Productivity Blogs, Hypocrisy and Me Just Generally Getting Some Things Off My Chest

No, I’m not yelling at you, my readers, I’m just yelling. Even us happy cheery fellows can get mighty pissed.

Angry Pug For the past who knows how long, I’ve been deleting RSS feeds from my aggregator. The first ones to go are the “how to be productive” ones, or the “63 new productivity apps that will take hours to learn and mere seconds to irreparably destroy your life.” I’ve got none of those left now in my reader now.

And I like it.

Why I’ve Read my Last Productivity Post

First, I’m bored as hell with this whole subject. I pretty much was after the second or third post I read, months and months ago.

Second, I’m already productive.

Third, regardless of how brilliant the productivity info is, 99% of the readers are going to keep on doing what they’re already doing. Most likely that is something that has been working for them just fine. Be it Post-It notes, a notebook, phone calendar, whatever. It doesn’t make the slightest bit of difference. If it helps you be productive, it works.

And there’s this…

The Piece of Gold That Productivity Gurus Are Clueless About

For all the tips and tricks, none of the gurus seems to have noticed that productivity isn’t even the problem in the first place.

When we are interested in our lives, our projects and our hobbies we DO them. Happily and with passion. Hours go by in the heat of production and when we’re done our tendons ache and our eyes burn, but we’re not even slightly tired. We have to force ourselves to sleep while our imaginations continue to burn into the wee hours.

Nobody has ever habitually forced a passionate man into creating on his passion. If you like what you do, you’ll fit it in. If you don’t like it, blunt enforcement certainly isn’t going to help.

My advice is to stop being productive. Just go outside and take a walk. Go look at the sky. Go turn on your imagination somewhere, somehow, any way you can. And when you’ve found a passion you’ll know it. You’ll feel that trickle of adrenaline in your belly. Your pulse will quicken and you’ll know exactly what you’re going to do when you get back home.

The Real Secret of Productivity

This is so simple it doesn’t even warrant it’s own blog post.

How to get shit done

Make a list of things you need to do
Do them, one at a time or two or all at once, whichever works
When you get distracted and stop working…
…stop. Get back to work
Repeat if necessary

Yes, that’s pretty much it. Just wake up in the morning, make a list of important items and do them. If it’s more complicated than that and you need some guidance on how to actually make an effective list, go read Nick’s Todoodlist. It’s a brilliant, entertaining read and will change how you start your mornings.

Why I’m So Pissed

I’m tickled crimson right now because one of the gurus out there who runs the one of the largest productivity blogs between here and Neptune can’t seem to find the time to write me back and answer my two-sentence email.

Sure, that happens. I guess. But not with me. Not with James Chartrand and his partner Harry. Not with Nick Cernis. Not with Collis. Not with my mother and father. Not with some multi-million dollar execs I occasionally correspond with. Not with a bunch of other people who, no matter how busy they seem, ALWAYS write me back.

But why can’t this productivity whiz? Am I at the bottom of his to-do list? Or am I lost somewhere between his iPhone, Things, Basecamp, Moleskine and iCal productivity tools? Yes, that is sarcasm, but I don’t think it’s unwarranted.

“Well perhaps there’s nothing in it for him,” you say. Oh, but there is. I’m on assignment right now doing something that will no doubt make him and I both a good chunk of change.

“Maybe he doesn’t want to do the project anymore.” Possibly, but he sure hasn’t told me.

“Maybe he’s too important and has way more important things cooking.” Nobody is “too important” for someone else. We’re people. All of us. We’re here together, right now. My world is his world, and mine is his.

So what should I do? Give him the benefit of the doubt? I have already, going on six weeks. And besides, it’s no longer doubt. Now it’s certainty and first-hand knowledge that his business ethics, communication and just plain old manners suck.

Am I giving up on the assignment and throwing it all out? No way, dog!

I’ve poured myself into it.

And it’s good.

And I love it, which is why I’ve been carrying on alone, without input from the person who asked for it in the first place.

Nope. This assignment will be finished and will remain mine. I’ll sell it myself through my own sites, to customers who I will communicate with and respond to if they write me.

I won’t sell as many without his gigantic readership behind me, this I know. But it’s not about the money is it? It’s about the passion. It’s about connecting with one, two or a thousand people who care enough to write me, to laugh with me, to cry with me and to support a guy who doesn’t know much outside the realm of his own imagination.

