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Lessons - How to Create Work That Matters in a World Full of Noise | Seth Godin - Marketing Legend · Success Story with Scott Clary

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  In this lessons episode, discover how to break out of the mold with an elegant strategy built
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  on the principles of time, games, empathy, and systems. Learn why focusing on these core components
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  helps simplify complex challenges and drives breakthrough innovation. Understand how aligning
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  your strategy with genuine customer needs transforms potential into lasting success.
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  When somebody wants to break out of the mold, you talk about threads of strategy. You talk about
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  the four components. Talk about time, games, empathy, and systems. Can you explain a little
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  bit about somebody's listening to this or the yes, I do feel like this resonates with me a lot,
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  but I don't have a playbook for it because that's what they're looking for. I don't have a
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  playbook for it. So what's the advice to that person? All right, so let's break these into pieces.
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  Let's start with time because it's invisible and so important. You have one of the most important
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  podcasts in the world. When you launched your podcast in week one, how many listeners did you have?
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  My mom. Yeah, anyone who's telling the truth doesn't pick a number over 10, right?
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  So how did this happen? Day by day, trip by trip. You bet on time. You said, if I keep
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  planting this seed and then that seed and I water them and fertilize them and keep doing it,
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  then I will get to where I'm going. Time must be seen in order to have a strategy.
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  How do you expect time to unfold? We all get tomorrow over. One time, what are you going to do with
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  it? That's number one. Number two, our games. Games are any activity where there's an outcome,
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  rules, players. And if you call it a game, you get to use game theory and you don't have to take
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  yourself so seriously. All right, so before we roll tape, you and I were talking about making a
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  Halloween themed episode where we both turn off the lights and do it in a spooky way. And
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  it's easy to talk about that because even if we did it, the risk would be an hour of our time.
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  So that's a move. If it doesn't work, it's not because we're bad people because we made a move
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  that didn't work. So when we approach marketplaces, we have to have a game theory in mind. If I do
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  this, then what will happen? If I do this, then what will happen? Game. Third one is empathy.
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  Empathy, I'm not talking about this kindness, talking about realizing you don't have power.
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  Other people have power. They get to say yes. They get to pick you. They get to buy from you.
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  So the only way that's going to happen is if you offer them something they want.
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  You're not them, but you have to think like you are or else they'll say no.
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  And two often entrepreneurs who have worked super hard, maybe they're in over their head or they
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  have debt. Say, well, this one's important. Do it because I said so. And that never works.
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  And the fourth one is systems and systems are all around us and they're invisible and they're
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  incredibly powerful. So my favorite example is the wedding industrial complex, which is the system.
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  What's the right amount of money to spend on a wedding? And the answer is exactly as much as your
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  best friend plus a dollar. And that's why weddings cost $100,000 now because the system only turns
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  in one direction. And systems are based on networks. They're based on culture. Systems like to
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  defend themselves. So they build culture to defend themselves. And at their heart, they have
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  status and affiliation. Keeping them going. So if you don't see the system, you can't dance with it.
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  You can't work with it and you definitely can't change it. This may be an overly simplistic
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  question and tell me if it is. But do you feel like there could be one or two of these that
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  should be a primary focus when somebody's building something new or should they focus on all four
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  simultaneously? I think it depends on what you're building. So if if you're a parent, time is the
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  dominant one. Because that kid's going to be different tomorrow. If you're building an elementary
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  school time kicks in in so many different directions, you're going to have the kids for years.
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  The building's going to last for years. You're not building a school for today. It's not a festival.
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  It's a school. On the other hand, in the tech world, systems are dominant. You've got the system
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  of Moore's Law, which says just that, just that that bandwidth is going to get cheaper.
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  Connections are going to get faster. Chips are going to get cheaper. So 10 years ago when people
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  started working on LLM's and AI, the world couldn't support it, but you could make a bet on the system
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  shifting. As a creative entrepreneur, for me, games are often high on the list because I like seeing
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  how the pieces fit together. So when I invented email marketing all those years ago,
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  I did it because I saw a game that could be played. And sorry, and then empathy is throughout
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  office because sooner or later, somebody else has got to deal with you. There are some billionaires
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  out there in the world who have no empathy and we're watching them self-destruct before her eyes
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  because they have such a big ego and so much money they don't care, but it's brittle. It doesn't
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  stick around. I'm actually really happy you said that because somebody would look at a billionaire
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  that's self-destructing and they would say, well, they achieve success. They encapsulated some sort
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  of strategy. So how can you tell me that you need empathy because look at what they've done.
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  But then this actually brings us to something you said, right when we kicked it off, and I think this
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  is what we're trying to build an elegant strategy, not just a strategy, but an elegant strategy.
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  And you don't use words just by chance. So what does elegant strategy mean? And talking to that
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  person that feels like one of those four components isn't necessary. Yeah, so an elegant strategy
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  is the most efficient, easiest in the long run way forward. It's one where the systems are dancing
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  with you and you are dancing with the systems. So here's the story. I just learned it's fantastic.
