Podcasts about monday morning memo

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”“Life… Liberty… and the pursuit of Happiness.”We published those words 229 years ago when we declared our independence from Britain. That document was the earliest expression of what has come to be known as the American dream.Jefferson's Declaration did not free us from the tyranny of Britain. It merely communicated our collective desire to be unfettered and unrestrained.Do we now feel unfettered and unrestrained? I think not.It seems to me that our current view of the American dream sees raw ambition as “the pursuit of happiness.”Ambition is like sexual hunger. It is satisfied with accomplishment only for a moment, and then the hunger returns. Ambition will lead you to momentary satisfaction, but it will not lead you to happiness.John D. Rockefeller, the world's first billionaire, was worth 1% of the entire U.S. economy when he was asked,“How much money does it take to make a man happy?”Rockefeller answered, “Just a little bit more.”Ambition is never contented.Am I condemning ambition? I promise you that I am not. I am merely pointing out the deep chasm that separates the unending hunger of ambition from the high and lofty contentment of happiness.An old man named Paul wrote a letter to a young man named Timothy 2,000 years ago. Near the end of that letter, Paul wrote about old people and hypocrites and slavery and wealth.Paul then added two sentences that have echoed in my brain for the past 60 years.“To know God and to be deeply contented is the true definition of wealth. For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out.”Happiness cannot spread its wings while wearing the handcuffs of our ambitions. The shining light of Hope is made of a stronger and happier substance than our dark dreams of future accomplishment.Ambition can bring you recognition, reputation, and riches. But those are no substitute for friendships, family, and contentment; for these are the three strong cords from which happiness is woven.Have you figured it out yet? Happiness is not material. It is relational.With whom do you have a meaningful relationship?Roy H. WilliamsWe have solved the mystery of the roving reporter!The wizard received this email from Italy a couple of days ago:Dear Roy and Pennie,Talya and I found this quaint restaurant with tables in its wine cellar and thought you'd love this place. (I don't drink, but thought it appropriate to pose with a glass of wine — which our son-in-law ordered.) If your future plans bring you to Vincenza, Italy, this is one stop you won't regret. Avital sends her warmest regards.– DEAN(You will find the photo that accompanied this email on the final page of today's rabbit hole. I'm Ian Rogers.)EMAIL NEWSLETTERSign up to receive the Monday Morning Memo in your inbox!Download the PDF "Dictionary of the Cognoscenti of Wizard Academy"RANDOM QUOTE:“As we start looking for the good, our focus automatically is taken off the bad.”- Susan JeffersTHE WIZARD TRILOGY

From writing a regular article in Radio Ink magazine to a weekly outbound memo to free clinics, Roy H. Williams created a marketing school like no other. Dave Young: Welcome to the Empire Builders Podcast, teaching business owners the not-so-secret techniques that took famous businesses from mom and pop to major brands. Stephen Semple is a marketing consultant, story collector and storyteller. I'm Stephen's sidekick in business partner Dave Young. Before we get into today's episode, a word from our sponsor, which is, well, it's us, but we're highlighting ads we've written and produced for our clients. So here's one of those. [Travis Crawford Ad] Dave Young: Welcome back to the Empire Builders Podcast, Dave Young here alongside Stephen Semple. And Stephen has just told me what the topic for today's episode is and well, I have some thoughts. Stephen Semple: I sure hope so. Dave Young: So we're going to talk about Wizard Academy, we've mentioned it quite a few times on the podcast and I don't know that it falls into the pantheon of super empire type brands, but the things that Wizard Academy teaches have definitely helped some businesses achieve at least some local empire status in the growth of their business. Well, thank you for making this one of the topics. Stephen Semple: Yeah, and part of the reason why I wanted as one of the topics is first of all, we've referred to it a lot and so we might as well let people know what the heck this thing is that we refer to you work there, I'm a major donor there, taught there a few times, been a student there a lot of times. And the thing I find incredible is, look, it's not a big school. When you go to do a class, it's not a hundred people, it's small classes it's like 18 people. But when I was there last, when I taught the course there with Matthew Burns and Gary Bernier, we had people from the Czech Republic, we had somebody from Australia. I've been there where there's been people from Central America and South America. When you go and there's people that are from around the world coming to this little place, it fits it to a degree because it tells us how special this place is. So let's talk a little bit about the specialness of it and the origin of it. Dave Young: I love it. Yeah. So origin-wise, man, I'll go back to my origin and my first exposure to Roy Williams who founded Wizard Academy. I was managing my family's small market radio stations in Nebraska starting in the mid eighties and in the radio broadcasting world, there are national groups like the National Association of Broadcasters, the Radio Advertising Bureau, and there's only ever been a handful of privately held industry publications that focused entirely on the radio broadcast industry. One of those is a magazine called Radio Ink, and it's not INC like incorporated it's Radio Ink as in printers ink, I-N-K. And started by a guy named Eric Rhoades, and I'm not sure how he and Roy first met, and by the way, Roy's got a hilarious story about Eric Rhoades dad speaking of empire building. We'll save that for another time. But Roy started writing a column for Radio Ink in the nineties, and the column was just, Hey, here's some things that you ought to consider when you're writing ads for businesses and you're in the radio business, or here are some tips for radio salespeople to sell more long form kind of schedules. And so I'd been reading those, you'd go to the post office once a month and there'd be the Radio Ink in the mail and it was always exciting because it was great writing, it was one of the few pieces of industry focused Journalism that was really engaging if you were in the radio business and Roy's column was always the first thing I looked at. And at some point he started doing the Monday morning memo and I think promoted it in the Radio Ink article. Hey, if you want, subscribe to The Monday Morning Memo send us a fax at this number.

Brian Brushwood knows how to gain and hold attention in social media.Reaching for that brass ring causes most people to lean too far off their plastic horse on the social media merry-go-round.SPLAT! They land flat on their faces with only a few hundred views.Brian has built a YouTube channel to 1.7 million subscribers, an entirely different channel to more than 2 million subscribers, and 12 days ago he produced a 1-minute “short” that had 3.6 million views on the first day, and at the time of this writing – on Day 12 – it has climbed to 17.1 million views.And you – yes, you – could have shot that exact same video with nothing more than a cell phone.I asked Brian if I could ask him a few questions on ZOOM for the Monday Morning Memo. Here are a some of the things he shared with me:“There's a temptation, especially with YouTube, to perpetually feel like you're too late. You're never too late. I thought I was too late to start YouTube in 2006 because it had been around since 2005. It was already seeing its early superstars. And I started in 2006. And then I thought by the time Scam School came to YouTube in 2009, I thought it was too late. It wasn't too late. I thought it was too late in 2016 when we launched the Modern Rogue. It wasn't too late.”“YouTube is the dominant market now.”“Facebook is now pay-to-play. And for some messaging, that works. It's worth paying the money to get the message out there. But if you're trying to build organic fans like I am, it's not a fit.”“TikTok: there's only one star of TikTok, and that's TikTok. You can get a million views one day and the next day you'll get 800. And it's agonizing because they literally just want to lure you into their dopamine trap. Whereas YouTube is a meritocracy.”“And here's the beauty. If you think about YouTube as your personal agent… What personal agent knows your material all the way back to the very first time you ever posted anything? And also it knows the customer, your client, your prospective new best friend, their entire history of everything they've ever watched.”What can you do for me in one hour, Brian?“We can crack who you are, what you do and do not do, and craft your storytelling engine.”“Have you noticed, Roy, that on YouTube, so much of the content boils down to, ‘Can you blank with a blank?' Or ‘How to blank with a blank.' And these are transactional things. Either they trade on curiosity, or they trade on things that people are searching for. But very quickly, all you have to do is get on paper what your flavor is – that's called in fancy Hollywood talk – ‘a style guide.'”“Now, I don't want to intimidate anybody… You know what, if I did want to intimidate people, I'll say, ‘In one hour, Roy, I can give you a story bible, a style guide, I can give you a structure, a framework, a narrative storytelling. I could break down the beats of your three-act structure. We could consider the Campbellian monomyth, all those things.'”“We could get that done in an hour and technically I'd be accurate. But the way I would explain it to anybody watching this is, ‘Give me an hour and I'll teach you not how to tell a story; I'll teach you to tell all the stories, because stories are happening to you all the time. Every client that has a setback is an amazing story.'”“It is so dead simple.”“Now that doesn't mean it's easy, but it is simple. The first hour is basically everything you're going to need to know. Everything past that is reinforcement, and everything after that is refinement.”

The Wizard Academy tower sits on a plateau 900 feet above the city of Austin. The view from the stardeck is stunning.When you attend our free public seminar on the afternoon of March 17, you will be in Tuscan Hall just 500 feet from the tower. If you have some extra time on campus, perhaps Dave Young will be willing to press the button that lifts you from the underground art gallery up to the stardeck so that you can look around.This is what I will teach you in Tuscan Hall:How to create a magnetic personality for your brand. It's easier than you think.How to use personification to breathe life into all your corporate communications, beginning with your advertising.How to use character banter and magical thinking to help customers understand that your company has beliefs, values, motives, can make choices, and that it has life.How to gather these techniques into an operating plan that will integrate this magnetic new personality into every touchpoint of your business.How to measure the trajectory and momentum of your rejuvenated brand.You're going to have a good time. I will include lots of examples of PowerSelling ads that have lifted people to new heights.Q: PowerSelling. What is it?A: PowerSelling is an advertising technique that makes your name the one people think of first – and feel the best about – when they need what you sell.Q: Does it work for B2B? (Business to Business)A: Not really. B2B requires tight targeting and significantly more logic than is required to win the hearts of the public. [NOTE: If today's memo feels different than the typical Monday Morning Memo, it is because this is probably the first example of B2B writing that you have ever seen me write. Are you noticing the additional logic? – RHW]Q: Does it work for Direct Response offers?A: No. Direct Response offers are built almost entirely on features and benefits, the so-called “value proposition,” enhanced by an urgent call-to-action, usually with a final bit of “added value” if you “act now.”Q: So what's it good for?A: PowerSelling is for products and services that have a long purchase cycle and a relatively high price tag; things like diamond engagement rings, legal services, medical services, and home services like plumbing, air conditioning, roofing, and electrical. PowerSelling is strictly B2C (Business to Consumer) and it almost always employs mass media; television or radio, sometimes with billboards added.Q: Will there be recordings made, or perhaps a livestream?A: Sorry, but no. The Wizards of Ads® have little desire to debate – or educate – a world full of traditional ad writers that have been trained on the tripe that is taught in college.*You are going to learn the explosive techniques that will make your advertising leap off the launchpad with fire and smoke as you begin your journey to the stars. You will feel your acceleration grow to the point where your cheeks are pulled back and your eyes become slits as the corners of your mouth touch your earlobes.Or maybe you are just smiling.If you are ready for the ride of your life, be in Austin on March 17th.Roy H. Williams|“Running a big company is like...

Last week's Monday Morning Memo included a photograph of a diamond pendant and the promise of a $1,000 cash prize to whoever could use AI to write the 60-second radio ad that would sell the largest number of that pendant for Valentine's Day.I was given that photo by a jewelry client. In a moment we will look at the 60-second radio ad I wrote for the client before I issued the AI prompter challenge. But first, here are 10 things I have learned from the advertising results (and lack of results) I have seen during my 40 years as an ad writer.The most effective ads don't sound like ads.Most jewelry ads are filled with cliches and schmaltz.The Large Language Models used by AI are educated by the most often used phrases.This is why jewelry ads written by AI are filled with cliches and schmaltz.Most of the ads written by AI are better than what the average citizen would write.The average citizen has not received specific data about the results delivered by each of the thousands of ads they have written during the past 40 years.My challenge to AI prompters included a photograph of the pendant, but none of the ads written by AI were specific to that pendant.Specifics are more persuasive than generalities.The non-specific ads written by AI sold only the idea of a diamond pendant; an idea that can be fulfilled by any diamond pendant sold by any jewelry store, anywhere.Advertisers who use these “generalized” ads are not advertising for their store alone, but for all their competitors as well.Q: Would the AI radio ads “work”?A: If what you mean is, “Would they generate a result?” Then yes, but that result would not be the highest and best use of your ad dollars. Not by a long shot.AI is great at a lot of things, but effective ad writing is not among them.Radio cannot reveal visual images except in the imagination. That's what makes radio the perfect medium to deliver this ad. It is the radio ad I wrote to sell that specific pendant:JACOB: David, have you seen it?DAVID: Oh yes! I've seen it.JACOB: What did it say to you?DAVID: There is only one thing it CAN say.JACOB: Sometimes an artist will say something incredibly specific without using any words at all.DAVID: We've all heard music that can tell a story without words.JACOB: And we've all seen paintings that can tell a story without words.DAVID: But this time a jewelry designer did it.JACOB: The moment you see it, you know what it is saying.DAVID: I understood the message immediately.JACOB: [slowly] “The long and the short of it is we're in this together.”DAVID: “The long and the short of it is we're in this together.”JACOB: It has wit, and whimsy, and humor, and warmthDAVID: and commitment.JACOB: It made me smile when I saw it.DAVID: Me, too.MONICA: [SFX cell phone ring] Hello.SARAH: Did they see it?MONICA: Oh yes, they saw...

John Steinbeck wrote a letter to Carlton Sheffield about a conversation he'd had with his wife, Elaine.“Once I said to her, ‘I don't want the barbarity of funeral for myself.' And she said, ‘Don't be silly. A funeral isn't for the dead. You'll simply be a stage set for a kind of festival, maybe. And besides, you won't even be there.'”– Steinbeck: A Life in Letters, p 829Henry Fonda – one of the most famous actors of his generation – stood up at John Steinbeck's funeral and recited a piece of a poem by Robert Louis Stevenson:Bright is the ring of wordsWhen the right man rings them,Fair the fall of songsWhen the singer sings them.Still they are carolled and said –On wings they are carried –After the singer is deadAnd the maker is buried.– Robert Louis StevensonWe know Henry Fonda spoke those words because Elaine Steinbeck, John's wife, describes the scene in a letter to her friend, Jean Vounder-Davis.What will people say when you are gone? Will memories of you ring like bells in the hearts you left behind?How will you be remembered?You cannot build a reputation on what you intend to do.The saddest eulogy ever carved on a tombstone said, “He Had Potential.”Will you be remembered for having a lot of money?“You can have money stacked to the ceiling, but the size of your funeral will still depend on the weather.” – Chuck TannerWill you be remembered as a selfish person, or a generous one?“We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give.” – Winston ChurchillI have never seen a hearse pulling a U-Haul trainer.“We brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out.” – Paul's letter to Timothy, ch. 6Will you be remembered as a critical person, or as an encourager?“People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” – Maya AngelouThere is nothing standing in the way of you being a different person today than you were yesterday. Do you remember what I wrote to you in last week's Monday Morning Memo?“Escaping the past is easy. The hard part is choosing to start over.”If we make the right decision, we'll have more to be thankful for next Thanksgiving than we did this year.Ciao for Niao,Roy H. WilliamsDouglas Katz is a West Point graduate, a disabled Army veteran, and a culinary enthusiast (also known as a foodie.) Douglas, like many other people who suffer from limited mobility, struggled to use kitchen utensils that require upper extremity strength. Aided by an army of friends and military veterans, Doug retreated to his workshop to invent a new type of kitchen knife, the first in a series of “adaptive” kitchen products he plans to introduce. Doug is building a cutting-edge company (pun intended) dedicated to radical innovation and inclusive kitchen design. It's happening and it's happening right now, with roving reporter Rotbart and you at MondayMorningRadio.com.