These are people for whom I create. That’s a privilege, and it’s one of the richer payments I get for simply being alive.

_____________________________

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The Internet. Now with Tartar Control.

By Charlie on April 17th, 2008 | Filed in Good Business Practice, Marketing | 0

The Internet, Now With Tartar Control I think every time I buy toothpaste I buy a different type. I can’t remember from tube to tube which brand I owned before, so every time I go to the market I have to look at 120 boxes all over again.

Every single time.

In fact, the only specific tooth product I can think of at all at the moment is one old people use to soak their dentures in at night. I only remember that because the commercial for it is absolutely abhorrent. Watching someone take out their teeth and stick them in a cup of fizzy liquid as the camera zooms in isn’t my idea of a good time.

But then again, if I were 96 I’m sure that would be the stuff I’d buy because I’d be in the market for fizzy tooth solvent and it’s certainly a memorable commercial.

Individual toothpastes aren’t memorable because individual toothpastes don’t have unique branding.

Toothpaste in general, as a product, has branding: you take a box, add some swooshy toothpaste-like shapes, put some glitter on it, add the words “white,” “tartar” and “control” in any combination and you’re golden. Every toothpaste company is stuck in that rut and that’s why I have no idea what’s on my bathroom counter.

Sounds like the internet doesn’t it?

Today a website is a website is a website. There are thousands of new sites every day and if my own web surfing is any measure, fewer and fewer of them are worth a damn. Perhaps we’re seeing the proliferation of a new day where the unique website is dead and the best you can hope for is to buy 67 domain names, put template-based websites up and hope for your .05 cents of revenue from Adsense.

Not gonna happen.

I mean, think of how many websites you’ve ever seen since the beginning of the internet. Lots and lots.

Now tell me how many sites are in your bookmark list. See?

Now, I’m not one to say that every site has to be different and designed by a $15,000 designer. There are millions and millions of websites and obviously the line is going to blur somewhere.

But having a generic site is not enough. A plug-n-play theme is not doing you, your site or your product any good at all.

If we can’t distinguish your site from another, it’s just another toothpaste, isn’t it?

Girl Scout Marketing

By Charlie on April 7th, 2008 | Filed in Good Business Practice, Marketing | 0

Peruse the Marketing section of your local bookstore and you’ll see a lot of titles and some unusual pairings. Guerrilla Marketing, Punk Marketing, Pyro Marketing…the list goes on.

These are not bad books and if they were I wouldn’t say so, at least not now, as this post is not intended to be a review. I merely hope to assuage your marketing dilemma.

The problem with the above titles and the apparent surplus of marketing styles available to us is that they confuse something that is very very simple. They also imply that perhaps there is some hidden technique for marketing that only a punk or pyromaniac knows.

Take Biff. Biff is starting a new business (a banana stand he intends to run with his cousin) and wends his way into his local Barnes & Noble. He looks at the titles and thinks to himself, “Well, jeez. I’m not a punk so I don’t think I need to learn to market like a punk. And I’m certainly not a pyro, except for that one incident back in grade school. And guerrilla? Do I have to wear camo for that? Probably…I’m out.”

Biff gets confused and takes off. He decides he’ll just figure it all out on his own. And probably he will because Biff knows deep down that marketing is simply telling people what he’s selling.

The Backbone of Marketing

Marketing is nothing more than finding a communication line from you to your consumer and putting your product on it. That’s all it is. You can call it whatever you want: punk, pyro, elephantiasis or Aunt Jemima’s Christmas Basket, but marketing breaks down to the simple actions of:

Have a product
Find someone to tell
Find a way to tell them
Tell them

That’s marketing.

Whether you do that via TV, radio, magazine ads, internet banners or street-corner evangelism, you’re finding a communication line and putting your product on it. You can do it with a loudspeaker, by dropping turkeys out of an airplane or setting shit on fire. You can do it aggressively, loudly, expensively or all for free. How you choose to market is up to you, but without a communication line and someone receiving at the other end of it, you’re not marketing.

A Simple Real-Life Example

There’s a knock on my door, and I answer it.

On the stoop is a little girl. She’s wearing a Girl Scout uniform and she’s got a little red wagon piled high with boxes of cookies.

