who do.
At a lake we visited there were the usual young men daring each other to feats of daring by diving backwards with a somersault into the lake, off a pontoon.
And in watercourses all around the country on any given day, there are children swinging out over lagoons and waterholes on an old tyre attached to a rope and jumping off into the water.
And all around the country, in any given year there will be accidents – people who want that fun, carefree joy and challenge – but who dive into shallow water or land on something submerged in the water. There are people absolutely incapacitated because of such accidents or even worse.
……………………………………………………
In many places there are signs, just like this one …
and on the whole, people abide by them.
Not always.
……………………………………………………
If I were a young man (or woman, though it seems to be young men who are more tempted), would I abide by them?
If I were a young man’s mother, would I want him to abide by them?
I know the temptation is strong for the fun, carefree joy and challenge, and I know it is not always resisted.
……………………………………………………
But at The Boulders, the signs were different.
And here’s where the story comes in.
I had never ever before seen a sign that said “Many people have died here”, and it was repeated on signs throughout the area.
People have died here.
That is a four word story.
I like to think it would have more impact than the standard sign.
If you were a young man (or woman), would you be more likely to abide by the rule?
If you were a young man’s parent or friend, would you be more likely to persuade him?
I would like to think so.
I know as a mother … I would.
I was caught by this thought every time we passed such a sign.
But then when we walked out of the rainforest into the car park, I noticed this plaque on a rock.
Did he dive … and die? Perhaps not, but if the story is that he did,
imagine his mother, his father, his friends, his family, his community and how they felt when he did not return – forever – just because of that daredevil impulse.
That is a heartrending story of a young man who did not live out his life as he could have and whose death must have caused waves and years of anguish.
If you were a young man (or woman), would you be more likely to abide by the rule … knowing that story?
If you were a young man’s parent or friend, would you be more likely to persuade him?
I would like to think so.
I know as a mother … I would.
Who are you?
If someone wants to know who you are, they type your name into Google.
Before the meeting, you have been googled.
Before the interview, you have been googled.
Before the pitch, you have been googled.
What is Google saying about you?
What did you give Google to say about you?
It’s an interesting exercise to Google oneself … interesting and sometimes surprising!!
Right there is a little window into how people might be seeing you.
That is the story people are seeing and reading about you – your personal brand story, your business brand story.
Did Google put it there? No. But Google chose which parts of it to put in front of searchers as the first thing they saw.
Did other people put it there? Yes. Your clients comment on your business and connect with you. Your friends comment on you and connect with you. You listed yourself on other websites, and commented or interacted there.
So to some extent, this is happening without you.
Consider, though …
You gave your clients something to comment on. What was that?
You connected with them. What impression did that give?
You gave your friends something to comment on. What was that?
You connected with them. What impression did that give?
You associated yourself with other websites. What impression does that give?
Everything communicates.
My mother said to me often and often, “Put your words on the palm of your hand before you say them.”
She probably said that as I grew into a teenager with attitude, and not much thought for what I said, or what the consequences might be.
Everything communicates, especially words, but actions too.
So everything we do on the internet communicates something and it’s not always what we might expect.
Google, and the internet as a whole, gives us an unparalleled opportunity to communicate, to share and to build a brand, and there is nothing so challenging, nor so rewarding as to to watch that brand build and grow.
Enjoy!!
This morning I walked along the tracks through Aussie bush not far from our house.
There are all sorts of creatures living there and I love to stop and see if I can spot whatever it is that is creating rustling noises not far from the track. There are goannas, snakes, birds, lizards, echidnas (though I have never had the luck to see one of those), and the occasional wallaby.
Today, there was a rather large bird pecking about near the dry creek. I could not identify it – a stranger.
As I walked back that way, two of them flew up and into the trees not far away. I was lucky to meet a man and his wife just then. They identified the birds as bronze-wing pigeons. Beautiful people, those people, friendly and kind. The birds are rather dull-coloured, though apparently if the sun shines on the bronze, it is beautiful. To me it was a beautiful experience, though – bringing back absolutely beautiful memories, and the feeling of something clicking into place.
When I was a little girl, growing up in the country, there was a young man – a “bit of a character” – who had a perfectly chosen nick-name for everyone in the district. Mine … because of my own name, Bronwyn, was “bronze-wing”. He was a bit of larrikin, but well-liked, and occasionally, my family would refer to me as bronze-wing, or remind me that that was the name Lennie had given me, always with humorous respect for him and with tender love for me.
I don’t remember ever meeting or being shown a bronze-wing pigeon then or since – until today. It was just Lennie’s lovely nick-name, and it brings back memories of those days – images, scents, sounds, and the pervading feeling of love. Click!
……………………….
Bronze-wing : Part 2
Lennie, the larrikin. Lennie the name-giver.
I think life was painful for Lennie.
He did have a wonderful sense of humour, possibly it could be called a wicked sense of humour.
I guess he could have been seen as wicked. When we went back 10 years or so ago to the centenary of the primary school he and I attended, there were the records of the canings he was given – almost daily. I don’t remember what misdemeanors he committed – possibly swearing …, but he probably made life difficult for the teachers.
I suspect he saw no relevance in school, or its operations.
He loved his car, I remember. It burbled – certainly a V8. I remember him arriving at a rodeo, driving slowly behind the cars parked around the rodeo ring, looking for a pace to stop, and creating a jaunty little change to the burble of his car as he passed, as a way of saying “hello”.
He grew up on a farm as we all did, but obviously had no desire to stay there. He drove school buses for a while and then became a long distance truckie. It must have a been a huge worry for his wife. He was a diabetic, but rebelled against the stringent diet and exercise restrictions.
He was a person who questioned life and expressed his views with that special witty humour. Everyone in that community, as far as I know, appreciated his wit. He did have a sense of humour and there was often a twinkle in his eye, though also often a grimace. I know he had the knack, whenever he saw me, of communicating both a question as to the most basic of my assumptions about myself and what I was doing, and, simultaneously, a feeling of love, respect and fellowship.
Funny. Clever. Different. Irreverent. Insightful.
……………………………….
Today I have just read that the autopsy performed on Robin Williams showed no traces of drugs or alcohol. The final indignity.
But this, too, was a man who was funny, clever, different, irreverent, insightful and with that same communication of love, respect and fellowship.
R.I.P. Robin Williams.
R.I.P. Lenny …
and thank you for my totem, “Bronze-wing”.