By Sonia Simone
Ittybiz is one of my two or three favorite blogs, and one of the few I read religiously every day. She helps small businesses with their marketing, and she has an amazing ability to cut through people’s self delusion and help them figure out what they really do.
Naomi gave us five questions to answer–privately for ourselves, and publicly for our customers. So far I’ve resisted the "meme" phenomenon (IMO not the right word for it, but I can’t think of a better one, damn it), but I liked these questions a lot, and answering them did help me see some things more clearly.
If you have any kind of regular connection with customers–a blog, a Squidoo lens, a newsletter–you might consider answering these questions to get to the heart of what you do.
(If you blog these or put them on the Web in some way, let me know with a trackback or a comment and I’ll post a link so we can all swing by and get to know you better.)
What’s your game? What do you do?
I’m a shrink for businesses–both big businesses and small ones. I help them build better relationships with their customers by creating better communication.
Why do you do it? Do you love it, or do you just have one of those creepy knacks?
I love it and I have one of those creepy knacks. Somewhere along the line I got good at seeing through to what folks were really good at, and helping them put that into words.
Who are your customers? What kind of people would need or want what you offer?
Folks who hate marketing but don’t want their business to die.
What’s your marketing USP? Why should I buy from you instead of the other losers?
The kind of marketing I do doesn’t require you to choose between your soul and the success of your business. You can have both–in fact, that’s where you find the greatest successes. I can help you with that.
What’s next for you? What’s the big plan?
I’m putting together some products that will help people learn effective, ethical marketing for themselves. Straight info–no sleazy, unethical tricks and no feel-good fluff. My motivation for this has been my notable lack of success in working 48-hour days to keep up with all of the people I want to help.
Flickr Creative Commons image by ehnmark
Us.
So, what do we do? Naomi Dunford at Ittybiz throws up the idea and I love games where I am the centre of attention so here goes
What’s your game? What do you do?
Our company, Coote Libeau sells foreign language communication training in France….
I understand what you do Sonia but I have no idea what thought process kicks into gear when you choose your photos. This is the real “Mystery Simone”.
Ha, Tim! I don’t either. Sometimes I just see an image and it wants to be with a particular post.
The Flickr ones are always more oblique than the istockphoto ones, and I’ve come to like them much more. For example, I looked at some therapist/patient interview sort of images on istockphoto, but they all seemed very boring in comparison.
First off, please cease this whole “moral marketing” thing you have going on. The rest of us charlatans and scheisters do NOT need you running your mouth off about how marketing doesn’t need to be sleazy. Of COURSE it needs to be sleazy. Duh. 🙂
Second, re: photos — I used to be in charge of selecting unique photos for First Wives World, a blog for about 15 divorced or divorcing women. 10 posts a day, no photo repeats allowed. We got our photos from iStock. Do you know how many of these women were in therapy? Do you know how many of them talked about their therapy several times a week? Insanity. Those pictures were HORRENDOUS. I wish I could’ve used the pic you’ve used here.
And it’s not a meme. It’s an interview. 🙂
Naomi, we can’t all be experts at the “hookers and blow” school of marketing, leave me my poor little niche, willya?
istock is great for photos of animals & certain objects, and overall really weak for photos of people. I’ve become a major Flickr addict (thanks to Skelliewag who turned me on to the Creative Commons thing).
I really meant to do this when Naomi posted it the other day, but I’m Mr Run-Around-Like-Crazy-but-Accomplish-Nothing at the moment (was he a real character in the Mr Men? I forget.)
This inspired me though, so here’s my answers:
http://omnirms.blogspot.com/2008/04/what-do-you-do-game.html
P.S. Sorry for linking to you twice in two days, I promise I’m not a stalker!
James, no one can ever say I don’t appreciate links. If you link to me five times a day, I will always say thank you!
That picture you used for this post must have been taken as they were leaving my house after a dinner party I was hosting.:)
Thanks for the opportunity to comment on this and for stopping by to check out my blog.
I have this half baked Idea to maybe turn this blog into a book. Hey just maybe.
Sonia,
Oh, my, your photo got me hook line and sinker. What DO they do? Punk flower girls posing for new Manga comic? Love it!
I would stay tuned anyway, but on the Internet “no feel-good fluff” is such a rarity, I wish I could subscribe twice.
You can see my answers at Naomi Dunford’s “I Never Called It a Meme,” Meme: http://maximumcustomerexperience.typepad.com/mce/2008/04/naomi-dunfords.html
It sure was fun to write. The key to getting on her good side is apparently to coin a phrase in her honor, as I am now engaged to her. I’m last in a kinda long line. Hehehe.
Regards,
Kelly
@ Sonia. True. I do have a creepy knack for “hookers and blow”, don’t I? Definite tagline potential.
@ Kelly. I NEVER CALLED IT A MEME. And the phrase has to start with Itty.
@Kelly, according to the comments on Flickr, it’s “Japanese vision rock cosplay” in Yoyogi Park. I am nowhere remotely cool enough to know what that means.
I get on Naomi’s good side by being as obnoxious as I can possibly manage. For some weird reason she finds it endearing. Unusual combinations of curse words are also very good.
Well, I might be the first to answer these questions that actually PRODUCES something, so it’s a little different!
http://blondechicken.blogspot.com/2008/04/fiber-friday-behind-fiber.html
I love it! I am a major yarn ‘ho. You’ve got awesome stuff, love the handspun. (My mom is a spinner, I have some very tasty skeins from her that I’m pondering the perfect project for.)
Yarn ho.