She says to me, “Do you want to buy some cookies?”

That’s marketing.

Branding for people who aren’t toilet paper

By Charlie on March 25th, 2008 | Filed in Getting Commissions, The Lighter Side | 3

When I buy toilet paper, I don’t look for the best packaging or logo. I grab the gigantic 6,000-roll pack and call it a day. Toilet paper all ends up in the same place and performs a function that obviates the need for great design and swell packaging.

When I buy staples, I don’t check to see if there’s a mascot on the packaging or if they’re the new Version 2.0 variety. Staples are staples and individuation amongst types and brands means nothing to me.

For such items, branding isn’t really that important. We want 6 billion staples for 12 cents and we don’t care what’s on the box. We want 6,000 rolls of toilet paper for $1.99, regardless of whether or not the package features a talking antelope. As long as the packaging doesn’t have razor blades or dead babies on it, such items are a guaranteed sale.

But you’re not a toilet paper company, are you?

No, you’re not. You sell consulting, or ebooks, or blog posts, or websites, or logos. You do something that, because of your personality and skills and talents, nobody can get anywhere other than from you.

That’s why you need a brand. And that’s why you don’t have to reduce your prices down to a six-pack of toilet paper.

You’re not selling something I can get from any store.

You’re selling something I can only get from you.

Life Myths #2 - You need to swallow your pride

By Charlie on March 10th, 2008 | Filed in Happy Living, Improving Life | 0

I’m going to say anything stupid and cliche in this post like, “Your pride is all you have.”

Something I overheard today.

On accident.

While eavesdropping on a somewhat heated conversation:

“Just ask him for help already, swallow your pride.”

I didn’t hear the rest of it because I immediately ran out to make fun of these people on my blog.

I’ve heard it a few times myself in this life, “Swallow your pride.” One occasion I remember vividly.

I was in boarding school at the time, hundreds of miles away from my folks, and I’d been blamed for doing something obnoxious to/in the Dean’s office.

God knows, I deserved the finger pointing, as I was an active participant in plenty of shaving cream mishaps, stealing the stuffed moose head that hung in the cafeteria, midnight donut raids on the kitchen and even some fisticuffs to round it all out.

Now, I’d love to tell you what I did to the Dean’s office, but I have no idea. I didn’t do it. But nobody was buying that and I was being urged to apologize for my transgression.

“Swallow your pride, Charlie,” I was told, by an older person who should have know better. “Just apologize to the Dean.”

Though I didn’t know exactly why at the time, I knew something was dreadfully wrong with that advice. I’m older now (in years, at least. I still love the practical joke.) and I get why this is such terrible advice.

Don’t teach your kids this

Pride isn’t arrogance or a haughty demeanor. It’s not how much money you have or what you drive. It has nothing to do with being right or winning arguments.

Pride is the quality you put forth and exude into life. It’s the professionalism and feeling of “nothing is leaving my desk if it doesn’t meet my minimum acceptable standard.” It’s part ethics, part communication, part integrity, part desire to improve, part whole bunch of other shit I can’t think of at the moment.

So why is it that when this “swallow your pride” line sneaks into our lives, it’s in the midst of apologizing? Or admitting you’re wrong? Or asking for help?

Are we born with 100% of our pride supply, and then every time we learn something new or take a piece of advice it diminishes the total store?

“Can you help me balance my checkbook?”

“I would, but you just went over your quota of pride-reducing questions. You’re on your own.”

Come on. If you are good at what you do, or intend on becoming good, you learn from everything. Every book, magazine, online tutorial and opinion leader that you can. You keep your eyes and ears open and if there’s even a tiny remnant of sense to what you observe, you steal it and make it part of your arsenal.

It’s not an insult to get help or ask for it. It’s not a insult to your character to admit that you were wrong or to let the other guy win the conversation if he’s actually, you know, winning the conversation.

It’s not a character flaw to pay attention when some truly brilliant person is giving you advice. If you have pride you’ll listen because you want to learn, want to get better at what you do, want to make the best of what you got to give can I get a hallelujah!

Hallelujah!

If you’ve enjoyed saying “Hallelujah!” just wait ’til the next post when we’ll practice saying other words like “intestinal fortitude” and “rhinoplasty!” Subscribe now to be part of the choir!