This is going to be an interesting update for me because I am genuinely looking forward to the responses I receive from this post. Some of them will be positive of course, but far more than the positive responses, I am most looking forward to the negative reactions.
Anyway, here's the story.
I have a long commute to work, and if you're like me and most people, you're going to tune out mass media. That means tuning out anything on the radio (I spend maybe fifteen to twenty minutes TOPS getting acquainted with current events, and most of it I get from a select few websites or from Flipboard.
Speaking of which, out of curiosity, where do the majority of you consume content? I would imagine that most people on Wattpad would be pretty tech savvy. After all, it does take a certain level of sophistication to be able to read books from a mobile device.
Anyway, I digress.
The whole point of this post was that I was particularly inspired by a presentation Seth Godin made at Inbound 2013. I found it on Youtube yesterday, and I've been listening to it non-stop. I'm on my fourth listen and I'm still finding stuff to learn from. Nevertheless, his speech is incredibly inspirational, and I still have goosebumps listening to it.
This chapter is completely and totally inspired by Seth Godin's work. I take ZERO credit for this. This is all Seth Godin.
For those of you interested, I have included the full presentation in the media section of this chapter.
Seth Godin is a marketer's marketer. Not only is he amazingly prescient about how things work in the digital age, but he presents his findings in such a compelling manner that you can't help but agree with him. Rather than tell everyone, "This is how you should be doing it", he tells you the why's. He helps you reach the same conclusion he has.
On your own.
Anyway, one of the things I agree with Seth on, and I've actually gone on record as saying this, is that the middleman/gatekeeper has been removed. In other words, in the past if you wanted someone to read your book, or listen to your song, or see you dance, you had to spend years, honing your craft, polishing it to a razor-sharp sheen, and understanding how the industry worked. The process was long, arduous and there was little guarantee of success, even after you had met all the criteria and achieved mass distribution.
Understand this ladies and gentlemen: what we have today, our parents could only dream of having. If our parents wanted to write a book, not only did they have to write it, but they had to find someone who believed enough in their book to want to show it to other people. In other words, a publisher.
Us? We just go right out and DO IT.
And this is where I am going to put my flame retardant suit on, because this post, is bound to get some hate.
What are you talking about Mike?
Just this. For the longest time, we have all been conditioned to think that the way to success was to get a good college education, work hard, rise up the ranks, do well, and then save up for retirement.
It's a good formula right? Sure. But what about in the 12th century? Or the 16th century? Do you think the people during that age were thinking, "God, if only I graduated from college and got good grades, things might be a little different?"
No. I can assure you that could not have been further from the truth.
Matter of fact. What did people do during those times? That's simple.
Everyone had a product.
The farmer had his produce, the blacksmith had his steel, and the artisan had his art, the winemaker his wine. In other words, NO ONE had a JOB.
Does anyone want to guess what the unemployment rate was back then? That's right, ZERO. Everyone had a skill or a talent.
Fast forward to the current.age.
We have the INTERNET. And the internet changes everything.
And finally, after that long winded introduction, I finally come to my point.
We have this wondeful, AMAZING platform called Wattpad. And we STILL have people saying, damn, why the heck did that stupid girl have seventy five million reads, when I can write much better than she can?
Why am I not succesful?
Those stupid teenagers wouldn't know genius if it bit them in the face!
And here's my answer to you:
What the hell is wrong with you???
Seriously. Are you truly so blind that you cannot see what's going on here?
The reason you're not succeeding is two-fold.
1) You've failed to make the connections
2) You've failed to have a good product
Now, #1 is the theme of this ENTIRE book, so if you take anything from this at all, it's the importance and value of connections.
In the words of Seth Godin, if you still think that in this day and age, that the best way to get the word out about your product is to interrupt someone's attention and put forth "The Little Green Giant" and have them talk about how wonderful your product is, let's all take a moment of silence, and MOURN THAT.
If you're an old school marketer who still thinks he can buy attention by paying for placements on CBS and NBC and that the "captive" audience is gonna buy the product because of that, I've got news for you.