There is a time to get started, and there is a time to wait.When you have thought carefully about it, take action. But when you haven't thought about it, wait.The important is rarely urgent, and the urgent is rarely important. Do not become a slave to the merely urgent.Perception is to see things that not everyone sees. Intuition is to recognize connections, and the patterns that occur because of these connections.Maximum information is available, and maximum contemplation is possible, only at the last possible moment.If you ever feel bad about procrastinating, just remember that Mozart wrote the overture to Don Giovanni the morning it premiered.Procrastination is the soul rebelling against entrapment. But if you procrastinate too long, you will have your choice made for you by circumstance.Mozart was christened Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart. Theophilus, in Greek, means “loved by God”.In a letter announcing his birth, his father said his name was Wolfgang Gottlieb Mozart. Gottlieb, in German, means “loved by God.”When he was 21, Mozart began calling himself Amadè, which is Hungarian for “loved by God.”Mozart called himself Amadeus only once, when he signed a letter “Wolfgangus Amadeus Mozartus” as a joke, (sort of like Indiana Beagle calling himself “Indianus Beaglus” in the image at the top of today's Monday Morning Memo.) Amadeus, in Latin, means “Loved by God.”“Johannes Chrysostomus” precedes the name “Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart” because he, a Catholic, was born on January 27, the feast day of Saint John Chrysostomus in the West until the calendar reform of 1969.But I digress. We were talking about the tyranny of the “merely urgent” versus information, contemplation, and procrastination.Waiting serves a purpose. In Manley Miller's booklet, “Potato Chips: Greasy, Salty, Really Good Stories from Growing Up in New Orleans,” he writes,I became a pastor when I was still young and foolish enough to say, “All right, God, if I'm not a senior pastor by the time I'm 30, then I'm going to quit being a pastor. I'm just going to take that as a sign from you that this is not what I'm supposed to be doing.”Later, I found out the reason Jesus didn't start his ministry until he was 30 is because you couldn't become a rabbi until you were 30. You didn't have enough life experience.Jesus was 12 when Mary and Joseph found him teaching in the Synagogue, and it says that he “spoke with great wisdom.” But then when he's 30 and starts his ministry, it says he spoke with great authority.You have an aptitude for something when you have a talent for it.But you develop proficiency over long experience.And it's going to take some time to get there.Likewise, there's a long journey from wisdom to authority.When you have something to say worth hearing, that's wisdom.But when people respect you enough to listen, that's authority.Waiting is not wasting.And now we're going to make a 90-degree turn and head off in a tangential direction. Hold on tight.Here are the Top Five Regrets of People Who are Dying:I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.I wish I hadn't worked so hard. I wish I had spent more time with my family.I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings.I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.I wish that I had let myself be...

When you are having an adventure, you wish you were safe at home. But when you are safe at home, you wish you were having an adventure.Every adventure is marked by setbacks, disappointments, and difficulties. Without trouble, there can be no adventure.Our love of movies, video games, and sporting events proves our craving for adventure, for what are these but a celebration of people overcoming setbacks, disappointments, difficulties, and problems?What are you facing today?What must you overcome?What is your current adventure?Adventure is exciting when the vision of a glowing future shines brightly in your mind. But when we have no vision of a happy outcome, we walk in darkness.Jesus spoke of this phenomenon in the sixth chapter of the book of Matthew.“Your vision is the lamp of your body. If you see the world clearly, your body will be full of light. But if your vision is distorted, the light within you will be darkness. And if the light that is in you is darkness, how great is that darkness!”When our vision is distorted, we lose hope.Please understand that I am not talking about mental illness. I don't pretend to have a cure for that. But I do know a thing or two about sadness, confusion, frustration, and loneliness.One out of every four people you encounter today will be hiding deep sadness, confusion, frustration, or loneliness. They won't let you see it, but it is there.This is the cure you have within you: You can listen intently when a person is speaking, so that the person feels seen and heard. You can smile and nod, so that the person feels accepted.You have the power to make other people feel valued.Each of us needs to be seen, and heard, and missed when we are absent.You can shine a light into the darkness.And sometimes, that is enough.Roy H. Williams NOTE: Today we celebrate the 13th anniversary of MondayMorningRadio, hosted by our own Pulitzer-nominated roving reporter, Dean Rotbart. Next week's episode will be number 600! Can you believe it? And last month we quietly celebrated the 30th anniversary of the MondayMorningMemo. How many of you have been subscribers since the days when it was delivered by FAX? Aroo. – Indy BeagleGwendolyn “Wendy” Bounds, an award-winning broadcast reporter, was an eyewitness of 9/11. In his book, September Twelfth: An American Comeback Story, roving reporter Rotbart describes Wendy Bounds as telegenically attractive, “with big chocolate-brown eyes, a sparkly broad smile, and shoulder-length buttery blond hair blended with honey highlights.” Today, the long-time desk jockey is ripped, with muscular arms, strong and toned legs, and broad, well-developed shoulders. Wendy has transformed herself into a competitive Spartan racer, running through mud pits, crawling under barbed wire, swinging across monkey bars, and hoisting sandbags as she navigates obstacle courses. “It is never too late to achieve your full potential,” Wendy writes in a new book, out tomorrow (June 18). “Age,” she tells the roving reporter and his deputy, Maxwell, “can be a secret weapon.” Age. Learn how to use it, at MondayMorningRadio.com

Two-letter postal abbreviations don't have periods after the letters, so when I titled today's Monday Morning Memo, “Reno is West of L.A.” I was not using L.A. as the postal abbreviation for Louisiana.Carson City – the capitol of Nevada – is likewise west of Los Angeles, as are 5 other state capitols. Juneau, Honolulu, Sacramento, Salem, and Olympia are the capitols of Alaska, Hawaii, California, Oregon, and Washington. West, west, west, west, and west of L.A.Google it. Or Bing it. Or Yahoo it. However you like to do it.Reno is located at 119°49′ West.Los Angeles is 118°14′ West.Reno is 86 miles west of Los Angeles.The coordinates of a city give you its precise location, just like the chapter and verse numbers of books in the Bible.Psalm 119:49 – the Reno Psalm – says,“Remember your word to your servant, for you have given me hope.”Reno was founded by Charles William Fuller, who built a bridge across the Truckee river so that settlers would not lose hope.Psalm 118:14 – the L.A. Psalm – says,“The LORD is my strength and my defense; he has become my salvation.”Los Angeles was named “The Angels” in 1769 by Father Juan Crespi, a Franciscan priest who celebrated in his journal the discovery of a “beautiful river from the northwest.” A source of water that saved his thirsty band of travelers.You will remember that I mentioned Louisiana in my opening sentence.New Orleans is at 90°07′ West.Psalm 90:7 – the New Orleans Psalm – says,“We are consumed by your anger and terrified by your indignation.”The French Quarter of New Orleans is 90.°06′ West.Psalm 90:6 – the French Quarter Psalm –says,“In the morning it springs up new, but by evening it is dry and withered.”Does the longitude and/or latitude of a city unlock a secret message from God to that city?No. Of course not. Don't be ridiculous. Have you lost your mind?But let's pretend that it does.The latitude for my hometown of Broken Arrow, Oklahoma – which, prior to 1907 was “Indian Territory” – is 36.°06′ N.Psalm 36:6 – the Broken Arrow Psalm – says,“Your righteousness is like the highest mountains, your justice like the great deep. You, Lord, preserve both people and animals.”We create imaginary worlds when we pretend, but even imaginary worlds have to have rules. This truth is known to every author of Science Fiction, to every author of Fantasy, and to every 6-year-old.We must now make up some additional rules because some of the Psalms don't have enough verses to match the coordinates of certain cities. As an example: Chicago is at latitude 41°52′ North, and its longitude is 87°39′ West.We'll begin with longitude: Uh-oh, Psalm 87 doesn't have a 39th verse.Now let's take a look at latitude: Uh-oh, Psalm 41 doesn't have a 52nd verse.But Genesis 41 does!Genesis 41:52 – the Birth Verse of Chicago – says,“The second son he named Ephraim and said, ‘It is because God has made me fruitful in the land of my suffering.'”Chicago was incorporated in 1837, but it blossomed in an amazing second birth after the fire of 1871. Read it for yourself.I went with “birth verse” because Genesis means...

The tectonic plates of America are shifting beneath our feet. Can you feel the tremors?I'm not talking about the foundations of our continent. I'm talking about the foundations our nation.Our continent is rock, soil, and water; mountains and prairies and oceans white with foam.Our nation is a people; a family that we love.And if I might continue quoting Kate Smith for a moment, we would be wise to ask God to, “stand beside her and guide her through the night with the light from above.”We feel the tremors of our unsteady family – our nation – not in our soles, but in our souls.I felt the tremors of the waning “Me” generation shift into the groupthink perspective of the “We” in 2003. To read my nascent ramblings about it, just go to MondayMorningMemo.com and type “1963 All Over Again” into the website search block. This will take you to my MondayMorningMemo for December 15, 2003.These are the important paragraphs:“AOL and Google.com are the Kerouac and Salinger of the new generation that will soon pry the torch from the hands of Boomers reluctant to let it go. Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley have become Tupac Shakur and Eminem, and the Baby Boomers' reaction to them is much like their own parents' reaction to Chuck and Elvis. But instead of saying, ‘Take a bath, cut your hair and get a job,' we're saying, ‘Pull those pants up, spin that cap around and wash your mouth out with soap.'“At the peak of the Baby Boom there were 74 million teenagers in America and radio carried a generation on its shoulders. Today there are 72 million teenagers that are about to take over the world. Do you understand what fuels their passions? Can you see the technological bonds that bind them?”“Baby Boomer heroes were always bigger than life, perfect icons, brash and beautiful: Muhammad Ali… Elvis… James Bond. But the emerging generation holds a different view of what makes a hero.”The only hard choice in life is the choice between two good things.Freedom and Responsibility are both good things. But like all dualities, they oppose each other. The more you have of one, the less you have of the other.All responsibility with no freedom makes you a slave. All freedom with no responsibility makes you a self-absorbed hedonist and an asshole.But I promised to tell you how to keep your balance during this earthquake, didn't I?Here's how to do it: remind yourself that different people perceive the world differently. They notice different things. They value different things. They live in their own private reality, and you live in yours.You are acutely aware of what you see that they do not, and you want to open their eyes.They are acutely aware of what they see that you do not, and they want to open your eyes.Both of you feel you are being attacked.I have a question for you: do the two of you have the courage to shut up and listen? Really listen? Can you muster enough courtesy and grace and self-restraint to share why you value what you value without disparaging or attacking what they value and why they value it?If both of you can do this, you will find your balance and quit hating each other.The birds will start singing, the flowers will bloom, a rainbow will appear, and everyone will laugh in joyous relief that the ugliness is finally over.As I look back on the events that have marked the previous 37 zeniths of the “We” generation that have occurred during the past 2,960 years (937 BC,) I realize that no one is likely to do this.But I thought I would give it a shot.Roy H. Williams50,000 new restaurants open in the United States each year, and most of them are...

In the Monday Morning Memo for Oct. 10, 2022, I wrote,“Do you want to be one of the world's great ad writers? Don't read ads. Read the poems, short stories and novels written by the winners of the Pulitzer and Nobel prizes in Literature.”My friend Tom Grimes – the waterboy of Amarillo – texted me this insightful correction:“I've heard you teach in class that magicians, stand-up comedians and the creators of comic strips always structure their storytelling in that same tight economy of words used by the world's great poets. ‘And then what happened, and then what happened, and then what happened…'”I stand corrected. Thank you, Tom.Yes, comedians, magicians, and the creators of comics are three different types of writers who know how to capture and hold our attention, just as the world's great poets have done for centuries. These writers show us possible futures, imaginary pasts, or an exaggerated present; realities that exist entirely in our imaginations.And they do it in a brief, tight, economy of words.Likewise, the best ad writers take us on journeys that begin and end quickly, but leave us altered, changed, modified, different.I don't list AI in my pantheon of persuasive writers for the same reason that I don't list the makers of movies.Great movies are created from great plays and great books. Even Disney's animated cartoon adventuresbegin with great stories.Stories are written by writers.The actors, directors, and illustrators who portray those stories are called artists and they are assisted by technicians. Artists and technicians don't write the stories; they adapt stories to fit a format and then show them to us.AI is not a writer. AI is an artist and a technician.Dune was written by Frank Herbert 59 years ago and has sold nearly 20 million copies worldwide. Artists and technicians adapted it into a 1984 film, a 2000 television miniseries, and then a major motion picture in 2021 with a sequel that was released in theaters just last week.The Lord of the Rings was written by Tolkien and adapted by artists and technicians.The Godfather was written by Puzo and adapted by artists and technicians.Harry Potter was written by Rowling and adapted by artists and technicians.Charles Schultz, Bill Watterson, Neil Gaiman, Stan Lee, Scott McCloud and Tom Fishburne are writers who tell stories in comic panels.Robin Williams, Chris Rock, Eddie Murphy, Richard Pryor, Ellen DeGeneres and Dave Chappelle are writers who tell stories in short bursts while standing behind a microphone.Penn and Teller, Siegried and Roy, David Blaine, Brian Brushwood, David Copperfield and Nate Staniforth are writers who stand on stage and tell stories while proving that you cannot believe your eyes or trust your logical mind.Ian Fleming, Cormac McCarthy, Stephen King, Truman Capote, and Elmore Leonard are writers who tell stories using only words.Artists and technicians adapt their stories for stage, film, and video.Shakespeare wrote 38 stories that artists and technicians have adapted for the past 450 years. The artists who gave faces and voices to Shakespeare's characters include Judi Dench, Patrick Stewart, Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Kenneth Branagh, David Tarrant, Derek Jacobi and Peter O'Toole.We have writers. We

I don't know if he was was an American Patriot or a British Loyalist. All I know is that he owned a 1726 edition of “The Gentleman Angler,” a leather bound book on fly fishing.That book was 50 years old when Thomas Jefferson penned the Declaration of Independence.Speaking of Jefferson, that same fly-fisherman bought a first edition of the complete, 4-volume leather bound set of “Memoir, Correspondence, and Miscellanies” written by Thomas Jefferson and published in 1829. This leads me to believe that our fly-fishing friend purchased his 103-year-old copy of the 1726 edition of “The Gentleman Angler” at about that same time, roughly 200 years ago.There were no modern books in his collection.I just realized something. Our fly-fishing friend was obviously an American Patriot, or he would not have purchased Thomas Jefferson's “Memoir, Correspondence, and Miscellanies” in 1829.“Hang on a moment, Roy, you identified that man as a ‘Fly-Fishing Fanatic' in the title of today's MondayMorningMemo. What led you to call him that?”I call him a “Fly-Fishing Fanatic” because the majority of the 18 books in his collection were about fly fishing, including a 1750 edition, a 1760 edition, and an 1823 edition of “The Compleat Angler” by Izaak Walton.I bought his entire collection because books are cool, especially books that are centuries old.What would have been REALLY cool, though, is if this lover-of-books who lived during the years of Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, and George Washington also owned an original, 1605 first-edition of Don Quixote de La Mancha. Wouldn't that have been cool?There are only 10 known copies of that book in all the world, and the last one to change hands sold 35 years ago for 1,500,000 dollars. There are no universities that own a copy, and there are no copies available to public view except the one that is owned by the citizens of the United States of America, and that one is closely guarded in our Library of Congress.Did you guess already?Our colonial fly-fishing friend did, in fact, own a 1605 edition of Cervantes' masterpiece, and I bought it with the rest of his collection.The mystery is that my copy is roughly 8 inches by 11 inches, much larger than the 4-inch by 6-inch edition owned by the Library of Congress. My copy is, without question, extraordinarily old. The attributes that bring me to this conclusion are not easily faked.The cover is wrapped in the remains of old, brittle vellum – tightly stretched animal skin – and the pages are substantial and thick. It is not, however, the unauthorized pirated version published in Portugal in 1605, because mine has the correct 1605 frontispiece and title page, identical to that of the 4-inch by 6-inch 1605 edition held by the Library of Congress.My copy has the vellum cover and ties, like the 1605 Portuguese edition and the 1620 English edition, but it is neither of those.It appears to a centuries old Presentation Edition, if such a thing existed so long ago.The print seems to occupy about the same dimensions as the smaller, first book, but the pages themselves are bigger and more substantial, as if the original press was used on larger paper, leaving a lot of unprinted paper bordering the...

