The Good Human Strategy

There are a lot of strategies when it comes to marketing. There are a lot of funnels, and tunnels, and maybe even gunnels. I don’t know because these things change all the time. Every day there are new “experts” with new “secrets” which come with a hefty price tag.

Frankly, I study this stuff for a living and almost everything people tell me leads to utter nonsense. Mostly, it’s marketing people who use fear to drive product sales.  They make you feel stupid and worthless because you haven’t figured it out, and promise to fix everything for you…

…except it almost never works, because they’ve done nothing but create a shiny new ball for you to play with that doesn’t deal with the underlying issues people have in their business.

More than that, it wears you out, because you’re always chasing the next thing, too tired to think critically when the next shiny ball rolls past. It’s constantly chasing, and very little improvement.

So, I thought I would let you in on my strategy for a moment. It’s called The Good Human Strategy, and it is the basis for everything I do.

It’s worked for me pretty well, but I will admit it takes much longer to work than other fear-based strategies.

There is nothing more compelling than fear when it comes to selling things. However, I personally don’t like selling on fear. It doesn’t make me feel good, and while I might leave a lot of money on the table, I have no problem sleeping at night.

So, here is the strategy I use:

1- Be a good human.

2- Do good work.

3- Show yourself to as many people as possible.

One of the most important things I ever learned while building my career was called The Attractive Character. It is the idea that if you become the kind of person your audience can’t resist, then you will magnetize the right people to your message while repelling the wrong people.

This single concept changed a lot for me. In fact, it turned my marketing around completely. Instead of pushing my message out to everybody endlessly, I planted my flag in the ground and pulled the right people to me.

This idea is the basis for The Good Human Strategy.

In it, you act like a good human. Hopefully, you are already a good human, but even if you only act as a good human, you will find that you eventually become that kind of human. It is very important that you are at the very least helpful and kind because those are two qualities people respond to, especially if you are helpful and kind to them.

Wielded correctly, it’s almost as compelling as fear but makes you feel 1,000 times better about yourself.

These qualities do not work as well as fear when it comes to building loyalty quickly, but it does create a better class of fan, who is loyal because they want to be loyal, instead of loyal because they fear not being near you.

Once you are a good human, who does good things, for the right reasons, you must also make sure to do good work. This is the type of work that people respond to and like. If you just make garbage, then people won’t like it, and this strategy falls apart. Everybody doesn’t have to like your work, but your work needs to resonate deeply with at least some people.

After you make good work and do good things, then you plant yourself as many places as possible, like a magnet, and allow the right people to find you. Once you implement the first two parts of this strategy, the rest of your life becomes about planting yourself in as many places of the right places as possible, spreading your message to the right people, and waiting for them to find you.

Planting is a bit like playing music on a busy street corner. Most people walking past won’t pay you any mind, but some of them will stop. If you’re good enough, they’ll turn around, and engage with you. If you are magnetic enough, you’ll start to gather a nice little crowd for yourself before too long. Does everybody who plays on the street gather a crowd? No, because most people aren’t good enough or magnetic enough to sway an audience.

It’s the opposite of standing on that same street corner and running around begging people to listen to your cd. This happens a lot in Los Angeles. Every time you walk up a busy street, you see one singer or another stopping people at random and begging them to give them a minute of their time.

In that scenario, you are doing the chasing. You are tiring yourself out, engaging with the wrong people, and wasting a lot of time. On top of that, you’re pissing a lot of people off who just want to go about their day.

It’s the same crowd you’re engaging with during both scenarios, but you’re engaging in a much different way. In one scenario, you run around chasing them. In the other, they come to you. Same crowd, but with much different results. The problem, though, is when you plant, you better have something say worthy of attention.

Another great way to plant is to say “Here is my Facebook group!” and let the right people find you. Unfortunately, it is hard to plant without an audience already, at least with your own group, because nobody knows you…yet. This is why you need to plant in other places first, but you can direct them back to where you are growing your own audience, like a mailing list or Facebook group.

Sometimes, you have to plant several times in the same place, but you can never stop planting. This is the opposite of chasing after people. It is the opposite of hustle. You are choosing where to plant, and you know what resonates with your audience. Once you have that, the right people will magnetize to you instead of the other way around.

There are all sorts of marketing and sales strategies you need to understand in order to know where to plant, how to message yourself, and how to turn a casual observer into a lifelong fan, but The Good Human Strategy is simple and sound. Instead of chasing after people, become the person they need you to be, and then they will come to you.