We aren't on NBC or CBS or whatever channel you want us to be. Growing up, we may have five or six channels that commanded everyone's attention, but that's just not the case anymore. You think "share of voice" means anything in this day and age? Have you been to Youtube recently? What about Wattpad?
How many hours of your time do you spend in front of a TV versus the amount of time you spend on your cellphone? That's right. I thought so.
Okay. Let's take inventory for second.
So far, we have learned that:
1) We are in the middle of a "revolution". For our parents, grandparents, and great grandparents, that revolution was the Industrial Revolution.
2) The industrial revolution has taught us all "time-tested" values that are now counter-productive in the current environment. Values such as, "fitting in" or "being normal", or "studying hard". Why do we do all these things? Because the reward, at the end of the day is a "steady", "well-paying", "job".
Now, there is NOTHING wrong with having a steady, well-paying job. I myself have one. But the point I wanted to make here is that this does not have to define how we behave or how we act.
The New Model
But maybe, once you've spent a few years in corporate america, perhaps when you've risen up the ranks and finally get to a level where you realize, it's not how smart you are or how hard you work. Eventually, you're going to get to a point where, wow, the only way I'll move up is because my boss likes me. Not because of my contributions. Not because of how hard I work.
Is there a better way? Perhaps.
Okay, now I finally come to point I wanted to make.
Do you have a good product?
My definition of a good product is having something that someone else wants, so much that they are willing to pay us, or spend their time with us in order to obtain it.
Seth Godin's definition is a lot simpler: "A good product is the thing that I want it to be, when I need it."
What constitutes a good product on Wattpad? A well-written novel? A polished, well-crafted historical journey through the ages? The answer might surprise you.
The Power of Audience
Some of you might know who @BlueNinetails is. I didn't really come to know her until she connected with me when I still somewhat new on Wattpad. For those of you not in the know, @BlueNinetails is Wattpad's reigning Queen of Anime Fan-fiction. More specifically, she is the undisputed Queen of Naruto fan-fiction. And she has an ABSOLUTE LOCK on the genre. I mean, it's really stupid to even try to take that away from her on Wattpad. If I tried for a million years, I would FAIL. MISERABLY. When the Watty awards came around, the voting process was a COMPLETE JOKE. Everyone knew she was going to win!
Would you try to beat Ozzy Osbourne or the Beatles at their own game? OF COURSE NOT.
This is an extremely important thing to realize!
Are you good at something in particular? Is it writing well?" is it writing a good story? Is it writing a story about werewolves and vampires? Whatever it is that you are good at, you'd best focus on the part of it that differentiates you from the rest.
Are you copying Twilight? "After"? In that case, you have placed yourself at the forefront of a LOSING BATTLE.
So what is key to success then?
Be the number one, UNDISPUTED, BEST-EVER EXPERT at SOMETHING.
Yep. That's it. It's as easy as that.
What is the one thing you are better than anyone at? Is it Anime fan-fiction? 1D fan-ficition? Is it writing stories about werewolves? Dig deep within yourself and do a little evaluation. Seth Godin talks about a little village in China called Dafen where the primary source of livelihood is to make copies of famous paintings.
How much does the real Mona Lisa cost? It's priceless right?
What about a copy of the Mona Lisa then? $29? $10? $5?. My point is that the value of a copy is far less than a copy of the original.
So the question we have to ask ourselves, ladies and gentlemen is, are we making copies of other people's works? Or are we blazing the trail and making our own path?
I am not saying we all have to be original. Fan-fictions, by definition are not original. But at the end of the day, we still have to have something that sets us apart from everyone else.
What is that one thing that's sets you apart from everyone else? If you don't know what it is, chances are, you aren't doing very well right now. Now matter what you've learned from me.
So START HERE. Find your value proposition. Find the ONE THING that you do better than anyone else. AND GET GOOD AT THAT. :)
Thanks for reading this humble post. :)