It's birthday week and I have a gift of resources for you.  Here's the links I mention at the end: Sales Leadership: Mike Weinberg.  I've read three of his books and was a regular listener to his podcast when I was a sales manager.  I was part of his launch team for his latest book, First Time Manager: Sales.  Check him out here: https://mikeweinberg.com/   Marketing guru Seth Godin.  A thought leader and I see he also has a podcast that I'm going to subscribe to:  https://www.sethgodin.com/    Roy H. Williams, aka The Wizard of Ads, besides his books on marketing, he publishes a weekly newsletter called the Monday Morning Memo that includes a rabbit hole that often is fun and intriguing. http://www.rhw.com/youll-laugh-youll-cry/ is the link to his books and here's the link to his MMM: https://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/ Art Sobczak has sales books that I've bought along with a podcast and blog at: https://businessbyphone.com/ There are three others that I'm going to recommend that had an impact on me 20, even 30 years ago: Harvey MacKay https://harveymackay.com/   Harvey's first two books on sales were so influential that my first year as sales manager I gave my team their own copy of them for their own use. Trout & Ries.  Al Ries and Jack Trout launched a series of books on Branding and Marketing in the 1970's that I discovered when I started in the ad world in 1986.  Al passed away just last year and his partner and daughter continues his work. https://www.ries.com/books/ The last recommendation is a book that I re-read every few years as a reminder of how to approach sales. Frank Bettger penned the book How I Raised Myself From Failure to Success in the 1940's and here's an Amazon link: https://www.amazon.com/Raised-Myself-Failure-Success-Selling/dp/067179437X See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You cut a nick into a stick to mark a moment. Then, at the end of the time being measured, you make another nick.To do a thing at the last possible moment is to do it within that second nick, “in the nick of time.”Millions of us have been using this phrase since the year 1580, but very few know the story behind it. You are now one of the chosen few who possess the arcane knowledge of the nick on a stick.But why do we say, “nick of time” instead of “notch of time”? If nick and notch mean the same thing, why haven't we been saying for 443 years, “This money arrived in the notch of time.”We say nick because “nick” ends with a sharper, cleaner sound than “notch.” Say it out loud. “nick-nick-nick.” “notch-notch-notch.” “nick-nick-nick.” “notch-notch-notch.”“Nick” sounds like a sharp, narrow cut, shaped like a V, narrow and specific. But “notch” sounds softer and wider, with an indistinct bottom shaped like the letter U, a bite taken out of an apple.But nick doesn't have a V in it, and notch doesn't have a U. So what's going on?The letters V and U are graphemes, visual letters in the alphabet. But the meaning of a word is not determined by the look of its letters, but by the sounds they make within the word. Those sounds are called phonemes.When describing a phoneme, don't say the name of the letter. Make only the sound represented by the letter. The letter is a grapheme. The sound it makes is a phoneme.The sound of a word has a lot to do with how it makes us feel, even when we are reading silently.This is incredibly important when choosing names for products and services and companies. It is also important when writing messages that you hope will persuade.Ad writers, song writers, speech writers, and poets, are you listening?Phonemes with abrupt, clean sounds are “p” “b” “t” “d” “ck” and “g”. The visual graphemes that visually represent those phonemes are P, B, T, D, K, and G. “p” “b” “t” “d” “ck” and “g” are known as the stops, or plosives. This is because all the air is stopped, then released with a plosion: “Kate kicked a kite. nick-nick-nick.” The grapheme is called a K, but the final phoneme in “nick” is “ck”.The “tch” sound in “notch” is an affricate, a sound that begins as a stop and releases as a fricative, a sound that will hiss, hush, or buzz, like “f” “v” “s” “th” “z” “sh” “j” and “h”. The indistinct ending of the sound is what causes us to hear something less sharply defined than we hear in “nick.”We could go on for at least 30 more minutes describing the 44 sounds that make up the English language and discussing the conceptual ideas we unconsciously associate with each of those 44 sounds, but right now my interest is elsewhere.I want you to return with me to the title of today's Monday Morning Memo, “Living in the Nick of Time.”Do you remember the Monday Morning Memo from 8 weeks ago, July 17, 2023? Today's Monday Morning Memo is a callback to that memo. A callback is a powerful tool in storytelling because it deepens the understanding of the audience by giving them a new context to consider.When you end with a callback to the beginning, this is called “going full circle.”In the words of T.S. Eliot,“We shall not cease from explorationAnd the end of all our exploringWill be to arrive where we startedAnd know the place for the first time.”Here is what I told you on July 17th:“You cannot suffer the past or future because they do not exist. What you are suffering is your memory and your imagination.”You cut a nick on a stick to mark a moment. At the end of the time being measured, you make another nick. To do a thing at the last possible moment is to do it inside that second nick, “in the...

A friend rotated my brain toward the subject of fame.He aimed my eyes in a new direction when he said, “Do you remember that thing you sent me 10 or 15 years ago?”I gave him the same blank look that you would have given him.He continued, “It was that thing Leonard Pitts wrote about being ‘the Man.'”I recovered it from the Random Quotes database at MondayMorningMemo.com, handed my phone to him and told him to read it out loud. When he was finished, we laughed together like two little boys who heard someone fart in church.Here it is:“I've got nothing against fame. I'm famous myself. Sort of.OK, not Will Smith famous. Or Ellen DeGeneres famous. All right, not even Marilu Henner famous.I'm the kind of famous where you fly into some town to give a speech before that shrinking subset of Americans who still read newspapers and, for that hour, they treat you like a rock star, applauding, crowding around, asking for autographs.Then it's over. You walk through the airport the next day and no one gives a second glance. You are nobody again.Dave Barry told me this story once about Mark Russell, the political satirist. It seems Russell gave this performance where he packed the hall, got a standing O. He was The Man. Later, at the hotel, The Man gets hungry, but the only place to eat is a McDonald's across the road. The front door is locked, but the drive-through is still open. So he stands in it. A car pulls in behind him. The driver honks and yells, “Great show, Mark!”The moral of the story is that a certain level of fame — call it the level of minor celebrity — comes with a built-in reality check. One minute, you're the toast of Milwaukee. The next, you're standing behind a Buick waiting to order a Big Mac.”– Leonard Pitts, January 14, 2008There is something about laughing with a friend that soaks into your heart and redirects your thoughts.I woke up the next morning thinking about fame, and how easily it comes and goes.I thought about Bill Cosby and Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart. And then my computer told me “Joe the Plumber” had died. Remember Joe the Plumber? He became a celebrity in 2008 when he asked Barack Obama a question. We learned later that his name wasn't Joe and he was never a plumber, but his perspective resonated with a lot of Americans.And then it hit me: Andy Warhol was a painter, but what we remember about him was his colorful comment about each person receiving “15 minutes of fame.”I could feel the freight train of curiosity gaining momentum in my mind, so I had to quickly decide whether to grab a handrail, swing aboard and see where it would take me, or spend the rest of the day regretting having missed the chance.I didn't want to live in regret, so I grabbed a handrail and was yanked off my feet into a noisy, rattling railcar.When my eyes had grown accustomed to the dust and the half-light, I found the following 19 statements carved into the wooden walls of that railcar. These statements were signed by Marilyn Monroe, Johnny Depp, Erma Bombeck, Tony Bennett, Emily Dickinson, John Wooden, Gene Tierney, Jack Kerouac, George Michael, Eddie Van Halen, Sinead O'Connor, Fran Lebowitz, Michael Huffington, Lord Byron, Arthur Schopenhauer, Michelle Pfeiffer, Clive James, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Davy Crockett.But not in that order. I'm not going to tell you who said what, because I don't want your reactions to be influenced by your memories of those people.“Wealth is like sea-water; the more we drink, the thirstier we become; and the same is true of fame.”“Fame is the thirst of youth.”“Don't confuse fame with success. Madonna is one; Helen Keller is the other.”“Fame comes and goes. Longevity...

The positioning gurus get to the point immediately on this episode of Brand Shorthand, that being a commentary on Roy Williams' Monday Morning Memo, "Why Most Ads Don't Work." It's a brief, but brilliant commentary on the advertising industry. Williams' point is that most ads are written "not to offend." Mark and Lorraine spend the episode walking through Williams' four mistakes most ads suffer and in the end, why most ads fail to create a customer.Spend 30-ish with Mark and Lorraine to learn more about advertising, marketing, and positioning.

Richard Feynman, winner of the Nobel Prize, said, “Nature uses only the longest threads to weave her patterns, so that each small piece of her fabric reveals the organization of the entire tapestry.” He was speaking, of course, of DNA, the organizing pattern of every type of life on our planet.Your DNA contains the archetypal pattern of your physical body, but the world around you is bigger than your body.The world around you contains an infinite number of archetypes.An archetype is any recurrent pattern recognized by the pattern-seeking right hemisphere of the brain.Archetypes exist in our minds and in the physical reality that surrounds us. Archetypes are the interface that allows us to interpret, understand, and catalogue what we are experiencing.Archetypes are the basis for all similes and metaphors. Carl Jung understood this.If you Google “Jungian archetypes” you'll find that most writers list the archetypes as twelve basic characters: Lover, Magician, Explorer, Creator, Sage, Outlaw, Hero, Jester, Everyman, Caretaker, Ruler, and the Innocent. These 12 characters populate the movies, television shows, novels, myths, and award-winning ad campaigns we experience on a daily basis.But what Jung actually taught is that archetypes are the psychological structures that allow us to recognize recurrent patterns in the world around us. They are the unconscious organizers of perceptions and ideas, since they spring from the systemic order that transcends both the external world and the human mind. Jung claimed there can be no master list of archetypes because there are an indefinite number of them, one for every recurrent pattern we observe.And not just patterns of personalities, but patterns of events, as well. Examples of events that follow an archetypal pattern include: Reproduction, Substitution, Reconfiguration, Following a Path, Collapse, Renewal, De-alignment, Re-alignment, and the Investment Bubble that always precedes delayed gratification.Every introduction of change requires a Pattern Shift, a transition from one pattern to another.Although most events could be categorized as “transitions,” an Archetypal Transition is a specific type of event, such as the ritual of Initiation (baptism,) or the ritual of Union (marriage,) or the ritual of Casting Out (divorce.) An Archetypal Transition is a portal to a new identity. Some examples of Archetypal Transition include being parented, courtship, loss of virginity, a sudden change in status, and preparation for death.Archetypes of Transition open the door for a new and different person to experience a new and different world.As a writer, you create new realities in the imaginations of your readers, so it is perfectly reasonable that you should observe and name new archetypes. You are not limited only to those named by Jung and popularized by tradition.In fact, I have invented names for several recurrent patterns that I have observed, and have mentioned several of them to you already.And now I officially give you permission to do the same:1. Go. Observe the world around you.2. Recognize and name the recurrent patterns that you find.3. Keep a list of them.Indy Beagle and I look forward to reading about your discoveries.Ciao for Niao,Roy H. WilliamsPS – Today's soirée was inspired by my partner, Vi Wickam, who sent me the Richard Feynman quote that opened today's Monday Morning Memo.When Victoria Pelletier sets her mind to achieving a goal, she won't let anything or anyone stop her. Nor will she blame anyone but herself when things don't go the way she planned. Those two personality traits — being unstoppable and making no excuses — have been a recipe for success since she became the chief operating...

One of the emails I never fail to read, and never fail to benefit from in some way is the Monday Morning Memo. What I like about it, and you probably would hate, judging from many YOUR choices which of my emails to read… What I like most about the Monday Morning Memo, is that … Continue reading "Words, hands, facts, numbers. Which is your bailiwick?" The post Words, hands, facts, numbers. Which is your bailiwick? first appeared on Raise Your Vibration.

If you ever get into a backdoor hiring situation, you'll hear clients draw up excuses that support why they did what they did. And sometimes, these reasons may even be legitimate. For today's Monday Morning Memo, Wilson clues you in on what these excuses might be. Adams, Evens & Ross, which only collects debts for the hiring and recruitment sector, has grown to be the world's largest credit and collection company during the past 30 years. Adams, Evens, & Ross is the unchallenged leader in credit and collection for the staffing and recruiting sector, with offices in the US, Canada, the UK, and Asia serving over 3500 staffing and recruiting organizations. All we do is collect past-due debts for hiring and recruiting. Dealing with Adams, Evens & Ross has several advantages, one of which is that we do not have to learn how to recover your past-due staffing and recruitment debt. Our secret is our people. We are one of the few collection agencies with a staff of in-house attorneys in addition to seasoned collectors, asset sleuths, and top-notch support employees. There is no question as to why Adams, Evens & Ross is the only collecting company in the world to have the support of 10 recruiting and staffing trade publications, 14 associations, and 5 financing corporations. To turn over a past-due account, click the link below: https://www.staffingdebt.com/place-account/ To subscribe to our FREE Credit Alert Email, an email that is sent out weekly that identifies the companies that have not paid other staffing and recruiting firms, click the link below. https://www.aeremail.com/credit-alert-signup-form To book an appointment to discuss your specific collection issue, click the link below: https://www.staffingdebt.com/book-a-30-minute-free-consultation/ Call us at  800-452-5287 Ext 6578 to discuss your collection issue.

Gerald was an unwanted third son to his father, so his mother took Gerald on long walks each Saturday night so they would not be available when his father came home drunk. To avoid a beating, Gerald and his mother would wait outside in all weathers until his father fell asleep. Gerald was 16 when his father died, so he quit school to help support his mother by singing in the London subways for tips. Gerald was a Scottish introvert who became famous, but who could have been much more so.I closed last week's Monday Morning Memo with a famous line from one of Gerald's songs: “Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right, here I am, stuck in the middle with you.” Some people surround themselves with a low outer wall, and a high inner wall. It's easy to get to know them, but hard to get to know them well. Gerald was the opposite; he had a high outer wall and a low inner wall. It was nearly impossible to meet him, but those he allowed to get to know him, knew him well enough to know that he was attracted to the comfort of the familiar. New places and new faces were emotionally exhausting to Gerald, so he drank to hide from them. Gerald wrote, “Winding your way down on Baker Street, light in your head and dead on your feet, well, another crazy day, you'll drink the night away, and forget about everything. This city desert makes you feel so cold. It's got so many people, but it's got no soul, and it's taken you so long, to find out you were wrong, when you thought it held everything.” In the words of his daughter, Martha, “The soaring saxophone solo perfectly captures the endurance and triumph of the human spirit in adversity, the sun rising out of the darkness and lighting the way once again… ‘and when you wake up it's a new morning, the sun is shining it's a new morning, and you're going, you're going home'.” On that same album was a song called Right Down the Line. “You know I need your love, you've got that hold over me. Long as I've got your love, you know that I'll never leave. When I wanted you to share my life, I had no doubt in my mind. And it's been you, woman, Right down the line.” Both songs were on a 1978 album called City to City. That album almost didn't get made. Gerald was not a people person. Paul Simon openly admired Gerald's song-writing ability.Eric Clapton and Paul McCartney both wanted to work with Gerald, but Gerald said “no.” According to his manager, City to City was rejected by several record label executives because of Gerald's defensive abrasiveness. The only reason they got a record deal was because Artie Mogull, the United Artists representative, “was in a rush and never met him.” When Rolling Stone interviewed Gerald, he said, “To be a ‘star' in inverted commas – that is probably the last thing I want. I knew I'd written a good bunch of songs … I remember thinking I'd be pleased if City to City sold 50,000 copies.” City to City became a worldwide phenomenon, selling over 5.5 million copies. Hiding from people because his outer wall wasn't quite high enough, the great Welsh poet, Dylan Thomas, drank himself to death. Hiding from people because his outer wall wasn't quite high enough, the great American novelist, Jack Kerouac, drank himself to death. Hiding from people because his outer wall wasn't quite high enough, the great Scottish songwriter, Gerry Rafferty, drank himself to death. His daughter, Martha Rafferty, gathered a collection of her father's unpublished recordings during the lockdown of 2020 and https://gerryrafferty.com/ (posted them, with these comments, on a website.) “His evolution as a songwriter was intimately connected to his love and joy of singing. Singing was home for him, and he returned to it every day wherever he found himself, harmony especially so. He loved the company of singing with others and nothing gave him more joy, as those who have sat around a table with him will testify. That was his way

