Life is too damn short not to have fun at what you do. And if you are in sales and marketing, you better have fun - or you will not succeed. The great thing about marketing in this day and age is the same old boring rules of the past no longer work. And you are encouraged to break them!
Thus, you need to do things differently. Katherine Hepburn famously said "If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun." She was right.
Want an example? I have a lot of fun watching Hugh MacLeod's marketing campaign for Stormhoek, a South African winery. Click on the image above - that's Hugh's blog. He's doing things a little differently there. And I bet he's having fun.
"Most business practices repress our natural tendency to have fun and socialize. " -George Zimmer
Why do so many people insist on making this stuff feel like work? Ask yourself seriously - are you having fun with your marketing campaigns? Where else can you be creative? Where else is it ok to fail - and relish the lessons learned from those failures? Where else can we strategically move chess pieces on message, design, and targeting - all to achieve stronger response rates and change behavior of customers?
"When people aren't having any fun they seldom produce good advertising." -David Ogilvy
Am I having fun, you might ask? Let's see: I serve a great company that provides security and safety to thousands. I market for an abstract painter. I market for a real estate company that is actually growing - and having fun - in this economy. I market for a successful old school company wanting to break into new media. I market for a new hip restaurant that - despite the economy - plans to charge full steam ahead and build franchises. And I am working with a guy who's life is centered on helping people innovate.
These are a few of my clients. How could I not have fun with this? Sure, my clients and I debate message, we go back and forth on design, we argue tactical budgets. But at the end of the day, we are having fun with our interactions. And the mutual joy we feel when something works - or when a new concept gels - is magic.
The interesting thing about the clients listed above is that they've all achieved some degree of success using traditional marketing approaches. But now they want to explore new frontiers. They want to learn, they want to test, they want to try new things. This makes things fun.
Trust me, as a small businessman myself, I've had my share of challenges and frustrations. But you've got to force yourself into a mindset where you look at your daily challenges, projects, To Do lists - as opportunities to have fun. Social media, while it is great at promoting awareness about yourself, helping others, learning, and building relationships - it is also a lot of fun!
The strategic side of developing a marketing plan that is successful - is fun. Deploying tactics and testing and measuring their success - is fun.
I've discovered that the people that don't look at these things as fun - are the same people who are fussing about the economy. So now's the time to break rules, try new things, be bold, but most importantly - have fun.
So, are we having fun yet? Please share ideas on what you've done to both succeed in business - AND enjoy yourself along the way!
Posted in General Marketing Strategy, Social Media