This blog post carbon dates me, but I'm prepared to put myself out there in the interest of furthering science.
In 2000, the internet was just getting going; we had Internet Explorer, Netscape and Adobe Flash. These were frontier times when everything was possible, and there weren't any real playbooks or history under the internet's belt to inform what was the right path to success.
The world of IT was flush with Year 2000 consultants and the burning wrecks of the dot com crash. Demand for development skills had taken a nosedive; a large flock of people chased every job like so many two-legged chickens pecking around for the last solitary grain of wheat.
Through a friend, I'd managed to land a job at London Underground; our remit was to build thetube.com, to bring real-time travel information and relevant topics to commuters reliant on worming their way around London.
There's a host of stories from my three years there, but I'll have to drip-feed those to ensure I've left something in the tank for other posts.
Once we had built the site and connected real-time travel information, it was popular and doing well because it felt like, at that time, the trains were a little unpredictable and knowing when they would turn up was meaningful.
As a consultant, I managed to get my company logo, a very small clickable thing, included in part of the navigation, driving traffic to my website. It was a golden opportunity to get noticed, perhaps to pave the way for more exciting opportunities and … brand awareness.
So what did I do? I thought I was being cool, and I created a very esoteric, minimal website that didn't say anything. It didn't say what I did, for whom, or what value could be created by contacting my business. In short, it was the polar opposite of promotion. Unsurprisingly, nothing came of this fumbled opportunity.
Sales is a function of promotion, awareness and reputation (to name a few). In life, you die twice, once when you die and again when people stop mentioning your name. To come alive as a business, it's the mirror; your business must be creating value, i.e. existing, and secondly, people need to be talking about you.
To really make a difference, to grow and develop a business at a speed which exceeds that of wading through a tar pit, is to promote. You need to shout from the rooftops about what you're doing, the value, the success and the vision. More over you need a level of energy and engagement, a passion so strong that it drives a path through others battling for the same attention.
My worldview at that time, and to some extent now, is that doing good work, i.e. the reputation bit, is the only real way to create a sustainable business. The downside to this is that it's extremely long tail.
Reputation will only create a hockey stick growth if your product is consumed quickly and repeatably; if you're a good coffee shop, today's success will drive tomorrow's success. If you're a software business where success is measured in ROI over a period of years, that reputation curve is much, much, much flatter.
One thing I know about myself is that I am committed to good business outcomes (see earlier ramblings on this topic), but I am not, as my early branding failure illustrates, one of those people who has "the stuff" to rapidly rub two sticks together to create a bonfire, not just a spark.
I've seen people who have this unnatural energy to create a sales process and engagement which strives to elevate a business to new heights. It's exhausting just watching them. They are a force of nature.
Now, the world is nothing if not a place where different strokes for different folks generally works out, and to whit, I've had my own degree of success. I can sell; I believe in what I do and the ability of the business to make a difference. However, I cannot energetically self-promote or be that different kind of person, even if I recognise that if I could it would elevate my success.
Rather than trying to change yourself to be something different in order to drive success, the byline is that you should recognise who you are, what you’re good at, and find people or join a team where your ability compliments others.
Truly amazing sales professionals who can make something enormous from nothing are very few and far between. Thinking back, I’ve met three people in business who meet this criteria. That’s less than one for every ten years I’ve been working. Meeting them has taught me about myself; I’ve learned where I should play in the team and what the shape of an organisation should look like to get out of the gravity well.
This blog post is a little bit all over the place. There are a few points I’m trying to make in one sitting, and I’m not sure if it’s all hanging together. But, dear friend, you’ve made it this far down the blog, so I’m thinking that’s something. Thank you for joining me on this outing; hit the like button to promote me; I’m rubbish at it myself. 😉 See you next time.