I made you a promise on November 22 in a Monday Morning Memo called “Time Travel”.This was how https://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/newsletters/time-travel/ (that memo) began: “My friend Don has a time machine. He takes me with him sometimes. You should come, too! Every person who rides in Don's time machine is changed by it.” “The United States Department of Justice has booked passage on Don's time machine for countless prison inmates. State and local governments and hundreds of rehab centers have booked journeys for people as well. Thirty-five million in all.” “Each trip through time begins with a series of words…” I then described two different types of storytelling and the purpose and effect of each. And to give myself a little “third-party credibility,” I quoted Professor Steven Pinker of MIT and Harvard. When the word-count of that Monday Morning Memo indicated that we were approaching our destination and it was time to land, I instructed you to store your tray-table and return your seat to its full, upright and locked position. Then I told you something you probably didn't know: “Every word in the English language is composed of just 44 sounds called phonemes. We arrange these into clusters called words which we string together in rapid succession so that others can see in their minds what we see in ours.” And then I talked about the Book of Beginnings. Do you you remember? “In the first chapter of Genesis, God says, ‘Let there be this' and ‘Let there be that' for 25 verses, and then in verse 26 he says, ‘Let us make mankind in our own image.'” “According to that ancient story, God spoke the world into existence and then gave you and me the power to do the same. When you, as a storyteller, speak a world into existence in the hearts and minds of your listeners, you are doing the work of God.” “Don Kuhl has spent the past 30 years unleashing the power of storytelling to help 35 million people find peace, hope, and happiness, and now he has written a book for you and me. It will be published early next year.” And then I promised you, “I'll make sure you know when it's available.” Roy H. Williams That book is now available for pre-order on Amazon.com. It's called https://www.amazon.com/Changing-Aging-Little-Stories-Lessons/dp/0757324444/ref=sr_1_1?crid=20RWQJCUQJ7UE&keywords=Don+Kuhl+changing+with+aging&qid=1654164095&sprefix=don+kuhl+changing+with+aging%2Caps%2C79&sr=8-1 (“Changing with Aging: Little Stories, Big Lessons.”) Don sent preview copies to several people I know. Everyone who has received a copy has been enchanted and enthralled by the stories in Don's book, as I knew they would be. Don is a remarkable teller of short, bright, heart-warming stories that overflow with honesty, transparency, and wisdom. Peter Vegso, the original publisher of that record-breaking series of books, “Chicken Soup for the Soul,” is such a fan of Don's stories that he jumped at the chance to publish Don's book. I have fulfilled my promise. I told you the book is available for pre-order. Do what seems to you good. My partner Johnny Molson was asked to speak to a 4th grade class last week about his career as an ad writer.When he left the school, Johnny texted me to say that two of the children had asked remarkably delightful questions. The first child asked, “Have you ever cringed at your own commercials?” Johnny answered yes, that he always cringes at the predictable commercials his clients occasionally demand that he write, but no, he never cringes at the happy ads that flow from the depths of his heart through his fingertips and then onto the radio and television airwaves. That's when the second child asked, “Do you have a criminal record?” A conversation with a child is a remarkable adventure full of twists and turns, with surprises around every corner.Today's rabbit hole is like that, too. It is a theological journey that begins in the first chapter of Genesis and ends...

What Henry Ford learned from a slaughter house and how it changed the world. Dave Young: Welcome to the Empire Builders Podcast, teaching business owners the not-so-secret techniques that took famous businesses from mom and pop to major brands. Dave Young: Stephen Semple is a marketing consultant, story collector and storyteller. I'm Stephen's sidekick and business partner, Dave Young. Dave Young: Before we get into today's episode, a word from our sponsor, which is... well it's us, but we're highlighting ads we've written and produced for our clients. So, here's one of those. [Why It Works Ad] Dave Young: Steven, I'm looking at the show notes and today it says Ford and the word model, and I'm thinking the Ford modeling company. Well, this could be kind of fun and exciting. Stephen Semple: I kind of wish now. I think I'm going to disappoint you. You are talking about a Lizzie, but it happens to be Tin Lizzie. Dave Young: The Model T. Stephen Semple: The Model T Ford. That's what we're going to go back and talk about, but before I get started, I wanted to read something to you. I'm not sure whether you read this week's Monday Morning Memo. You know, Roy does a memo every Monday. Roy's consistency on the memo, it's kind of what really inspired me when I approached you for doing this podcast of really wanting to produce something every week and do that consistency. Now, I had a long time to catch up to him, he's been doing it for like 30 years or some crazy- Dave Young: Yeah, yeah. Stephen Semple: ... number, but there was a piece I came across in the Monday Morning Memo and you can see this going to mondaymorningmemo.com that I want to read because want to share because to me it captures the real essence of what we're doing in this podcast and also specifically why we're going to talk about the Model T Ford today. Dave Young: Let me just put a preface on this. We record these things pretty, pretty far in advance sometimes and I- Stephen Semple: Right. Dave Young: ... want to make sure that if somebody wants to go back and read this particular Monday Morning Memo, we're talking about the December 20th, 2021 Monday Morning Memo. Stephen Semple: Thank you for that, Dave. So David, here's what Roy wrote, but what makes them wonderful? Wonderful things were touched by someone who knew the secret of wonder and how to capture it. When you know how to capture wonder, you carry it on your head, your heart and your hands. You glitter when you walk. Isaac Newton knew how to capture wonder and he passed the secrets forward in just 14 words. Countless millions have read those words and assumed Newton was talking about himself. He was not. Newton was giving you his most precious advice. He was telling you how to capture wonder. He was telling you how to glitter when you walk. Stephen Semple: In 1675 Newton wrote, "I have seen further. It is by standing on the shoulders of Giants." Isaac Newton stood on the shoulders of Galileo, Kepler and Copernicus in astronomy. Huygens, Euclid, Henry Briggs, Isaac Barrow and math, Kepler and Descartes in optics, Plato, Aristotle in philosophy. Newton combined the insights of these men and made them uniquely his own. Stephen Semple: Choose your giants. Stand on their shoulders. Repurpose the proven. Vincent Van Gogh stood on the shoulders of Monticelli and Hiroshige long after they were dead. They taught him how to paint. He studied their paintings, captured their wonder and made it his own. Johnny Depp stood on the shoulders of Pepe Le Pew, the cartoon skunk and Keith Richards, The Rolling Stones. They taught him how to capture our Captain Jack Sparrow. Depp studied their mannerisms, captured their wonder and made it uniquely his own. Stephen Semple: Roy says he stands on the shoulders of John Steinbeck, Ernest Hemingway, Robert Frost, Tolkien, Paul Harvey and Robinson. They taught him how to write.

The illustration at the top of today's Monday Morning Memo features Indy Beagle wearing a yarmulke as he says, “The https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/fbi-releases-2020-hate-crime-statistics (FBI) just released its hate crime statistics for 2020. https://www.npr.org/2021/08/31/1032932257/hate-crimes-reach-the-highest-level-in-more-than-a-decade (Are you ready?) 36% of victims were attacked for being black, 10% were attacked for being white, and 9% were attacked for being Jewish. Of all hate crimes motivated by hatred of the victims due to their religion alone, 57.5% targeted Jews, although Jews are less than 2% of the U.S. population.” That illustration will be hotly criticized by two people. The first person will be the one who refuses to accept the validity of the FBI's hate crime report. They will want to “set the record straight” by telling me that the FBI report was “fake news planted by Jews,” or some other nonsense. The second person will be outraged by the “deeply offensive” image of a dog wearing a yarmulke and accuse me of implying that Jews are dogs. But you, since you are not looking for a reason to be outraged, knew immediately that Indy is wearing a yarmulke as a symbol of support for his Jewish friends. And because you are perceptive, you noticed long ago that Indy is black, white, and brown. Small-minded people give themselves power by being easily offended. One person considers even the smallest request to be an attack on his or her personal freedom, and another person considers the rest of us to be asleep. Each of these believes that they alone know the true facts; they alone are awake. Although these two persons sit at opposite extremes on the sociopolitical spectrum, they are alike in that they both have an inflated sense of self-importance, and they are both easily outraged. I do my best to ignore them, because to pay attention to them is to give them power. The strange thing about all of this is that I agree – in principle, at least – with both sides. I agree that we must be vigilant to protect our liberties, and I agree that we should be sensitive to the needs of others. But the extremists on both sides have taken a good thing too far. You will remember that I predicted all of this many years ago when I wrote Pendulum, a book about the predictable, cyclical swings in western society for the past 3,000 years. The bad news is that it will get worse before it gets better. The good news is that it will get better. Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right. Here I am. Stuck in the middle with you.* I appreciate your companionship, your tolerance, and your sense of humor. I like you. Roy H. Williams

We figured that after 13 great Royal Oak Chamber guests, we should take an episode to go straight to the source - the Chamber itself.  Executive Director Shelly Kemp joins us today.We hear about Shelly's background - what made her unique in Key West, and how an earthquake brought her home from California.We also learn about the Chamber, its wonderful staff, and why it's sometimes considered the "sherpa" of Royal Oak - going above and beyond for residents.Shelly walks us through the different networking groups within the Chamber, including the Business Women's Network, the ALPHA and ROYAL groups, TAC, and the new walking club. There truly is a group for everyone.The Chamber has three big annual events - Art of Fire, Royal Oak in Bloom, and Barktoberfest - and Shelly teases a potential fourth event for 2022.Most importantly, the Royal Oak Chamber of Commerce exists to help local  businesses - through ribbon cuttings, the Monday Morning Memo, social media support, and so much more. Now in its 100th year (just like Royal Oak itself), we talk about some anniversary events planned, and of course the upcoming Holiday Soiree.Finally, you don't have to live or work in Royal Oak to be a Chamber member.  In fact, one of our hosts now lives out of state.  Can you guess which one?Resources:Jon Gay from JAG in Detroit Podcasts - http://www.jagindetroit.com/Trish Carruth from The Personal Jeweler - https://www.thepersonaljeweler.com/Lisa Bibbee from Keller Williams - http://soldbylisab.com/Andrea Arndt of Dickinson Wright - https://www.dickinson-wright.com/And if you'd like to know more about the Royal Oak Chamber of Commerce, or join, find them here:  https://www.royaloakchamber.com/

It is 3AM on a Thursday morning and I haven't yet written the MondayMorningMemo. In fact, I haven't even started it. The fact that you are reading it right now means that I did, in the end, get it done, such as it is. Reading is a form of transportation that takes you to a different place and time.You are with me at 3AM as I try to think of something that might entertain you. I keep asking you what you'd like to read, and you keep not telling me. “Write what you want,” you say. At 4:46AM you watch as I visit the home page at MondayMorningMemo.com to see which of the 5,394 random quotes will pop up on the sidebar to inspire me. “One sword keeps another in the sheath.” – George Herbert, (1593–1633)It's an interesting thought. I assume George Herbert was a military man, but I decide to Google him to be sure. As I type his name and birth year into the Google search block, I wonder, “What would it be like to live in a world where everyone carried a gun at all times? Would one sword keep another in the sheath?” Indy Beagle opens one eye and quietly says, “You don't want to put your dog in that fight. Think about something else.” And then he goes back to sleep. A contemporary of Shakespeare, George Herbert was a famous metaphysical poet and a priest in the Church of England! He was born into an artistic and wealthy family, began classes at Trinity College in Cambridge in 1609 and was noted as an exceptional speaker by none other than King James the first. Yes, the King James of the 1611 King James Bible, that King James. George Herbert was elected to Parliament in 1624. We are now in England 397 years ago as Google, our tour guide, tells us more about the man who said, “One sword keeps another in the sheath.” “After the death of King James, Herbert renewed his interest in ordination. He gave up his secular ambitions in his mid-thirties and took holy orders in the Church of England, spending the rest of his life as the rector of the rural parish of Fugglestone St Peter, just outside Salisbury. He was noted for unfailing care for his parishioners, bringing the sacraments to them when they were ill and providing food and clothing for those in need. Henry Vaughan called him – quote – ‘a most glorious saint and seer'. He was never a healthy man and died of consumption at age 39.” Who was Henry Vaughn, and what is “consumption,” anyway? I've heard of it all my life. Oh! Consumption is what they used to call Tuberculosis! Who knew? Henry Vaughn was another metaphysical poet and a physician. (yawn) Having wrung the last drop of honey from the story of “One sword keeps another in the sheath,” you and I decide to wander around Cambridge in 1609, the year that George Herbert entered Trinity College and came to the attention of King James. Indy Beagle, upon hearing of our journey, decides to go with us. We wander first into The Eagle and the Child, a pub in Cambridge that William Shakespeare was known to haunt. The locals call it The Bird and Baby. It stands opposite the oldest building in Cambridgeshire, the Saxon church tower of St Bene't's church which dates from around 1025. A tavern has stood here since 1353, famous for selling beer “for three gallons a penny”. I ask the bartender if he knows a young man by the name of George Herbert. Without looking up, he shakes his head “no.” Behind me, I hear Indy say, “Can we buy you a pint?” Shakespeare is sitting alone at a table scattered with ink-stained papers. “Sit,” says Shakespeare, as he pours wine from a jug into three wooden cups. The cups slosh a little as he slides them across the table. He looks down at the papers. “This new play I am writing is shit.” Indy leaned over and whispered in my ear, “Cymbeline.” “It began as a tragedy but a comedy now emerges. Coming hard on the heels of Julius Caesar, Hamlet and King Lear, the audience won't know what to think.” He takes the pile of papers off the table and...

At the bottom of last week's Monday Morning Memo, I asked, “Does it surprise you that the multibillion-dollar investment funds that used to buy manufacturing companies and mortgages are now bidding to buy successful home service companies at record-setting prices?”Immediately following my publishing of that comment, a client of my partner Ryan Chute asked him for any insights he might be able to provide about the Private Equity firms that were trying to buy his business. Another Wizard of Ads partner, Stephen Semple, has worked with almost 100 business owners who sold their businesses. Here is what https://wizardofads.org/partner/stephen-semple/ (Steve) told https://wizardofads.org/partner/ryan-chute/ (Ryan): “There are three problems I've seen over and over. The first problem is that there is a due diligence clause in every sales contract that professional business buyers regularly use to lower the price. Here is how it works: the closing is scheduled for Friday afternoon (yes, almost always a Friday.) At noon on Friday the buyer drops the price. They tell you they have come across something that says the price is now 20-30% lower.” “These business buyers are banking on the owner having already sold the company in his heart. The champagne is on ice and the owner is not emotionally capable of walking away from the closing table. To fight this, the seller needs to remain ready to walk. Walking away is the only power the seller has.” “The second problem I have seen is this: selling a business is a slow process and the closer it gets to the closing of the sale, the more the business owner mentally and emotionally disconnects from the business. They stop investing in the business, stop growing it. This is a dangerous thing to do because if the sale falls through, they have to get the momentum going again.” “The third problem is that most business owners don't actually know what their business is worth. Knowledge is power, and you desperately need the power of knowledge when you are preparing to sell your business.” “Ryan, my best advice is that you tell your client to run their business like they are planning to own it for the next 20 years. Remind them that their business isn't actually sold until the check is cashed.” Ted Rogers owned a cable TV company. When a buyer came along, Ted negotiated the price to be based on the number of subscribers he transferred to the buyer on closing day. Ted was now prepared to spend more per subscriber to acquire new subscribers than he had ever spent before. He ran promotions and offered bonuses to drive up his subscriber count. The buyer was now motivated to close the sale quickly because the price was going up every hour. The technique that Ted Rogers employed can be used by any seller of any business. All you have to do is base the sales price on a metric that is within your control, not the buyer's control. It can be top line sales in a rolling 12-month window, or gross profits in a rolling 12-month window, or you can negotiate the closing price to be adjusted up-or-down by the same percentage the company has grown or declined during the due diligence window. Pick a metric that you control. And then start growing your business as you've never grown it before. By remaining fully engaged in your business, you have now stripped the buyer of his power to ambush you at the closing table. And then, when the deal is done, come to Wizard Academy and tell us your story and we'll help you celebrate. Aroo, Roy H. Williams

