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I saw a guy at a stoplight trying to click his shoes into his bike pedal. I share this story from the limited perspective of me driving by quickly, not knowing the guy, not knowing what his story is. So, this is kind of fan fiction based on a little bit of movement I saw.

Dude does not look like an avid cyclist, but he looked prepared. He had the…

• bike shorts,
• the bike shirt,
• the water bottle,
• the headlight in case he decided to go out at night,
• the fantastic road bike,
• the clip on shoes,
• the bike bag

The story I told myself is this is his second time out with this new plan for fitness – bicycle riding. He bought all the everything. This story that I made up struck me.

This is the trap I get myself into sometimes. I get ready. I get really ready before I start. I don’t even know if I like riding a bike. I spend my time going to several metaphorical bike stores. Comparing equipment online. Talking to experts. Subscribe to cycling monthly and, there I am trying to click my shoe into my pedal.

I hope you know what I mean. I try to think my way through and be completely prepared before I get started so that whoever is watching doesn’t think I was foolhardy. It’s craziness and insecurity and a lot of time wasted.

A story that’s true and is not in my imagination is I’m trying to get people to hire me to make websites because I can make the best entertainer websites they can get. My sites help people get good gigs, so every great entertainer that doesn’t hire me is at a disadvantage. I am doing people a disservice by not letting them know what I have available. Shy is selfish. My brain cleverly turns my shyness into “preparedness” So, instead of just telling someone what’s up, I think about how I need a better portfolio, or a sales plan or gotta buy a CRM or something. It’s really not cool.

Chris Ruggiero, in his book “Just Go” says to “Just Go” — get started before you’re ready. If I get started talking to performers now, I can see patterns, I can get better at communicating, I can learn if other’s see my websites are as good as I believe they are.

I encourage the reader and myself to just go!

• “Please tell your friends about my show”
• “Share this link”
• “Let’s get the word out about my album”

These phrases almost don’t need to be uttered when we have a strong brand. If we don’t have a strong brand, they’re even more useless.

What we do is not for everyone. So many people tell me what they do is for everyone, or that they need everyone to know about what they do. This is wrong.

Having a weak brand and getting a new purchaser of a ticket to my show for example sucks. They come to the show, most likely, it’s not for them. They’re not happy. I’m not happy. It’s not going to lead to them buying merch, becoming a fan or an evangelist and I have to go find a new ticket buyer again. It’s expensive and unfun at the same time! We’re throwing a seed at a rock. It’s not going to grow.

Instead we want to know who we are, what we do, what the result of the experience of our service is. We want to know who our fans are gonna be and what their other options are. Then we get the right seeds in the right soil with the right moisture and PH balance and our stuff blossoms and grows!

The brand is how we make consistent impact and how we get really valuable people in our sphere. Not every ticket buyer or fan or whatever has the same value to us. Getting the right booker to know about us when we know who we are means big cash!

I discern entertainment as a craft instead of an art because it has a goal. If we forget that it has a goal, or we ignore the responsibility to the audience we don’t do what we’re supposed to. We’re supposed to entertain. We sign up for it and we come through as heros with as much consistency as possible. That means refining the product, but also being as agile as we need to be to adjust to incoming situations.

Performance is an art. It’s okay to be a performer who does it for ourselves or to express the inexpressible, but entertainment is not about being subjective. It’s about capturing the audience and giving them a rewarding experience.

We probably all have more than one thing to offer as entertainment pros. We can offer a small show or a big show; a dirty show or a clean show; a short one or a long one. We have 8 different costume styles.

The multitude is a negative

I am kinda grossed out when a restaurant has too many menu items. There’s no way they’re putting care into each one. It’s either a freezer to fryer situation or they’re doing some majorly careless cooking back there. It’s very likely that when they have a short menu, that each thing is good and they put TLC in it — my fave ingredient.

A performer who does a million things probably doesn’t have a thing they do that really kills.

