#75: PLEASE flamethrow responsibly, what gives insights power, rainbows and spendimonum...
Friends, last weekend was Christmas, I mean, Boston Pride - and in lieu of writing this newsletter, Saturday I was busy celebrating with half a million of my closest friends, and giving out 800+ flowers alongside my fearless sister.
Some screenshots from the coverage:
Source: NECN (I'm famous.)
Ok I know what you're thinking... what is happening here, Rainbow Brite?
Here's the deal: Pride began as a riot and has turned into something very corporate, and very political.
Companies march hundreds of employees and buy expensive floats while politicians demonstrate their alliance wearing rainbow boas and taking selfies. And hey, that's to be expected - and celebrated - as attitudes have changed and senseless intolerance goes extinct.
For my part, I hand out hundreds of carnations along the route as a reminder of what pride is for - a moment shared between two people of love without expectation, and without agenda. Only acceptance.
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So, I hope you enjoyed your brief hiatus from the World's Best Newsletter, and warmly welcome you back to the most important links you need to remain an engaged, skeptical, yet informed member of society.
In this edition (#75!) of The World's Best Newsletter:
1. Next week: NYC and Boston happenings
2. Spendimonium - the marketer's modern enemy?
3. The gig economy is... well... shrinking.
4. What gives insights their power
5. Female-Founded Startups Generate More Revenue and Do It With Less Funding
6. 20 Marketing Goals That Are Just Plain Better Than “Growing Revenue”
7. Quote of the week - please flamethrow responsibly
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1. Next week: NYC and Boston happenings
Are you in NYC? Lucky duck. I'll be in town Monday and Tuesday for Chief Marketer's Marketing to Women event - where my femvertising framework is debuting on stage for the first time. I can't wait to tear into it with a room full of marketers. Join us?
Are you in Boston? I won't be here Tuesday - but you should be. Boston Women in Digital OPEN Happy Hour -- it's like the boys club, but for women in marketing. This amazing organization is starting a Boston chapter led by the amazing Britta Schellenberg, and you should join. Attend to learn more.
Wednesday in Boston will feature a NEW event for Boston Content (2,000+ of my content buddies here in Boston) - a content hackathon. Brands like TripAdvisor, Resilient Coders, Mendix, and Horizons for Homeless Children will bring their most pressing content challenges and put our talented members to the test.
It'll be fascinating to see what solutions come to light in an environment that asks nothing but your ideas. There's nothing to lose, no office politics, no "way things are done today." What will happen when all the restrictions that may squash innovation are removed??!?! Maybe nothing, since apparently group brainstorming doesn't work (oops)... but just maybe... something magical.
Stay tuned for a recap - and did I mention the group's original co-founder Jay Acunzo is keynoting? It's gonna be good. I'd invite you to register but we sold out weeks ago ;) #sorrynotsorry
2. Spendimonium - the marketer's modern enemy?
If you've seen me speak at INBOUND and other events, you may have heard me explicate the power of enemies in marketing, and how brands put them to work to build followers, customers, and awareness.
One such enemy plaguing marketers today has a new name born of one of many Slack conversations I recently had with Sam Melnick, VP of Marketing at Allocadia.
Spendimonium...
It describes the state of chaos that many teams find themselves when spending Marketing's limited dollars without control, or confidence over their results.
"You risk being in a world of hurt when it comes time to answer to the CEO and CFO on how you are spending the shareholders dollars and what you've gotten in return for them,"
says Sam in this LinkedIn discussion with Sangram Vajre. (Two of my favorite #MenofMarTech.)
Read more and listen to the podcast (#90) referenced in the post.
3. The gig economy is... well... shrinking.
I too have been guilty of riding the bandwagon of excitement about the rise of "alternative work arrangements:" the freelance, side-hustling self-employment trend, fervently hollering about the demise of the 9-5 and the rise of independent gig work. Down with the man! And such.
Turns out, thanks to new Bureau of Labor Statistics data, the share of workers working as independent contractors actually declined from 2005-2017 (from 7.44% to 6.92%).
Oops.
That's a bit of a narrative killjoy.
As some point out "The data has never really backed up future of work transformationists. We also haven't seen productivity gains that would indicate mass conversion to automation."
What's happening really is that, while nonstandard work hasn’t increased over all since 2005, the number of independent contractors has grown in some categories:
Read more.
4. What gives insights their power
I want to share a portion of this piece by Animalz "How to Make People Care About Your Content: Find the Right Angle..."
Framing Is What Gives Insights Their Power
The SaaS world is full of truism like “build things people want” and “hire for culture.” For the most part, people take such truisms at face value, but when they’re given reason to question those base beliefs, they listen.
It’s easiest to see this tactic at work in thought-leadership content. Chris Savage, founder and CEO of Wistia, is one of the best at leveraging this kind of curiosity in his blog posts. His titles routinely play off straightforward-sounding startup values in subtle, pointed ways. They’re contrarian without being outwardly so, and that’s what makes them both clickable and impactful.
When Your Competition Accelerates, Have the Courage to Go Slow
Thinking is Work. Give Yourself Time to Do It
Being Busy Doesn’t Mean You’re Successful
Great Leaders Say “I Don’t Know”
The insights that Chris conveys in the posts don’t run aggressively counter to your average lines of thinking on leadership or work. But each title above takes that core insight and stretches it around a lazy, familiar concept that we all think we know. By framing the insight against those familiar terms, it becomes more important—and makes us want to click.
Read more - this is a very handy post.
5. Female-Founded Startups Generate More Revenue and Do It With Less Funding
Ha!
A study released yesterday from the Boston Consulting Group and MassChallenge, a network of startup accelerators, found that of the 350 companies examined, the average woman-founded startup received $935,000 in funding. That’s less than half of the $2.1 million awarded on average to the male-founded startups in the study.
“The investment gap is real — and larger than we thought,” write the authors of the report.
That’s downright depressing. And yet there was one bright spot in the data: The female-founded startups outperformed their male counterparts’ in terms of revenue, bringing in $730,000 over a five-year period versus $662,000 for the men. When you crunch the numbers, that means these women-run companies are returning 78 cents per dollar compared to 31 cents for the men.
Read the full article and go fund more women.
6. Twenty Marketing Goals That Are Just Plain Better Than “Growing Revenue”
Allison Snow (one of my favorite human beings and a damn good marketing analyst at Forrester) refreshingly illuminates 20 marketing goals that are better than simply growing revenue.
No, we shouldn't stop driving at that aim. The point is, marketing has been perceived as a cost-center for years, but swinging the pendulum too far in the direction of solely "revenue-driver" ignores other benefits that are equally as important to business growth. Read 'em.
7. Quote of the week - please flamethrow responsibly
Elon Musk recently started giving away flamethrowers, because, well, marketing is fun.
Oh, but he can't call them flamethrowers because that would be illegal, so they're called "not-a-flamethrowers." Of course. And, their instructions for use are f*cking poetry.
"Please use as directed to avoid unintentionally burning things down..."
Amazing.
Have a marvelous weekend.
Katie
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Even more upcoming marketing events:
Who's going down at the #B2B Marketing and Sales Feud at #FlipMyFunnel 2018? (Can't we all just get along?) Come cheer me on! Details and promo code in this blog.
I'm excited to be your emcee for the 2018 Women in Digital National Conference. I'll also be sharing a talk on (R)evolution: Suffragettes to Social Media. Join us in Columbus, OH this fall.