It is a great Saturday morning. My girls are in the kitchen drawing and my lovely wife is making breakfast (I am indeed a lucky guy, 27 years later). Of course, I am making a few postings on
Twitter and just answered a LinkedIn request from my friend
Lataya Ballard. Getting ready to read a chapter from "
Become a Better You" by
Joel Olsteen. My wife and I are excited about reading this book together.
What is "threading the needle"? "Threading the needle" to me is doing the seemingly impossible. Business ownership and creating successful Marketing campaigns is like "threading the needle". The odds are always against you, your campaign, or strategic plan. One has to be very fluid in today's business climate.
What is your biggest challenge? What dream can you envision for your company and what will it take to make that happen? I am a dreamer. I love dreaming big dreams and acting on them. The thrill of the chase of making a big call, floating a big idea, and leveraging opportunities inspires me. As a Marketer, our goals are to sway public opinion, change patterns of behavior, and impact the world. How one does that is by "threading the needle".
It may take years to "thread the needle". Do you have the temperment for that? We have to look for patterns and connections that could help us to create something truly remarkable. A phone call leads to an e-mail, that gets the attention of someone totally unrelated to the objective at hand - remember to avoid small minds. Two years later it all circles back and now you know why and how to make the "needle thread". Shazaam!
A quick example. My wild motorcyle riding sister "
Jodie" visited our family last year and convinced us to attend the
International Motorcycle Exhibition show here in Houston. I reluctantly agreed (I was busy). I figured I could work and be with family at the same time and my family needed to get out, so we ventured.
I took my video camera with me and was able to get in as part of the media because of my involvement with a local business radio show (the psychology of presentation is critical, by having a press badge (if you blog you are part of the press these days), people are more willing to talk to you openly - try it sometime). Of course, I had no "press" reservations so I had to do some fast talking, but the lady who ran the event was young and hip and she let me in (she was fluid) and introduced me around (how cool is that).
My girls went and looked at the
cool bikes (a few pics here). I was in the hunt, looking for opportunities (they are everywhere, you have to be looking for them) and would circle back with my girls and update them on all of the cool interviews I was capturing. Well, I had a chance to meet motorcycle racer builder
Denis Manning (see his intervew) who recently broke the world's record at 350 MPH (and many others).
After meeting Denis, I continued to mull on a few ideas a year later and called up his daughter-in-law to discuss a few ideas (it is important to be great on the phone, expect to communicate well). She asked me to put those thoughts in an e-mail. Well, I waited a few months (sometimes you have to let some projects stew) and fired off one hell of an e-mail (it is important to think through your e-mails, make it short, compelling and exciting). Well, I got a call from Denis yesterday and he was very happy about his plans to break the record again next year and confided in a few interesting details about his strategy to break the new record.
This discussion opened up the other possibilities for a few other non-related projects in film, racing, and advertising that we are working on (it is amazing how one project helps another). The "long-thread" of the needle will enable more opportunities to be sewn up. So keep "threading the needle".
Warning: I am convinced that far too many people are "too focused" (narrow minded) and miss opportunities. If this is you, learn to be like water and flow. "Be water my friend" - Bruce Lee
To contact Marketing Dynamics visit: www.TeamMarketingDynamics.com or call 281.463.4560.
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