Specializing

Picking a specialty and going with it, repeating it, owning it, learning everything about it — that’s good. That’s helpful and gives us an edge if there’s enough work in that specialty.

Collectizing

One way to counter the “Jack-of-all-trades, master of none” syndrome is to harness the power of all the jackiness into one core value.

• “7 different circus skills to keep up the excitement“
• “we speak 5 different languages, so we can communicate with your audience every time“
• “I’ve performed in every kind of venue, and I know how to always connect with a crowd“
• “We create stunning looks : perfect for any environment”

What’s the thing that makes your multitude a powerful singletude?

I might go to a repairman who can repair anything if I have something very rare that I can’t find a specialist for. I might go to a store that has everything so I don’t have to find the right store. I might go to someone who does a lot of things for advice because they can connect dots that I specialist might not see.

When we’re doing marketing of any kind, we’re speaking to one person at a time. Each of our fans or clients or whatever can only experience the world as a single person. So, we can remember to talk to them as individuals instead of a crowd. Even people in a crowd are having their own individual experiences.

Eg: Email blast “I want to tell you” is better than “I want to tell everybody”

When thinking about how to sell tickets to a show, I think about how to sell one or a few to each person who already wants one. What do they each need to complete the purchase?

I posted this question on Facebook and didn’t get an adequate answer, so I’m making up a word. Here’s the facebook post…

I am an expert at making things complicated. I love complicated stories and people because they’re a great escape that my brain continuously puzzles over. When I’m working on a project that I actually want to finish, my puzzly brain works against me in creating endless tangents and murkiness in the goal.

I can get really into the idea of having a cafe or something – thinking that would be a really simple business to run. Just make sure i have the best products for the best price and make sure everyone knows about it. The problem is that my mudwashing brain will act up every time I encounter failure or perceived failure, so you can be guaranteed by cafe would have a bunch of performances, a postoffice box service, and a local radio show in no time.

Failure is evidence

Sticking to a goal and being connected with reality is how to achieve the goal. Simplifying it to … “I am trying to do this… These things are working… These things are not working…” is the ultimate way to move efficiently and mentally stay clear and fulfilled. The whole thing is a bunch of experiments and failure and success are common occurances along the path, not endpoints. The real end for a project is not failure, it’s the decision to end the project.

Mudwashing looks smart

Let’s say I’m trying to sell more tickets to a show. It might be that I focus on no other growth for the show for a month. All I do is count how many tickets I sold before, how many i want to sell, and try different things to sell more. I can make this goal muddier by saying “a new customer is worth more than an old customer. So, I’ll count how many new customers I get too.” then I say… “If I can get group sales, the experience might be better.” This stuff might be true, but constantly thinking and figuring and clevering this stuff does not end. Then, I’m spending all my jellybeans being a wizard and not selling tickets. Then, I probably won’t have a clear end goal, so I can’t really fail.

Fear of public scrutiny (what most people call fear of failure) is the motivation

When our goal is muddy, we’re off the hook. We can’t miss that goal because it doesn’t really exist. We can’t be blamed. We can’t be criticized. This is good sometimes. It sucks to be on the hook for everything.

The things that are important to us — the really big things — we want to be on the hook.

Reversing that social pressure

Social pressure is a strong force and we can’t just ignore it, but we can turn it to the other side. Instead of feeling the social pressure to not have a clear goal, we can feel the social pressure to stick to the goal. This is called accountability — another word I made up. We can get some people that we cannot escape that know our goal and what we’re exploring to accomplish it. Then, the pressure’s on to stay on track instead of obliterate the track.

In May 2021, I produced a fundraising event for the Francophone School of Oakland. We successfully raised them cash in their first ever Zoom auction and online day.

They originally were thinking of having an online gala to match their previous in-person galas, but I came back with the idea of an entertaining Portal Day so families could celebrate together and be reminded of why they love the school.

I created teasers for them, made fliers, helped with email communication, built an event website, ran ticketing, produced the zoom show and even made appearances at their online school assemblies to tempt the students!