Your assumptions about the intelligence of your customer will colorize and slant your ad writing in ways of which you are not even aware. Is the customer stupid? The writer of the 139th Psalm did not believe that customers are stupid. He said to God, “I will praise you; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” Harvard University Medical School made a 3-minute film that illustrates the idea that we are “fearfully and wonderfully made.” It's called The Inner Life of a Cell, and Indy Beagle has embedded it on the first page of the rabbit hole for you. To enter the rabbit hole, all you have to do is click the image of Indy at the top of the Monday Morning Memo. In the book, Wizard's First Rule by Terry Goodkind, we read, “Wizard's First Rule: People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything. Because people are stupid, they will believe a lie because they want to believe it's true, or because they are afraid it might be true. People's heads are full of knowledge, facts, and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all true. People are stupid; they can only rarely tell the difference between a lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the easier to fool.” When you make unsubstantiated claims, or if you “substantiate” your claims with sophistry, false facts, overstatements or hyperbole, you are writing under the assumption that people are stupid. But a lot of money has been made by giving gullible people false hope. When a person deeply wants to believe that what you are saying is true, they will believe it, in spite of the fact that you are lying. The assumption that people are stupid will help you write more effective political advertising, direct response advertising, and television infomercials. It will also help you build your downline in multilevel marketing. But conning stupid people out of their money is like beating up little children. I can do it, I just don't want to. There are two ways to write ads that target intelligent people. The first way is to immediately substantiate your claim with highly credible evidence each time you make a statement of benefit. EXAMPLE: Black Diamonds. Exotic. Rare. And Beautiful. A star exploded and sent an asteroid hurtling toward our galaxy a long time ago. That asteroid was more than half-a-mile wide, and it flew through space until it struck the earth. That asteroid was made of black diamonds. The National Science Foundation announced the news about these outer-space diamonds and then the New York Times wrote a story about them. Black Diamonds. Exotic. Rare. And Beautiful. The second way to advertise to intelligent persons is to use “Magical Thinking,” a style of writing characterized by elements of the impossible woven with a deadpan sense of presentation into an otherwise true story. Magical Thinking goes beyond the realm of exaggeration and moves into the realm of entertainment. EXAMPLE: Life is happier when it's less cluttered. Your house will be bigger! Your teeth will be whiter! Angels will sing! You'll be a better dancer. Go to 1-800-GotJunk.com and prepare to be amazed. If you make untrue statements and expect them to be believed, you are writing to a stupid person. But if you make untrue statements for the purposes of entertainment – knowing they will not be believed – you are writing to an intelligent person. If I provided an example of advertising filled with strong assurances, baseless claims, puffery and hyperbole with no evidence to support those claims, you would say, “Wow. I hear ads like that every day.” And now you know why people are so very annoyed by most advertising. Roy H. Williams

Brian, good thoughts!The https://healthtransformer.co/the-neuroscience-of-behavior-change-bcb567fa83c1 (Neuroscience of Behavior Change) link you sent was a great explanation of what Dr. Alan Baddeley calls “Procedural Memory.” You will recall this from The Magical Worlds Communications Workshop at Wizard Academy. Working Memory is consciousness, imagination, the thought you are thinking NOW. Semantic Declarative Memory contains things you can remember, but you cannot remember how or when you learned them. Episodic Declarative Memory is like Semantic Declarative Memory, except that you can remember the episode; the how and when of the learning. Procedural Memory is long-term, involuntary, automatic recall. It is electrical memory aided by chemical traces along the neural pathway. A perfect golf swing, the movement of fingers by a typist or a concert pianist, or the automatic recall of an advertiser's name; all these are positive expressions of Procedural Memory. Procedural Memory = Salience (impact or relevance) x Repetition. The greater the impact of the message, the less repetition is required. And keep in mind, repetition costs money.The Short-Term Goal of the Direct Response Ad Writer is to speak to an immediately-felt need of the customer who is currently, actively in need of the product or service in question. The Short-Term Goal of the Future Needs Ad Writer is to create Episodic declarative memory by saying or doing something new, surprising, or different, so that future recall of the episode might be established. To do this, the ad writer must make the reader/listener/viewer smile, laugh, cry, become nostalgic, become fearful, or get angry. This is because emotion triggers adrenaline and adrenaline is the biochemical adhesive that creates those chemical traces along the neural pathway. Information without emotion is of limited value. The Long-Term Goal of the Future Needs Ad Writer is to deliver a series of salient messages with enough repetition-over-time to create Procedural Memory, but without any of the negative associations that come with anger, sorrow and fear. So now you understand PTSD. It is simply is a negative expression of the long-term, involuntary, automatic recall known by neuroscientists as Procedural Memory, a product of Salience (importance, relevance, or surprise) times Repetition. With enough salience, a repetition of only one is sufficient to create Procedural Memory. Always good to hear from you Brian! Oh. One last thing: Those of you who didn't see https://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/reentry-2021/ (Brian's email to Indy Beagle) in last week's rabbit hole were likely intrigued by the new, surprising, and different opening of today's Monday Morning Memo: “Brian, good thoughts!” “Am I reading a private email to someone named Brian?” Or you may have wondered, “Brian who?” or if your own name is Brian, you may have asked, “How is the wizard personalizing the main body of the Monday Morning Memo to each individual reader?” In any case, those opening 3 words achieved reader/listener/viewer engagement, the first step in The Short-Term Goal of the Ad Writer. Aroo, Roy H. Williams

We were sitting in my backyard sharing a $600 bottle of wine he had brought.He said, “I got all 250 of my employees together on a Zoom call and told them, ‘You can disagree passionately and share your opinion while we are in the discussion phase, but when a decision has been made, you need to commit to the successful implementation of that decision as though it had been your own. To disagree and work half-heartedly and receive a paycheck is not an option. To disagree and covertly sabotage the plan and receive a paycheck is not an option. To disagree and whisper behind closed doors and receive a paycheck is not an option. You can either recuse yourself by turning in your resignation, or you can disagree and commit. Those are your options.'” My friend is strong, fair, and a marvelous employer. I have always admired him. Raised in a family with no money, he became stunningly successful by the time he was 40. That conversation with my friend is what triggered last week's Monday Morning Memo about https://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/newsletters/those-glorious-creative-handcuffs/ (“Those Glorious Creative Handcuffs.”)Ad writers like myself always believe we have the best answers and that people should listen to what we say. “But…” I tell my partners, “your client didn't hire you to be CEO. They hired you to make their plan work. If you believe you can improve their plan, you need to communicate what you would change, why you would change it, and how you would implement that change. But once you've had your day in court, your job is to make their plan succeed brilliantly, even if it's stupid.” In 40 years of ad-writing I've chosen to walk away only twice. In both instances I knew the only way the decided-upon plan could end was with a large, smoking hole in the earth where their successful company used to be. In both of those cases I was right. In every other instance, “Those Glorious Creative Handcuffs” clamped on my wrists triggered some of the best creative work I've ever done. “Disagree and Commit” works miraculously well, but only if you wash the memory of your ‘better plan' from your mind. Never speak of it again. Never think about it again. When you've had your day in court, commit to the plan and make it a point of honor to make that plan succeed. And then celebrate, celebrate, celebrate when it does. This will make you a person that every employer wants to hire, and every brilliant person wants on their team. Roy H. Williams

Every book is an island that exists only in the mind of its writer, and the hope of every writer is that you will visit their island and be glad you did. But in The Faraway Nearby, her book about how we make our lives out of stories, and how we are connected by empathy, narrative and imagination, Rebecca Solnit says, “The object we call a book is not the real book, but its potential, like a musical score or seed. It exists fully only in the act of being read. And its real home is inside the head of the reader, where the symphony resounds and the seed germinates. A book is a heart that only beats in the chest of another.” I think of books as islands, but Rebecca Solnit thinks of them as sheet music, or as seeds. I followed that trail of thought until I realized that she and I had simply discovered different metaphors to describe how books are literary portals of escape into alternate realities. Bored with my navel-gazing, I decided to search the 5,067 passages in the random quotes database at MondayMorningMemo.com to see how many other writers had spoken of islands. So I logged into the admin section, typed the word “island” into the search window, and was delighted to find that I had transcribed “island” passages from no fewer than a dozen of my favorite authors. “Something of the sense of holiness on islands comes, I think, from this strange, elastic geography. Islands are made larger, paradoxically, by the scale of the sea that surrounds them. The element which might reduce them, which might be thought to besiege them, has the opposite effect. The sea elevates these few acres into something they would never be if hidden in the mass of the mainland. The sea makes islands significant.” – Adam Nicolson, Sea Room From 1888 until his death in 1894, Robert Louis Stevenson lived in the South Seas. The diary of his island travels was published immediately after his death. “Few men who come to the islands leave them; they grow grey where they alighted; the palm shades and the trade-wind fans them till they die, perhaps cherishing to the last the fancy of a visit home, which is rarely made, more rarely enjoyed, and yet more rarely repeated. No part of the world exerts the same attractive power upon the visitor, and the task before me is to communicate to fireside travelers some sense of its seduction, and to describe the life, at sea and ashore, of many hundred thousand persons, some of our own blood and language, all our contemporaries, and yet as remote in thought and habit as Rob Roy or Barbarossa, the Apostles or the Caesars.” Three years later, Mary Kingsley spoke of her Travels in West Africa, an 1897 bestseller. “Once a hippopotamus and I were on an island together, and I wanted one of us to leave. I preferred it should be myself, but the hippo was close to my canoe, and looked like staying, so I made cautious and timorous advances to him and finally scratched him behind the ear with my umbrella and we parted on good terms. But with the crocodile it was different….” But 30 years before Robert Louis Stevenson or Mary Kingsley wrote about their islands, Mark Twain had a few words to say about the proposed US annexation of the Sandwich Islands. “When these islands were discovered the population was about 400,000, but the white man came and brought various complicated diseases, and education, and civilization, and all sorts of calamities, and consequently the population began to drop off with commendable activity. Forty years ago they were reduced to 200,000, and the educational and civilizing facilities being increased they dwindled down to 55,000, and it is proposed to send a few more missionaries and finish them. It isn't the education or civilization that has settled them; it is the imported diseases, and they have all got the consumption and other reliable distempers, and to speak figuratively, they are retiring from business pretty fast. When they pick up and leave we will

These are the basic principles of Chaotic Ad Writing as taught by Wizard Academy: 1. Approach your subject from an unexpected angle. 2. Tell two stories at once, using the relationship between two things as a pattern to reveal the relationship between two other things. 3. Allow the listener to arrive at their own conclusion. In the New Testament, stories like these are known as https://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/beagle-parables/ (parables.) This is the challenge we outlined in https://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/newsletters/my-visits-with-robert-frost/ (last week's Monday Morning Memo:) STEP ONE: I have chosen the word “Molokai” to be our unexpected beginning. STEP TWO: Send indy@WizardOfAds.com a link to the website of a product or service for which an ad could not possibly begin with the word “Molokai.” STEP THREE: I will randomly select five of these products or services and write a fascinating ad for each of them beginning with the word, “Molokai.” STEP FOUR: These five ads will be published in next week's Monday Morning Memo. DISCLOSURE: When I promised I would “randomly select” 5 products or services for which I would write an ad beginning with Molokai, I hadn't yet decided how I was going to do that. In the end, I just told Indy to give me the first 5 emails he received. These were from Jay Leigeber at 1:25AM, Malton Schexneider at 3:24AM, Pauline Tom at 3:51AM, Damien Deighan at 4:08AM, and TSO at 4:39AM, but this was an email to Indy for a “Molokai Beach Face Mask,” from John at TSO, so it was sort of like, “Interesting coincidence, huh?” So I figured I would take the next one, Bryan Eisenberg at 5:18AM, but Bryan is a close friend and that would look suspicious, so I disqualified him and went with  Wendy Gardner at 5:53AM. A few more emails trickled in during the next 30 minutes, then at 6:25AM Jason Fox opened the floodgates and Indy Beagle feared he would be swept away. Are you ready to read some ads? Jay Leigeber was convinced “Molokai” could not be used as the opening word for this product: Molokai. The most Hawaiian of the Hawaiian islands. Warm, wonderful, Molokai. For a one-time payment of just a hundred and twenty-nine dollars… Tushy will take you to Molokai every day… and bring you home, relaxed… refreshed… and feeling oh, so fine. The Tushy Spa warm water bidet attachment will fit any toilet… in any home… and take you to warm, wonderful Molokai whenever…you want…. to go. HelloTushy dot com. Malton Schexneider was convinced “Molokai” could not be used as the opening word for this product: Molokai is the wonderful island where the Hawaiians sent their people when they had a painful, debilitating condition. If you experience back pain, you know debilitating pain. Will you let us help you? Our free report on Eliminating and Preventing Back Pain will be your own private, Molokai, where you can find relief, and health, and experience happiness once again. Molokai awaits you at Back Pain Relief Secrets dot com. [That ad was completely true, by the way. Molokai housed Hawaii's leper colony for more than 100 years. – Indy Beagle] Pauline Tom was convinced “Molokai” could not be used as the opening word for this product: Molokai. That untouched Hawaiian island, is HOME to the world's most beautiful birds. But there is one bird in your own backyard that is smart… and wise… and beautiful enough to be the pride of Molokai, and it needs a home, too. Will you give your Bluebird a fabulous, custom home where it can be safe and happy? Just 25 dollars at Texas Bluebird Society dot org. Damien Deighan was convinced “Molokai” could not be used as the opening word for this product: Molokai is the island where everything is simple… straightforward… uncomplicated. If you're looking for a simple, straightforward, uncomplicated way

Robert Frost died when I was four, so we never met face to face, but throughout my formative years I spent an hour with him every night before I fell asleep. Robert Frost taught me how to write. If you will write like Robert Frost, you must approach your subject from an unexpected angle. Few things capture the attention like the unexpected. When your reader or listener has chosen to follow you on a journey, it is because they expect to be fascinated, intrigued, and delighted. Don't let them down. Robert Frost knew that things can be used as metaphors for other things, which is why his poems often finish by making a powerful point we didn't see coming. The dual nature of metaphors makes it easy to tell two stories at once. In addition, Frost uses metaphors to lead us toward a destination. Then he allows us to joyfully discover it on our own. He doesn't tell us what to believe; he just causes us to believe it. And like every great ad, his poems get better with every repetition. Robert Frost noticed the binary relationship between the hot and cold theories of earth's destruction and wrote “Fire and Ice” exactly 100 years ago. Some say the world will end in fire, Some say in ice. From what I've tasted of desire I hold with those who favor fire. But if it had to perish twice, I think I know enough of hate To say that for destruction ice Is also great And would suffice. – Robert Frost  (1920) 1. With his opening surprise of just 12 words he shows us the two possibilities known to every astrophysicist: (A.) our world could be burned up by the explosion of our sun, or (B.) we could perish in a coming ice age. 2. But then he makes a hard left turn to reveal that desire is just another type of fire, and hate is another kind of ice that for destruction “is also great and would suffice.” Robert Frost opens our eyes to the destructive powers of greed and hate in 15 seconds, with just 51 words. When you allow a person to arrive at their own conclusion, the truth you have communicated is no longer your truth, but their truth, and no one will ever be able to take it away from them. They will forever defend it as a product of their own observation. 1. Approach your subject from an unexpected angle. 2. Tell two stories at once, using the relationship between two things as a pattern to reveal the relationship between two other things. 3. Allow the listener to arrive at their own conclusion. These are the principles of Chaotic Ad Writing as taught by Wizard Academy. Chaos in science is not randomness but its opposite, a higher level of order beyond the scope of our immediate awareness. In the words of chaotic novelist Tom Robbins,* “Everything in the universe is connected, of course. It's just a matter of using imagination to discover the links, and language to expand and enliven them.” But Robert Frost knew this before Tom Robbins was born. And Robert Frost taught it to me. Shall we put it to the test? STEP ONE: I have chosen the word “Molokai” to be our unexpected beginning. STEP TWO: Send indy@WizardOfAds.com a link to the website of a product or service for which an ad could not possibly begin with the word “Molokai.” STEP THREE: I will randomly select five of these products or services and write a fascinating ad for each of them beginning with the word, “Molokai.” STEP FOUR: These five ads will be published in next week's Monday Morning Memo. The objective of this demonstration will be to show you how “everything in the universe is connected, of course,” and how you can leverage these connections to accomplish things you have never been able to accomplish before. I would happily tell you “what kinds of things” but when you have seen this technique demonstrated five times, you will come to your own conclusions. The connectedness of everything around you will no longer be Robert Frost's truth, or Tom Robbins' truth, or my truth, but your...