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  Potatoes were discovered in Peru. Potatoes, well, they were discovered by people in Europe
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  in Peru. And potatoes are one of the most extraordinarily efficient ways to feed a human being.
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  And they came to Europe in the 15, 8,500s, early 1600s, and they had a big problem, which is
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  they were low status. They came from far away from people who were seen as less sophisticated
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  than the colonialists. And they were almost banned in England and they were banned in France.
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  And the reason they were banned in France is there was a theory that foods looked like the part of
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  the body that they supported. So walnuts you should eat for brain help because they look like
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  little breath. And no one had ever seen a potato before. And they looked at the potato and they
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  said, potatoes, potatoes look like the fingers of someone with leprosy. So you should need a potato
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  or you'll get leprosy. And so there were no potatoes in France. And this entrepreneur who wanted
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  to bring potatoes to his country saw he had a problem. Now we can think of a thousand in
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  elegant ways to solve this problem. What he realized was the potato's only problem was it was
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  seen as low status. And high status people, particularly in those days, set the agenda.
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  And that doesn't have to mean money, but in France in 1600 it did. Okay, so first thing he did
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  is he got access to Marie Antoinette and he gave her a bunch of flowers from the potato plant
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  as she wore them in her hair. And that created a little bit of a sensation. But the second thing
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  he did that was so cool, a few miles away from Versailles, he got a farm, a plot of land, and he
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  planted potatoes. And then he put armed guards all around the plot of land. And all day long,
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  the guards were guarding the potatoes. And then at night, they went home and there was no night shift.
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  So local people seeing this valuable thing snuck in and stole the potatoes. And the next thing you
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  know, lots of people are eating potatoes. That's an elegant strategy. It didn't require super
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  ballad. It simply required understanding where in the culture was their spots that you could
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  create tension and change people's mind. Do you find that more often than not again with all
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  the entrepreneurs that you study and you speak with? We have a tendency for whatever reason.
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  I'm sure you figured it out that we have all these unelegant strategies, these over complicated
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  strategies. Oh yeah, there's a bunch of reasons. The first one is defensive, which is if we tell
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  so in the simple truth, they could reject us. And then we got nothing. If we say, well, it's
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  really complicated. There we always have room to update our story for them. And the second
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  reason is nobody knows what we're doing better than us. And so because we have lack empathy,
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  we're just insisting they know what we know. And then they'll get the job. But they're never
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  going to know what we know. So we have to figure out how to get to where they are instead of
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  demanding that they come to where we are. When you look at, so you speak a lot about human
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  desire and understanding humans and understanding what they want and what they need. So now we figured
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  out the sort of like the four tenons of what good strategy is. How does this play into
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  I guess the human desire component, the empathy component so that our strategy actually resonates
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  because we figured out the pieces that we have to understand. But the second part of a strategy
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  is always the customer, the human, the consumer. The best thing you can hear from a customer is,
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  oh, I was right all along. So Google didn't persuade people to search the internet. They just said,
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  this is just like Yahoo, but way simpler and faster. So all the people who were waiting for something
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  that was simpler and faster said, oh, great, I was right all along. I don't have to change my mind.
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  If you're wasting time arguing with the non-believers, you've picked the wrong people, right? So
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  there are people who are going to read the newspaper in print until the day they die. Stop trying
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  to persuade them. They should switch. There are other people who have said forever, oh, now I can
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  read this on the subway. I wish I'd had now I have this. Find the people who already want the
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  output of what you make, but didn't know that what you make would help them get that up.
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  You know, when you say it, it makes so much sense. And this has been something that's been part of
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  even the podcast marketing strategy, but it's so it's so smart. It's so it makes so much sense.
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  When I advertise this podcast or do a cross promotion, I am more inclined to advertise on
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  another podcast and on a newsletter because I don't need to convince people to like podcasts and
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  then tell it like mine or love podcasts and love mine. I just need people who already love podcasts
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  to be aware that I exist. And that's it. It's so simple. Yeah. So you know, if we think about
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  shows that were the most popular TV shows in the glory days of the 60s and the 70s,
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  they tended to be the second or third favorite show of a lot of people.
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  Not the favorite show of a few people because what you're saying is for people who are going to
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  watch something on television Thursday night, here it is. And when we're in a long tail world and
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  you don't need 70 million viewers, that gets even easier, right? And so sure, a brand like Patagonia
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  has died in the world, true believers, but there's also they've grown because they've gotten the
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  shoulder of that market. People were like, oh yeah, it would make my life a little bit better if I
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  could add some Patagonia to my quiver. But they're not trying to persuade anybody who's looking for a
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  $9 fleece on Amazon to turn around and buy a $200 Patagonia check. Thanks for tuning in. If you found
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  this valuable, don't forget to hit that subscribe button so you never miss an episode. And if you
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  want to dive deeper into this conversation, check out the links in the description to watch the
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  full episode. See you in the next one.