Here are a couple videos from it!

Here are some examples of consumer website platforms

• WordPress
• Wix
• Squarespace
• Weebly
• Google Sites
• Godaddy Website Builder

I know there are many professional sites built on these platforms, but I don’t believe they’re the best solution for most uses.

Strategy First

The most common problem with these sites built on WordPress or whatever is that the strategy is low priority.

Imagine you have a closet with lots of little shelves and nooks in it. You just moved in to this place, so you start trying to find items that fit these shelves. I guess the dustpan can go above the cereal, even though I don’t want dust falling on the food. I guess I need to buy a new vacuum because my current one doesn’t fit quite right. My one toaster fits so well here, but there are three identical spots. Maybe I gotta buy two more toasters.

The shelves are supposed to support your stuff. You’re not supposed to serve the shelves.

When we’re using website templates, we get tempted to have more pages because their available or pushing the crucial content to a backburner because the template dictates it. There are buttons for all my social networks, but what if my instagram has 20 followers and makes me look terrible? Obey wordpress and add that button.

Responsiveness

Most templates for the consumer platforms are mobile responsive – they work on phones and computers, but the response is not necessarily great. A hand-coded website can adjust intentionally and predictably on multiple devices. When I build a site, i’m particular about getting each one to look right. WordPress doesn’t care. Things will be cropped weird and certain things might be invisible.

Cobwebs

I wrote a little about how people make dead sites and this is an issue. People get really into the updateability of these platforms and their site is dependent on constant updates. Problem with that: we might not want to always be updating.

Inspiration

We get inspired to change something on our site and these platforms make it easy. Easy is great, right? Well, maybe it’s not that easy after all. If we start with a strategy that took a lot of thinking and we build a great site that conveys our message to our people, the web building platform can’t redo all that work for us. Our brains and our time and our advisors have to do that redoing. Doing quick updates can break the tons of work that we put into the original. Starting with a new brand and strategy and message is probably not going to be something we have bandwidth to do.

The Effort

This stuff can all be corrected with more effort. These are not dead end problems with the platforms. They can be fixed with more work and creative problem solving. It’s just not really that cool.

You want a car that is huge for cruising around smoothly and a car you can take on quick trips and park easily. You get two cars, or you get a car that’s a compromise. You don’t get a custom built car that can be size-adjusted at a whim. That car’s gonna be expensive, you’re gonna have grease under your nails everywhere you go, and it would probably not even work very well in the first place.

If people like us and talk about us we can use those positive blurbs as kudos. We wanna change our subjective statements objective ones.

Saying “I’m a great yo-yo performer” is subjective, but saying “Jojo Siwa said ‘She’s a great yo-yo performer’” is objective.

Kudos from experts are best, kudos from clones of our prospective buyers are second best, kudos from strangers on the internet is third best.

Experts include…

• People with a good credit in the wheelhouse of the comment eg “Nearly impossible” Jeff Tuck – Harvard Astrophysicist
• Famous people usually
• Press

The purpose of kudos is to prove value. So, if my value is that I provide the ultimate cocktail experience with friends… a better quote

“My gimlet shot out my nose” – Jane Doe

…is better than…

“The kids loved it!” – Tom Cruise

We only need kudos when we need them to fill a gap. It saves a lot of energy if we’re not chasing down every testimonial from every client. If i have 10 perfect kudos, I definitely don’t need one more.

☝️ we had four points we wanted to make. He had two of these quotes. He requested the two others.

☝️ he had worked on a project with David Copperfield

Getting Kudos – how to ask a person 😀

I’m blogging because I have to. Seth Godin told me to do something regularly as a practice, so I’m doing what he said. He’s right. Taking the magic out of the creative work is really how to make more creative work. Being consistent is good for my sanity, and has really pushed me to make something up that I would have maybe never done. I took a break for a little while, but I’m back baby ( famous last blog post phrase )

It seems like some non-profit membership organizations are trying to avoid money. They spend a lot of time trying to wrangle volunteers and continuously lower or maintain membership fees in the face of inflation. What if the non-profit’s goal was not to avoid money, but to do something great for society? I’m being weird — of course it’s trying to do something great for society. Getting more members, getting more money, and being able to hire qualified pros seem like things that would help.