You are flying your small airplane on a beautiful day. There is a tiny speck on your windshield. Like the North Star, it doesn't move. This is why it escapes your notice. Had that speck begun moving across your windshield, you would have recognized it as another airplane. The fact that it doesn't move means that you and that speck will soon intersect unless one of you changes direction. That speck will quickly-all-at-once fill your windshield and then… I'm trying to teach you a new way of thinking about your blind spot.If you knew it was there, they wouldn't call it a blind spot. Blind spots are why it is wise for you and me to each have a special person in our lives to notice things we don't notice. You would be amazed at the number of times each week Princess Pennie has to point out specks on the windshield I didn't see. Right now, you are thinking to yourself, “What the wizard just told us completely contradicts Indy Beagle's assertion last week that, ‘Nothing is so annoying as unsolicited advice, for within it lies the assumption of superior wisdom.'” I'm not contradicting Indy, I'm just pointing out a speck on his windshield. Each of us – you, me, everyone – is limited in our perceptions. But we don't like to believe we are. Time-travel with me:In the second chapter of the first book of the Bible, God muses to himself, “It is not good for a person to be alone.” I think this is why He made so many of us, and why we are so different. Solomon, widely known for his wisdom, wrote, “Two are better than one…If one falls down, his partner can help him up. But pity the person who falls and has no one to help him up!” 1 And in the Proverbs, he wrote, “Whoever finds a partner finds a good thing.” 2 On page 148 of the book that won her the Nobel Prize in Literature,3 Olga Tokarczuk writes, “The world here is so large, so impossible to take in,” she said, fixing her gaze on me for a few seconds, testing me, “Agata is my wife.” I blinked, I had never heard one woman referring to another as “my wife” before. But I liked it. “You're surprised, aren't you?” I thought for a while. “I could have a wife, too,” I said with conviction. “It's better to live with someone than alone. It's easier to go through life together with someone than on one's own.” Allow me to conclude by revisiting your accusation that today's Monday Morning Memo contradicts last week's Monday Morning Memo written by Indy Beagle.Niels Bohr, the physicist who won the 1922 Nobel Prize in Physics, said, “The opposite of a correct statement is a false statement. But the opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth.” Please note that Niels Bohr was a physicist, not a philosopher. Stanislaw Lec, however, was a philosopher. He confirmed Niels Bohr's thesis about opposite truths by saying, “Proverbs contradict each other. That is the wisdom of a people.” 4 F. Scott Fitzgerald, the writer who gave us The Great Gatsby, summarized the idea of opposite truths this way, “The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.” Yes, F. Scott was a drunkard, but that doesn't mean he was wrong. Alcohol was a speck on his windshield. Sadly for F. Scott, that speck quickly-all-at-once filled his windshield when he was just 44 years old. I'm betting if he had it all to do over again, he would have let someone help him wipe that speck away. Roy H. Williams 1 Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 2 Proverbs 18:22 [Yeah, I wrote “partner” when Solomon said “wife.” Don't have a conniption. A person doesn't have to be your spouse – or even female – to point out the speck on your windshield. – RHW] 3 Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead, p. 148 4 I've put 30 examples of “proverbs contradicting each other” in the rabbit hole for you. – Indy

Richard Kessler built one of the most famous stores in America. You might remember his name from https://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/newsletters/origins/ (the Monday Morning Memo about origin stories) published on March 20, 2017.  Here is Kessler's origin story in a 60-second radio ad:My Dad was a house painter. He taught me to sand and scrape paint until my fingers were aching and raw. But I wanted to make him proud, so I always worked hard. I'll never forget the day we opened our brown bags at lunch time and he said, “Son. I'm proud of how hard you work, but I hope that someday you'll get a job where you can wear a tie.” And because I wanted to make him proud, I decided to open a jewelry store. I watched as my Dad took his last seven hundred dollars out of his sock drawer to help me get started. But he never got to see that store.  He died just before it was open. I lived on wieners and beans for the next 11 years until I finally figured it out:  Lose the tie… And be a regular guy just like your Dad.  That's when things turned around for me. I've been sharing the story of that 700 dollars with young entrepreneurs in High Schools and Colleges for years. America's newest and best Kesslers Diamond Center is about to open in front of Cabela's next to the Rivertown Mall in Grandville. I'm Richard Kessler, and I'm hoping to become your jeweler. Richard Kessler is a celebrity in his hometown of Milwaukee, with 50% of the population of that city having heard at least 3 of his radio ads every week, fifty-two-weeks in a row, for the past 30 years. Richard's daughter, Monica, was his sidekick on the radio for 5 years, then became the principal voice of the Kesslers ad campaign when Richard retired. But Richard Kessler also has a son.Hi, I'm Rob Kessler, yeah that Kessler, son of Richard and brother to Monica. I invented a new kind of shirt that makes guys look fantastic.  You'll see what I mean the moment you look in the mirror after trying one on. “Wow! Is that me?” And you can try one on right now at Harleys Menswear. My company is called goTieless and your new shirt has my patented, Million Dollar Collar. Shirt-makers all over the world are trying to license the Million Dollar Collar, but I'm not sure I want to do that. But I AM sure I want you to see yourself in the mirror wearing one. Average dress shirts were designed to be worn with a tie.  goTIELESS shirts are designed to make you look like you've been spending time in the gym. Seriously, go to Harleys Menswear and try one on and look in the mirror.  WOW!! My website is goTIELESS dot com. You're going to look AMAZING in the casual dress shirts I designed for you.  goTIELESS dot com. Dad says “Hi” by the way.  For real.  goTIELESS dot com. Line 1: Introduce the unknown and unfamiliar by relating it to the known and familiar. “Hi, I'm Rob Kessler, yeah that Kessler, son of Richard and brother to Monica.” Line 2: Replace predictable words with unexpected words that mean the same thing. Not “I designed a shirt…” but, “I invented a shirt…” Also, bring the customer into the picture by saying “…that makes guys look FANTASTIC.” Line 3: Amplify the customer's curiosity by putting them squarely in the center of the picture you're painting. “You'll see what I mean the moment you look in the mirror after trying one on. ‘Wow! Is that me?'” Line 4: Cause the customer to imagine themselves taking the action you want them to take. “And you can try one on right now at Harleys Menswear.” Line 5a: Introduce the domain name you need them to remember, then answer the question that lurks in the mind of the listener: What did Rob Kessler invent that makes guys look fantastic? “My company is called goTIELESS and your new

I want you to be in Austin on May 2nd if you can. The Princess has chosen the perfect location for The House of Bilbo Baggins, and there's a chance we may have something for you to see when you get here. We have also begun construction on The Village of the Lost Boys and we ought to have the first two of the cabins in that village mostly completed by then. You remember The Lost Boys from Peter Pan, don't you? Peter tells Wendy about them in chapter 3 of his glittering 1904 novel. “They are the children who fall out of their perambulators when the nurse is looking the other way.” “Are none of them girls?” “Oh, no; girls are much too clever to fall out of their prams.” May 2nd will be the 20th Anniversary of the birth of Wizard Academy. In the year 2000, classes were held in the attic of our offices in Buda. In 2001, we appropriated the little one-room building next door that was originally built as a gym for the employees of Williams Marketing. In 2004, Princess Pennie located and purchased the plateau across which our sprawling little campus is now draped. The 6 cabins in The Village of the Lost Boys will raise the number of on-campus rooms to 24, but with a second bed in the loft of each cabin, we will theoretically be able to sleep 30. And 30 people, ladies and gentlemen, is a very packed Eye of the Storm. Did you know that The Eye of the Storm classroom and lecture hall in the tower was built by Tim Storm? I always intended to call it The Eye of the Storm since it is where the fierce winds of new information cause us to realize that much of “traditional marketing wisdom” is more tradition than wisdom. It was that loveliest of invisible ladies, Serendipity, that whispered to Tim Storm that he should build it, even though he had no idea what I planned to name it. I have always depended on the whispers of Serendipity to suggest to the friends of Wizard Academy that they should leave a permanent mark on our campus. Dozens of you have already heard her whispers and acted upon them. On May 2nd, 2020, we're going to celebrate what you, and she, have done together. Two weeks ago, Tim Gallagher was in The Magical Worlds Communications Workshop with his delightful daughter, Fallyn. She had never seen Gallagher Lane, that lovely winding sidewalk that leads from The Bell Wall all the way down to Engelbrecht House in the Valley of the Lost Boys. Have you never noticed the beautiful verdigris-bronze plaque in the portal of the Bell Wall? (Don't worry, Indy says he's going to show it to you along with a lot of other cool stuff in today's highly informative rabbit hole. To enter the rabbit hole, just click the image of Indy Beagle at the top of this Monday Morning Memo.) On January 1, the day after tomorrow, Daniel Whittington will officially take over as Chancellor of Wizard Academy although he's been doing most of my job for at least two years. Can you believe Daniel has been here for 6 years and that Zac Smith has been serving as Vice-Chancellor for a full year already? I will remain involved in classes at Wizard Academy and Pennie will continue her duties overseeing the appearance of the physical campus for years to come, but the day-to-day financial obligations and management of your school are now solidly on the shoulders of young brother Whittington. On May 2nd, we will release that long-awaited guidebook, Secrets of the Wizard Academy Campus, as you and we celebrate our past 20 years together and take a look at what is planned for the next 20 years. Among those things will be the speedy completion of The Village of the Lost Boys and The House of Bilbo Baggins. And then there is the incredibly important new certification program called The Ad Writers Masters Class. Indy is tapping the toenails of his right-front paw. I think he's anxious for you to come and see what...

My business partners meet twice a year to spend a few days together. A transcription of their discussions during these meetings could easily become a bestselling book. A number of my partners have grown far beyond anything I ever taught them, which makes answering their questions a lot easier for me. I employ a mildly deceptive technique that has been used by teachers throughout history:When confronted with a question for which you have no immediate answer, stall for time by tossing the question back to the students. Keep their discussion moving forward until they have arrived at a solid conclusion. They will never suspect that you didn't already know the answer. During our last meeting, one of my partners was sharing the secrets of his very successful online campaigns with the rest of us when he said, “When I became a partner 15 years ago, I was hoping that Roy would tell us exactly how the sausage is made. Looking back, I appreciate his wisdom in not doing that.” “What do you mean by, ‘how the sausage is made?'” I asked. “I mean, ‘exactly how to write great ads.'” His answer confused me because I was under the illusion that I had, in fact, taught them “exactly how to write great ads.” But rather than admit that I had no idea what he was talking about, I said, “Let's talk about the different ways of making the sausage. Sexton, how many ways are there to write great ads?” I asked that question as though I already knew the answer, when in truth, I did not. But I was smart enough to ask the person that I suspected would know the answer. “Two,” answered Sexton. “You can follow a template and search for the information to fill each of the openings within that template, or you can gather information and then organize it however you choose. No template.” His answer blew my mind because he was obviously right, but this idea of “writing to a template” had never once crossed my mind. Startled by his answer, I said to the room, “How many of you write to a template?” About half the hands went up. “How many of you gather information and then organize it? No template.” The other half of the hands went up. The thing that startled me the most, however, was that half of the most accomplished writers in the room were using one method, and the other half was using the other. Even more interestingly, I spent the next several weeks asking a number of highly accomplished business owners which of the two methods they would follow. Again, half of them said “template,” which is another way of saying, “Plan your work, and work your plan.” The other half said, “Gather, then organize,” which is another way of saying, “Work with what you've got. Improvise.” Regardless of which technique you prefer, does it surprise you that both techniques seem to work equally well? Who'd have thought it? If you have thoughts, anecdotes, or stories about this interesting duality of Planning vs. Improvisation, send them to indy@wizardofads.com and we'll see if some of them land in the rabbit hole. Also, Indy is planning to feature some murals on the sides of buildings in the rabbit hole next week, so if you have a cool photo of an outdoor mural, send it to him with a description of its location, okay? For those of you who don't know, the rabbit hole is entered by clicking the image of Indy Beagle at the top of each week's online version of the Monday Morning Memo. (That's him at the top of this page holding a sausage in his jaws.) Indy's rabbit hole is an informative, eclectic, wonderful waste of time. “Not long ago, sitting at my desk at home, I suddenly had the horrifying realization that I no longer waste time.” – MIT professor and physicist Alan Lightman in his book, A Sense of the Mysterious Indy has the cure for Alan Lightman's distress. His rabbit hole usually rambles on for about 8 to 28 pages. Click the image at the top of each rabbit hole page and it will take you to the next page. Anything can

“The rest of my life has passed quite suddenly. Around ten or twelve I fell into the inevitable logarithms of time. It seems to go faster and faster. I wonder now why we have to have Christmas so often.” – Kary MullisOur friend Kary Mullis died on Aug. 7, 2019, at the age of 74. His first trip to Wizard Academy with Nancy was more than 15 years ago. They were in the same class as (L to R) Chris Lowry of Savannah and Mike Greene of Asheville and Jane Fraser of Halifax (in teal, below Chris and Mike) along with 20 other delightful people. Kary's colleagues in science called him “an untamed genius.” His discovery of polymerase chain reaction in 1983 opened the door for us to study DNA and won him the 1993 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. I agree with Kary's observation concerning the inevitable logarithms of time, don't you? Wasn't it just a few months ago that you and I walked across an open field and spoke of what we would build together? That campus is nearly finished now. Do you remember when 106 of the cognoscenti of Wizard Academy worked together on a book called Accidental Magic? I pulled my copy off the shelf just now and marveled at it, as I have done at least once a year for the past 18 years. I do the same thing with your book, People Stories: Inside the Outside. Your talent continues to amaze me. Do you remember when Ray Bard arrived with those 200 hardbacks of Accidental Magic just as your book-release party began in 2001? You had already landed in Austin and were on your way to the Academy while Ray was still sitting anxiously at the airport, waiting for the first printing of your book to arrive. This summer, Avital Rotbart worked nonstop for several weeks on our long-promised book, Secrets of the Wizard Academy Campus. We hope to have those available on May 2, but as we have learned, printers often have schedules of their own. Likewise, we expect to be able to unveil The Ad Writer's Masters Class. Working at the speed of light, a person could – in theory – complete that class in a year, but in reality, it will take most people two years. You will instantly be able to recognize an Ad Master when you meet one. I'll tell you how on https://www.wizardacademy.org/product/2020-academy-reunion-may-2nd/ (May 2 when we gather) for an unforgettable campus tour and celebration. It will be epic. We'll feast like kings. When a person reminisces as I have done in today's Monday Morning Memo, we usually assume they will soon be departing and are singing us a soft goodbye. Let me assure you this is not the case. We're simply hosting a catered half-time show. Let us know if you plan to come. Roy H. Williams

Twenty-five years ago, I did three important things.The second-most-important of these was the launching of the Monday Morning Memo, even though no one can remember what it's called. “I've been reading your Monday thing for more than 10 years,” is the opening line to my favorite song. I never get tired of hearing it. The third-most-important thing I did in 1994 was fall asleep on a motorcycle and then get run over by a car as I lay unconscious in the middle of the road. “Induced hypothermia” is the medical name for involuntarily falling asleep due to your body temperature plummeting quickly. It was the first Wednesday after Thanksgiving – November 30 – and every retailer on my client list needed reassurance that Santa had not been kidnapped and Christmas had not been cancelled. My day started with ad writing at 2AM and ended with me climbing onto my 1000cc BMW at 10PM to ride home from the office. The sun had fallen far below the horizon and a cold front had swept the warm air away. Jacketless, I shivered as I climbed onto my bike, “Four miles, no stoplights, no traffic. I'll make it home in record time.” An hour and a half later, I woke up in the emergency room with lots of broken bones, none of which could be set. They kept me overnight – about 12 hours – to make sure I had no internal injuries, then I was back at work at 10:30AM. Christmas and retailers cannot be delayed. I typed with one hand – my uncoordinated left – for more than a year. When my right arm ached, I would reach over with my left hand to pick it up and lay it on the table. But that motorcycle wreck was the least consequential of the 3 things to happen that year and the creation of the Monday Morning Memo was number two, even though the first 100 of those memos would soon become the first book in the Wizard of Ads trilogy. The most important event of 1994 – by far – was that Pennie and I told our sons that each of them could choose any city in the world and I would take them there for a week while the other brother stayed at home with their mom.Rex was 13 that summer. Jake was 11. A week alone in a strange city with your Dad is a fascinating rite-of-passage. It is probably the smartest and best thing I've ever done. Allow your son or daughter, grandson or granddaughter, friend or neighbor, to choose their city with no guidance, no hints, no suggestions of any kind. They must make the decision all on their own and then announce it. I am amazed at the cities people choose and for the reasons behind their choices. Rex decided he wanted to spend 3 days in Las Vegas, then fly on a tiny airplane to the Grand Canyon where we would spend another 3 days in a series of misadventures. Jacob chose Juneau, Alaska where we went deep-sea fishing, ocean kayaking, panned for gold, landed in a helicopter on the Mendenhall glacier and then wandered dangerously around on the slippery ice as melting water gathered and gushed into infinitely-deep holes big enough for a human to fall into. We spent a week wandering around in that beautiful Alaskan town accessible only by air, water, and rail. Juneau has just 27 miles of pavement and a big part of those miles are the road to the airport. But more than 150 miles of gold mining tunnels hide in the mountains. Rex's son, Hollister, turned 13 this summer. He chose Long Beach, California. If you're reading this on Monday, August 19, 2019, Hollister and I are still here. Indy Beagle promised he would post photos of us in the rabbit hole. Hollister's brother, Gideon, will choose a city two summers from now. Their little sister, Edie, will choose her city in 2029 and Jacob's son, Vance, will choose his in 2030. Jewish boys look forward to a bar mitzvah when they turn 13, and their sisters look forward to a bat mitzvah at 12 or 13, depending on the tradition of their family. Our family tradition didn't have a name when Rex and Jake chose their cities 25 years ago, but Princess Pennie and the older grandkids refer...

