Yesterday marked the 10th anniversary of the Cluetrain Manifesto. Our faithful leader Keith McArthur organized a project and had different people blog about each of the 95 theses. There are still a few spots open,… so sign up, write up and post up something today. I’m going to write about:
If you want us to talk to you, tell us something. Make it something interesting for a change!
Having read the book so many years ago, I thought it would be a good idea to revisit some chapters before writing this. My topic really comes down to standing out from the crowd. The problem we are having today is that to many companies are taking a me 2 approach to everything they do. If they see one company do something successful then they go, “we’ve to have that as well.”. This is regardless of if the idea even makes sense for the initiative. Doing what everyone else does won’t make you sound very interesting.
However, developing a great plan can. After reading a few posts including David Fleet’s People recognize each other as such from the sound of this voice I started to see how my topic fit into the world. David talked about how we need to…
Listen. Engage. Develop.
Its the develop stage that is so important when it comes to telling the world something interesting. In order to make you stand out from the crowd and even remotely sound interesting, you need to do three things and do them really well:
- Take A Position: To many companies and people don’t take a stand and stand up for what they believe in. If you don’t have a position on your industry then you need to take one. Part of saying something interesting is doing the opposite of what everyone else is doing. If you sound like the majority of your industry, then how can you stand out and sound interesting?
- Make Sense: If you keep on using industry jargon and don’t sound like a real person, then please stop. There is no way you are making sense to the people you want to communicate with. If you don’t make any sense then how are they going to know you’ve something interesting to say?
- Be Yourself: Bring a bit of that person you are at home is key to being interesting. People are going to connect with you more if they can relate to you.
That’s it really. If you want to say something interesting then you need to stand out from the crowd, make sense when talking with others and be yourself at the end of the day. If you can achive these three things then you are well on your way to making it in this world.
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