Much of the erroneous thinking in these groups comes from the kindheartedness that attracts leaders to participate in the non-profits. The moves may be associated with being gentle and thoughtful, but really they’re not being kind and sweet to the mission.

It’s like when men wonder why they don’t get girls and they call themselves a “nice guy.” I’ll call it nice guy syndrome (NGS). Dude, you’re not rejected because you’re a nice guy. You’re rejected because you’re not attractive.

• Solidness is attractive.
• Power is attractive.
• Personality is attractive.
• Honesty is attractive.
• Generosity is attractive.
• Benevolence is attractive.

The flitch comes down to *Something*

The org has to be SOMETHING. It has to be substantial. It needs a brand, a personality, a direction, and a momentum.

Price

If price of membership is $20 / year, that’s not really a group I need to be a part of. It barely exists. Sure I might throw them two tens, but what about next year? I don’t care and I don’t know why they’d care if I’m a member for 20 bucks. NGS says lower the price and more people can join.

Lowering the price isn’t a technique for getting more members. It’s a technique for getting fewer.

Exclusion

We think when we’re losing membership it’s because we’re excluding people. No, those people are excluding the org. If I have a chess club, I need to exclude people who don’t like chess. If I want members, I need to exclude people that don’t LOVE chess too. Otherwise, what are the chess lovers joining? Nothing. Gotta be something. Gotta stand for things. Gotta stand against things. NGS opens the doors to everyone so that maybe we can inspire someone to eventually love chess.

Benefits

The members pay for things all the time like food and cars. Those things have value to them. We don’t want to lower prices, we want to increase value. Using the network effect, hive minds, herd action, systemizing, and pooling resources (like money) orgs can provide more services year after year to members. If the services have value that members can’t find anywhere else, they will stick around and participate. NGS keeps us feeling good about what we’re already doing and wonder why people don’t like us.

Benevolence

Related to exclusion, members want to have a badge to wear of goodness. Not just outwardly to get status, but to feel good about what they’re doing in the world. Members want to know they’re joining a group that’s doing something good. We have have to do good things and tell the members about it. NGS makes us assume that we’re doing good just by volunteering or working too hard or whatever and we assume everyone knows it.

Back Patting

Strong growing organizations remind their members over and over again what the name of the organization is and the good things they’re doing for the members and the world. Over and over. Say our name. Say it again. Think of AA, each member says they’re an alcoholic at least once per meeting. They need extreme buy-in if their erratic, undisciplined members are going to tear apart their entire way of life in order to get recovery. NGS thinks that humbleness is purity, but when an organization enforces or models humbleness, it’s really forcing its members to diminish themselves.

Barrier to Entry

If someone needs to climb over a wall to get in, they have to climb over a wall to get out. NGS rolls out a million red carpets and opens up all the doors and nobody really wants to come in because they can see what’s inside — nothing… or should I say not SOMETHING.

I will not divulge the secret identity of the man behind Billy The Mime, but this dude is good! You might have seen Billy in his successful Hollywood shows or at Edinburgh Fringe or opening for Penn & Teller or in the movie The Aristocrats. He’s hilarious, awesome, and precise.

Recently, he got a new workspace that has as much room as a stage, but he didn’t need it to gain the success he has. I visited his home and he showed me where he created his performances. His home isn’t tiny, but the space he worked was about 7′ by 3′. He didn’t get a perfect setup before starting. He didn’t even get a perfect setup before continuing. He worked for years (maybe a decade) on this little rectangle between a couch and a piano and he took those creations to tens of thousands of people.

No matter how much we refine our process, environment, tools, mission, etc. the creation process will still be very imperfect and messy and limiting in some way.