Have you ever casually started down a path and then the journey got a life of its own? The White Rabbit appears in chapter one, inexplicably wearing a waistcoat. So what does Alice do? She follows him down the rabbit hole. There's just no turning back after a decision like that. The journey is alive and it's bigger than you. At twenty, I followed a White Rabbit and became an ad writer. At forty, I wrote The Wizard of Ads and it became Business Book of the Year. At sixty, I announced I was going to create The Ad Writers Masters Class for The American Small Business Institute and that its graduates would be qualified for admission into The Ad Writer's Guild. The journey got a life of its own. Becoming an AdMaster will be like becoming a Black Belt in the art of ad writing. I expressed my biggest fear about that 52-week online class in last week's Monday Morning Memo. Did you read it?“I sometimes worry that we have an instant-gratification attitude regarding education. We believe that when we have learned from an expert how a thing is done, we now have the ability to do that thing expertly. But there is a long and winding road to be traveled from Information to Proficiency. And then there is a second long and winding road from Proficiency to Authority.” My partner Jeff Sexton read that and immediately sent me a video featuring Ira Glass, the producer and host of the award-winning public radio program This American Life.“Nobody tells people who are beginners – I really wish somebody had told this to me – is that all of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But for the first couple of years that you're making stuff, what you're making isn't so good. Okay? It's not that great. It's trying to be good, it has ambition to be good, but it's not quite good. But, your taste – the thing that got you into the game – your taste is still killer. And your taste is good enough that you can tell what you're making is a disappointment to you.” “A lot of people never get past that phase. They quit. The thing that I would say to you with all my heart is that most everybody I know who does interesting, creative work, went through a phase of years where they could tell that what they were making wasn't as good as they wanted it to be. They knew it fell short.” “Everyone goes through that, and if you're going through it right now, you've got to know it's totally normal, and the most important possible thing you could do is do a lot of work. Do a huge volume of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week, or every month, you know you're going to finish one story. Because it's only by actually going through a volume of work that you're actually going to catch up and close that gap. The work you're making will be as good as your ambitions.” “It's going to take you a while. It's normal to take a while, and you just have to fight your way through that. Okay?” When I followed up on that idea of becoming a black belt, I learned that it was a far more accurate comparison than I had realized. WIKIPEDIA says,“In Japanese martial arts; the shodan black belt is not the end of training, but rather a beginning to advanced learning: the individual now ‘knows how to walk' and may thus begin the ‘journey.'” When The Ad Writers Masters Class is finally announced, I hope you'll consider it. And if you decide to pursue your black belt in ad writing, I hope you'll remember that there's a long and winding road from Information to Proficiency. In the meantime, you can learn How to Become a YouTube Influencer. Not that it's any easier. But that class is fully polished and https://www.wizardacademy.org/product/how-to-build-an-audience-with-video-september-3-4/ (coming up in September.) Indy said to tell you “Aroo,” and that he'll see you in https://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/rabbithole/ (the rabbit hole.) You know the way. Roy H....

“It was dark inside the wolf,” is how Margaret Atwood believes the story might have opened. Emily Dickinson would agree. “Tell all the truth, but tell it slant,” was her advice to those of us who want our emails to be opened, our stories to be read, and our voices to be heard. If you want your subject line, headline, or opening line to win attention, “Tell all the truth, but tell it slant.” Approach your subject from an interesting angle. The head-on approach is for journalists without wit. “Elderly Woman Eaten by Wolf but Survives.” You are not a journalist without wit. Are you captivated by a photograph or story?Let me give you the reasons why:1. It represents an idea bigger than itself. 2. Part of you feels like you are there. 3. Your imagination is called upon to fill in what was purposely left out. 4. The subject is approached from an interesting angle. Do you want to secure the engagement of your reader, listener, customer?1. Make your words about something bigger than you and your product. 2. Put your reader, listener, customer into your story, your speech, your ad. This is easily done using second person perspective and present-tense verbs. “You are walking through a forest when you hear the shadows of the trees sucking the light from the air around you and notice a four-legged shadow making its way slowly through the trees, coming toward you…” 3. Did you see what we left out? We did not say it was a “dark” forest, but you saw darkness anyway. We did not say “ominous” but you felt it when the shadows came alive and began sucking the sunlight from the air around you. We did not say “wolf,” but you saw one in the four-legged shadow making its way slowly through the trees.* 4. Questions flood the mind when a story is entered from an interesting angle. Why are we in the woods? Where are we going? What will we do when we get there? Whether spoken or unspoken, questions are the unmistakable sign of engagement.No questions, no engagement. No engagement means no sale, no income, no rave reviews. But you will have all these things and in great supply because you subscribe to the Monday Morning Memo and you understand, and believe, what I have told you. But I will not tell you about our monthly webcast unless https://www.americansmallbusinessinstitute.org/full-access-asbi/ (you really want to know.) Confession: I write ads to attract successful people; perceptive, intelligent readers.I do not write for dull-witted people. My avoidance of false claims, fear-mongering, hyperbole and exclamation points is a form of targeting-through-ad-copy that is more reliable than any customer list money can buy. The fact that you have read these musings all the way to the end makes me think highly of you. Very highly, indeed. Yours, Roy H. Williams

I'm reading Hemingway's novel, Death in the Afternoon, and I like it.It is a detailed explanation of bullfighting. Not a story about a bullfighter. Bullfighting. I have no interest in bullfighting. None. The book has no character arc because it has no characters. It has narrative, but no narrative arc. No plot, no moments of crisis, no heroism, no romance. It is essentially an instruction manual. Why do I find myself drawn to this book? Yesterday morning I said to Pennie, “Hemingway is teaching me some things I can't quite put into words, but as soon as I can figure out how to explain them, I'll tell you what they are.” She was moving laundry from the washer to the dryer. “Read me a page that you liked.” “Page one hundred and twenty. Hemingway has been explaining how the bulls of Salamanca differ from the bulls of Andalucia when – out of nowhere – he inserts a literary device I've never seen in a book.” “What kind of literary device?” “He imagines a reader's reaction to his book, then, speaking as that reader, he criticizes the author for not doing the thing that made him famous. Then, as the author, he accommodates this imaginary reader by inserting an imaginary conversation with an imaginary woman. It's the same kind of multi-layered self-talk Robin Williams used to do.” “Read it to me.” But, you say, there is very little conversation in this book. Why isn't there more dialogue? What we want in a book by this citizen is people talking; that is all he knows how to do and now he doesn't do it. The fellow is no philosopher, no savant, an incompetent zoologist, he drinks too much and cannot punctuate readily and now he has stopped writing dialogue. Someone ought to put a stop to him. He is bull crazy. Citizen, perhaps you are right. Let us have a little dialogue. What do you ask, Madame? Is there anything you would like to know about the bulls? Yes, sir. What would you like to know? I'll tell you absolutely anything. It is a difficult thing to ask, sir. Do not let that trouble you; talk to me frankly; as you would to your doctor, or to another woman. Do not be afraid to ask what you would really like to know. Sir, I would like to know about their love life. Madame, you have come to just the man. Pennie smiled and nodded her head. Then she handed me a gang of shirts on hangers and told me to put them in my closet. I hung the shirts on the doorknob of the laundry room and said, “It's like that time I took http://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/chris-maddock-in-guatemala/ (Chris) with me to Seattle.” “That time he began speaking to an imaginary television audience in that seafood restaurant?” “Yeah. He just put down his fork, stared at a point on the wall across the room and said, ‘Hello there, friends. It's time, once again, for Workin' It, with Chris Maddock.' After a 5-minute opening monologue, he turned and began talking to a guest on his show; an invisible woman seated next to him. Never cracked a smile. Never broke character.” “How did the show end?” “He just picked up his fork and started eating again.” “What year was that?” “1999” “When did Hemingway write the bullfight book?” “1932” As she picked up a stack of folded towels, she said, “When we're surprised by weird, unexpected twists and turns, it makes the journey more interesting.” I nodded my agreement and lifted the shirts off the doorknob. “Maybe you should do that in a Monday Morning Memo.” “Maybe I will.” Roy H. Williams

“He knew how to lead by listening and teaching.”– Erwin C. Hargrove, a professor of political science at Vanderbilt University, writing in 1998 about a leader he much admired. I, too, have known brilliant leaders like that; men and women who lead by listening and teaching.Brian Scudamore, Lori Barr, Richard Kessler, Cathy Thorpe, Erik Church, Sarah Casebier, David Rehr, Michele Miller, Brian Alter, Richard D. Grant and David St. James to name just a few. I mentioned one such leader, Dewey Jenkins, in last week's Monday Morning Memo. Another of them, Ken Sim, is currently running for mayor of Vancouver. According to Professor Hargrove, the key to leadership is to hearken to “the better angels of our nature,” a phrase he borrowed from Abraham Lincoln, who used it in his first inaugural address on March 4, 1861. But we didn't listen to Lincoln. We chose civil war just 6 weeks later.The leader that Professor Hargrove admired who “knew how to lead by listening and teaching,” was another American president who encouraged us during a different time of social upheaval – the Great Depression. “In February 1933, a man shot at [Franklin Delano] Roosevelt, who was riding in an open car in Miami, but succeeded in killing Anton Cermak, the mayor of Chicago, who was with the president-elect. FDR was calm and deci­sive, ordering the driver to go immediately to the hospital, paying no attention to his own security, and talking to the wounded man. His calm courage impressed all who saw him.” – Erwin C. Hargrove, The President As A Leader: Appealing to the Better Angels of Our Nature, p. 79 (1998) The Stanford Library review of Professor Hargrove's book ends with this statement: “In harking back to Lincoln's evocation of the better angels of our nature, Hargrove reminds us that we may, even as leaders, be better versions of ourselves.” And the key to becoming that “better version of ourselves” is to become focused listeners and patient teachers. The reason history repeats itself is because we don't pay attention the first time.Anti-intellectualism in American Life was written in 1964 by Richard Hofstadter, a professor of American History at Columbia University. It won him the Pulitzer Prize. It was his second. He won his first Pulitzer for his 1955 book, The Age of Reform. Reading these books has caused me to develop a theory.Can I share my observations with you? Our obsession with the internet has led us to believe that we are smarter and wiser than any previous generation. We quietly assume that anyone over 40 is a dinosaur, and that every famous historical figure was innocently naive. “But they couldn't help it,” we sympathize, “because they didn't know everything like we do now.” We ignore the centuries of experience of previous generations. We are teaching. But we are not listening.And those who teach – without listening – share their own preferences as though those preferences were wisdom. But what do I know? I'm over 40. Roy H. Williams

The Random Quotes database at MondayMorningMemo.com currently contains 4,376 quotes.About a third of these are quotes you can easily find online. Nearly half are delightful passages I've transcribed from books, movies, or TV shows, and archived for future reference. Five percent are witty and wonderful statements made by friends during lunch or in casually written emails. And exactly 455 of those 4,376 quotes are words of my own.Quoting oneself might appear to be insufferably egotistical, but in truth, my only objective is to capture thoughts I might want to think upon in the future. Hence my latest addition to the database, made only moments ago, “Boxwine and Soupline are barstool buddies of Spraytan and Parlay. The girl is Parlay's sister, Parfait.” Innocent readers who stumble upon that quote in the future will doubtless scratch their heads and say, “What the hell?” never suspecting it's only a note I scribbled to myself about characters in a short story yet to be written. But today, because you are special, I will explain the backstory of those 5 characters.A dozen years ago I hired Devin Wright and trained him to be a media buyer, a professional negotiator. At least once a day I would pop into his office and ask him a wildly unexpected question. Devin would always laugh, and that would be that. But one day about 7 years ago I popped in, pointed at him and asked, “Devin, is that a spray tan?” Devin sputtered and coughed and denied that he would ever do such a thing, so of course being from Oklahoma, I was required to forever thereafter introduce him as Spraytan Wright. Wine snob Boxwine Harrison has the office next to Spraytan. I decided that Boxwine's little brother would be Soupline. “But whence,” you ask, “come Parlay and Parfait?” Be patient. I'm getting to that.A week ago, Spraytan put $200 on an online gambling site so that he could place bets on sporting events. He quickly turned his $200 into $600, then got bored and lost the whole $600 playing blackjack. His pirate friend Dave Neubert asked, “Did you check your bonus money?” “My what?” “When you put money into an account, they often give you a few bonus dollars just to keep you gambling.” Spraytan checked, and sure enough, he had 4 dollars and 41 cents in bonus money. So he chose 12 fights that would happen later that day, picked his 12 fighters, and parlayed his $4.41 across the entire dozen, which means he had to pick 12 winners in advance or his bet would be forfeited. If even one of his fighters lost, Spraytan would get nothing. Big deal, right? It's four dollars and 41 cents. And not even his money.So he went to get a haircut. When he got up from the barber chair, Spraytan checked on his bet. Ten of the 12 fights were over, and his fighters had won all 10 fights! He drove home quickly, to say the least. They tell me the gravel from his tires is still flying above that parking lot. Sliding sideways into his driveway, Spraytan ran into his house, turned on the TV and began shouting instructions to fighter number 11. But that guy lost. Then, when Spraytan checked his bet, it turns out that he had bet on the other guy, the winner! When his 12th fighter won the 12th fight, Spraytan looked at his cell phone screen to see that his four dollars and 41 cents was now three thousand, seven hundred and twelve dollars and two cents. When he told me what happened, I said, “Spraytan, I believe you've earned a new nickname. After today, I'm going to start calling you Parlay.” He smiled. “But of course Parlay isn't a word I'm really familiar with. The truth is I never heard that word until you told me your story just now, so I'm sure you'll understand if I occasionally call you Parfait.” The smile disappeared and Devin said, “I think we should just stick with Spraytan.” Walking across the parking lot, I began thinking about a series of adventures involving Boxwine and Spraytan and Parlay and Parfait and Boxwine's little brother,

When you have nothing to say, be careful that you don't pay money to say it.“What do you mean?” Have you ever paid a premium to target the right audience and then made an offer that failed to move them? “Everyone has paid for ads that didn't work.” Did you realize that your message was at fault, or did you assume that you had mis-targeted? “Well, even when it doesn't work, at least I get some name recognition.” [sigh] What am I going to do with you? Name recognition is enough only if your competitors are invisible or incompetent. “What do you mean?” Invisible means they don't have the courage to advertise.Incompetent means their ads are even worse than yours.“But my ads are way better than average. They look and feel professional.” Most ads – even professional ads – aren't written to persuade. They are written not to offend. This is why most ads speak in worn-out clichés. Why not just add a stock photo and get it over with? “Are you saying that most ads are ineffective?” Even the weakest ads have an effect, but what you're looking for is long-lasting, cumulative impact.“Can you speak more plainly, please?” Bad advertising is about your product. Good advertising is about your customer and their life. And your customer values nothing so much as they value that circle of people who are close to them. Your customer relates to those people. Your customer identifies with those people. Your customer forgives those people when they screw up. “I thought we were talking about advertising here. You make it sound like I should spend my ad budget trying to make friends.” That's right! I'm talking to you about trying to make friends! When your customer appreciates you and your comments, they consider you to be a friend, even though they have never met you. “So if I don't talk about my product, what do I talk about?”Talk about what your customer already cares about. Don't try to convince them to care about what you wish they cared about. “So what does my customer already care about?” They care about that circle of people I mentioned. They care about the people who care about them. You have the power – if you dare – to take your place in that circle. “But how?” By causing your customer to identify with you. “But why will they identify with me?” They will do it partly because of what you say and how you say it. But they will do it mostly because of what you don't say. “Okay, so tell me what not to say.” Don't talk constantly about your company and your product. This just makes your ads sound like ads.“As much as I hate to say it, you're beginning to make a little bit of sense. But can you give me an example of what you're talking about?” I'll ask Indy Beagle to put some recent examples on the first few pages of the rabbit hole. “The rabbit hole? What's that?” It's a weekly e-zine for self-selected insiders. “Where?” Just click the image of Indy Beagle at the top of any Monday Morning Memo and you're in. Indy is reading over my shoulder right now and wagging his tail. I think he has something in mind. I'm curious to see what it is. Roy H. Williams

Listen, my young apprentice, and I will release you from your chains.Every door of opportunity begins as a window in the mind. Look through that window of imagination and glimpse a world that could be, should be, ought to be someday. Keep looking… and watch it grow into a door of Opportunity through which you can pass into an entirely different future. Opportunity never knocks. It hangs thick in the air all around you. You breathe it unthinking, and dissipate it with your sighs. Opportunity never knocks. It appears, flickering, like faulty neon at a nondescript fork in the road. Opportunity never knocks. It whispers, a tickle in your distracted mind.1 Yes, opportunity begins as a window in the mind through which we glimpse possible futures. And then one day we leap through that window.“What is sure, predictable, inevitable – the one certain thing you know concerning your future, and mine?” “That we shall die.” “Yes, there's really only one question that can be answered, and we already know the answer… The only thing that makes life possible is permanent, intolerable uncertainty; not knowing what comes next.” 2 There is a space between yesterday and tomorrow. Do you know the place I mean?It's called Life. And you've got to make a living if you're going to have a life. How do you want to be paid? Do you want to be paid for your time, or do you want you be paid for your knowledge? Listen, my young apprentice, to what an old man knows.There is no future in being paid by the hour.You must escape from that financial prison.Become good at something. Become astoundingly good. Do you see a person who is skilled in their work? That person will stand before kings. 3 Do you wait tables? Become the server whose tables spend twice as much money as the other tables. Restaurants around the world will hire you to teach their servers how to do the same. But don't let those restaurant owners pay you for your time. Insist that you be paid for the difference you made. Do you stack bricks? Stack them in a way that no one has ever seen bricks stacked before. You have sizes, shapes, and colors. Stack them so they can't be ignored! But don't let your customers pay you for your time. Be paid for the difference you made. Listen, my young apprentice, to what an old man knows.Craftsmen are paid for the quality of their work. But craftsmen are paid by the hour. An artist is paid for the impact of their art. Artists are paid for the difference they made. The only thing that separates a craft from an art is how you agree to be paid. Roy H. Williams 1 The Monday Morning Memo, July 18, 2005 2 Ursula K. Le Guin, The Left Hand of Darkness, chapter 5 3 Proverbs 22:29 (NASB) Do you see a man skilled in his work? He will stand before kings; He will not stand before obscure men.

We connect with people who interest us. We have fun with people who know how to have fun. We bond with people who believe what we believe. But our deepest relationships are with people who have shared our pain. Think of the people you can count on – always – to have your back. Chances are, you've been through hard times with them at your side. Adversity is a whirlwind that tears friends apart if they don't hold on to each other, but bonds them tightly together if they do. An acquaintance is someone with whom you can laugh. A friend is someone with whom you can cry. I am not suggesting we celebrate adversity. I am suggesting we celebrate our friends. The seeds of commitment are watered by tears.“Where there is sorrow, there is holy ground.” – Oscar Wilde “The thing about rock'n'roll is that for me anyway it wasn't enough… There were great catch-phrases and driving pulse rhythms… but the songs weren't serious or didn't reflect life in a realistic way. I knew that when I got into folk music, it was more of a serious type of thing. The songs are filled with more despair, more sadness, more triumph, more faith in the supernatural, much deeper feelings.” – Bob Dylan, Divine Madness, p. 166 If you want to be persuasive, if you want to convince people, you must abandon the myth that you – or anyone else – is capable of being perfectly objective.We see things not as they are, but as we are. Exactly 4 years and one week ago – during this season of Passover and Easter – I wrote to you about cognitive bias: “You've heard it said that, ‘Every person is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts.' Yet we routinely craft our own facts from the fabric of personal experiences, preferences and prejudices. A stereotype is nothing more than a pattern we've observed. This pattern isn't always predictive, but it is a pattern nonetheless and we trust it. We do this in the misbegotten belief that we have correctly interpreted our past experiences and that our preferences and prejudices are, in fact, correct and reliable interpretations of objective reality.” – The Monday Morning Memo for March 24, 2014 Preferences and prejudices cannot be trusted.But pain is neither a preference nor a prejudice. And sorrow is hard to escape. To willfully walk into them for the sake of a friend is the signature of someone who cares. Do you have a friend in crisis? Don't send flowers. Send yourself. Roy H. Williams PS – Don't assume from today's memo that the wizard is feeling blue. He's not. It's just that he and I know a lot of people who need a hug. I'll bet you know people, too. – Indy Beagle PPS – Leonardo da Vinci clearly understood cognitive bias. He said, “The greatest deception men suffer is from their own opinions.”

Life-changing decisions often seem small on the day we make them.1978 – Everyone had gone home. I was in the warehouse alone, waiting for Pennie to come and pick me up. I had been installing guttering on houses all day. The job paid $5 an hour. We had just one car. Bored, I looked in the phone book to see if Tulsa had one of those pre-recorded “dial-a-prayer” lines I might call to pass the time. There were three of them. I called. I was appalled. Later that night I saw my friend, “Cheerful Charlie” Myers, and told him how devastatingly bad those messages had been. My secret hope was that Charlie would volunteer to create a more interesting daily message. I said, “Someone ought to…” Before I could finish that sentence, Charlie reached into his pocket, grabbed my wrist, turned my palm upward, slapped a 10-dollar bill into it, looked into my eyes and said, “And you're just the man to do it. Here's ten bucks. Let me know what number to call after the equipment is installed.” I had allowed my alligator mouth to overload my mockingbird butt, and Charlie called me on it.That ten dollars would be the only money I would ever collect from “Daybreak,” my daily recorded message, because I never told anyone how they could get in touch with me. The daily call count got so high that Pennie and I had to install rollover lines and lease additional equipment because too many callers were getting a busy signal. I was spending about 3 hours of writing time each day and 25% of our household income each month to fund an enterprise from which there was never a plan for return-on-investment. But it was the ultimate Masters Class on Ad Writing.If you write a new message – 7 days a week – that is interesting enough to cause complete strangers to voluntarily dial a phone number each day to hear that message, your friends are going to ask you to start writing ads for them. But ad writing takes a lot of time. So much, in fact, that “Daybreak” became a weekly 1-page fax called The Monday Morning Memo. That fax later became an email and a podcast. You're reading it, or listening to it, right now. 1998 ­– exactly 20 years after Cheerful Charlie Myers slapped that 10-dollar bill into my hand, Bard Press collected 100 of those memos and The Wizard of Ads became Business Book of the Year. Secret Formulas of the Wizard of Ads (1999) and Magical Worlds of the Wizard of Ads (2001) became New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestsellers. Then Pennie found a 21-acre plateau that overlooked Austin from 900 feet above the city and suggested that we build a campus for artists and entrepreneurs. 2018 – exactly 20 years after The Wizard of Ads was published – I'm preparing to turn Wizard Academy over to a new generation of leadership and begin the next chapter of my life with the Princess. But that's enough about me. 2018 – Let's talk about you.  Have you mapped the journey that brought you to where you are? I just showed you how to do it. Find a moment that, in hindsight, looks to be auspicious. Begin your map at that point in time. Look back at other positive, pivotal moments. Figure out where they should be on your map. Connect the dots. The fun of this exercise is that it: reminds you of who you are. focuses your attention on good, not bad, memories. gives you a glimpse at what might – just maybe – be around the corner. And now a Traveler's Blessing for you that I condensed from the Tefilat Haderekh, the traditional Hebrew traveler's prayer: May God guide your footsteps toward peace, and cause you to reach a happy destination. May he rescue you from the hand of every foe, and every ambush along the way. And may you have a wonderful time. Roy H. Williams

Real experts in online marketing rarely use the phrase “going viral,” because it has no agreed-upon definition. Instead, they talk about “Discovery Content” and “Community Content.” To understand Discovery Content, just look at anything posted by https://www.buzzfeed.com/?utm_term=.tuRjxDqxo#.bceqz2Jzd (BuzzFeed) or any of the other organizations whose principal income is generated by the companies who sponsor their clickbait.1 But not all Discovery Content is shallow and vacuous. The goal of Discovery Content is to generate a click. (The headline is the key.) If a customer finds something satisfying on the other side of that click, they're happy-happy-happy. And if your only goal was to get more people to “discover” your website, then you're happy, too. A visitor who “discovers” your website – but never returns – has no value beyond stroking your ego, unless1. their visit brought you ad revenue, or2. they purchased something on which you made a profit, or3. they told other people about you.Used correctly however, Discovery Content brings newcomers to your website where they will “discover” Community Content that truly speaks to them. It is Community Content that will bring them back again. We're talking about Targeting Through Copy Writing rather than Targeting Through Media Selection. Today's Monday Morning Memo is an example of Discovery Content. That headline: The Truth About Going Viral, will doubtless generate a lot more first-time visitors than usual. The Community Content these visitors will find includes the http://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/archives/ (Archives) of the Monday Morning Memo, the Subscribe button, the http://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/rabbithole/ (Rabbit Hole) of Indy Beagle, and all the free Downloads accessible through the nav panel. Discovery Content attracts first-time visitors.It brings people to your website.Community Content builds a tribe.It makes them feel like they belong.But these ideas aren't new. In the wild and woolly world of mass media, the Loss Leader was the original Discovery Content. The advertiser offering a Loss Leader hoped that by selling something at a loss they would explode store traffic and this horde of new visitors would then “discover” the wonder of their store and buy other items at full price. Today's online marketers call the Loss Leader a “tripwire.” 2 But I prefer to target through copy writing, which is why I use full-price Feature Items to attract new members of a tribe instead of cut-rate Loss Leaders that attract grave robbers, vampires, coupon clippers, discount addicts, freebie Freddies, and every other variety of Twitchy Little Bastard. A Case History of Targeting Through Copy Writing:Shreve and Company has been part of the ritzy Union Square district of San Francisco since the California Gold Rush more than 165 years ago. Shreve routinely sells jewelry items that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. Due to the rich history of this store and the impact of all the world's-finest brands they carry, they could easily be perceived as stodgy, snooty and overpriced. But they aren't. In the radio campaign for Shreve, 5th generation Shreve jeweler Lawrence “Ren” Schiffman, a young and definitely NOT-stodgy, NOT-snooty 20-something has become the official spokesperson for the family store. Ren's dad is a jeweler, his grandad was a jeweler, his great grandad was a jeweler, and his great-great grandad was a jeweler. Credibility and history wrapped in youth and style. Here's the Example:REN:   Polo is “the sport of kings.” ROY: And in the go-go 80's, the Paiget Polo was the watch of kings. REN:  Having a Piaget Polo was even cooler than having a phone in your car. ROY:  [reflectingly] I remember those days. REN:  The new Polo “S” is...

Ivan and Alvina are in their early 20s.Ivan was born and raised in Bulgaria. Alvina, in Siberia.When Alvina sees Ivan playing keyboards in a café on the Black Sea, they become pen pals. And then they fall in love. And then they get married. They dream of moving to the west. Canada says it will accept them as immigrants if they will learn to speak French. Self-taught piano players in cafés don't make enough money to pay for dreams, so Ivan and Alvina sleep in their car so they can pay a tutor to teach them French. They spend long hours every day for a year learning and practicing their nouvelle langue étrange. There is no money for anything else. Ivan and Alvina step onto Canadian soil with bright eyes, big smiles and 4 thousand dollars; exactly enough money to pay the first and last month's rent to live in a landlord's unfinished basement. There is no money left for food or transportation.But they have each other and they're living their dream. This is the west! So Ivan and Alvina never quit smiling, never quit laughing, never quit feeling grateful. Ivan gets a job as a construction laborer for an older man who can't always pay Ivan all he is owed. But he is an honest man, so he pays the balance of Ivan's unpaid wages by giving him tools. After many months of working for this man, Ivan has the knowledge, the tools, and the man's blessing to go into business for himself. Ivan and Alvina arrived in Canada exactly 11 years ago. Last year their business did more than 20 million dollars. It appears they will do 30 million next year. Neither of them is 40 years old. I share their story to encourage you, and to tease Ivan and Alvina a little. None of this delightful true story appears on the About Us page of their website. Not a word of it. Not even their names. Do you remember what I wrote to you in last week's Monday Morning Memo? “Inspirational stories are never about accumulation. They're about sacrifice. What have you sacrificed and why? Are you willing to tell that story?”Here are some final thoughts for you to ponder: Never quit smiling, never quit laughing, never quit feeling grateful. You will never reach your destination if you stop and throw stones at every dog that barks. The only safe thing is to take a chance. Oh! I forgot to mention 2 tiny details in this wonderful story of poetic, home-made destiny. Ivan and Alvina finish unfinished basements. And they've never needed to speak a word of French since the day they arrived in Canada. Have a great week. Roy H. Williams

Business Personality Disorder (BPD) is characterized by at least two distinct identities or dissociated personality states that show up in a company's behavior.BPD emerges when unrelated teams work independently in the areas of (1.) Advertising (2.) Web Presence (3.) Sales Training. If a person encounters your ads, then visits your website, then comes to your place of business, will they feel they have encountered a single personality three times, or three personalities once? Advertising rarely makes the sale. It merely engages the customer in the early stages of a conversation. If the reader/listener/viewer of your ad has purchased from you in the past and had a good experience, it's possible the ad will cause him or her to make immediate contact with your business. But customers who are less familiar with you will hope to extend the conversation and learn more about you by visiting your website. And they will expect to encounter the same personality they met in your ads. Will that happen?Or will they encounter an entirely different personality crafted by your website team? Does your website continue the conversation begun by your advertising, or does it stand alone, as though that conversation never took place? To what degree is your website disconnected from your advertising? That will be the degree of disconnection experienced by your customer. If by some miracle, the personality, tone and style of your website agrees with the personality, tone and style of your advertising, your biggest problem remains. Will your people continue the conversation that was begun in your ads and continued on your website? Or will they introduce an entirely different company than the one your customer was hoping to meet? Relational Marketing depends on Integrated Messaging.Integrated Messaging begins withWe Believe(Statements that capture the Personality and Promises, Processes and Benefits of your company.) Personality makes the customer feel they know you. Promises make the customer feel secure. Processes give credibility to your Promises. Benefits are what the customer is hoping to experience. (Your http://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/newsletters/origins/ (Origin Story) is essentially the backstory of We Believe. We spoke of this in last week's MondayMorningMemo.) Brandable Chunks(memorable identifiers and phrases extracted from your We Believe statements.) Deliverables(Advertising, web copy, content marketing, and signature phrases used by your people, all built from the same list of Brandable Chunks) These deliverables include 5, 10, 15, 30 and 60-second radio ads, billboard copy, email subject lines and body copy, digital marketing text, memorable identifiers for truck and van wraps, store signage, etc.) You'd like to see some examples, I know.You'll find them in http://www.mondaymorningmemo.com/chaptersone-eleven/ (Chapter Ten of Be Like Amazon: Even a Lemonade Stand Can Do It.) You can read that chapter by following the hyperlink in the previous sentence, or you can wait for the book to be published in a couple of months. The audiobook is in production right now. It's going to be the first ever of its kind; a business book presented as dialogue. Roy H. Williams