Links 3.28.08

In the kitchen with Moby

Tony Morgan on Seth Godin…
Your Branding Sucks

FortyOneTwenty
Hot church media

A surly group of friends doing great work, from their passion, here and in Rwanda.
Scallywags – I’m continually amazed by them.

Safari is still the best browsing experience, but Apple still needs to fix a few things.
$10,000 exploit

What is a brand?

This is a brilliantly well-done slideshow.

| View | Upload your own

Favorite lines:

It’s not what YOU say it is. It’s what THEY say it is.

The Focus Test:
1. Who are you?
2. What do you do?
3. What does it matter?

Another good post over on Swerve; Everything Communicates Something

Everything communicates something.

When I was in grad school, my thesis project involved studying the impact that nonverbal communication has in the courtroom. Everything I observed firsthand in the courtroom and later talked to jurors about revealed that nonverbal factors in the courtroom have an enormous impact on the outcome of a case, almost as much as the words spoken and the evidence presented. The demeanor and dress of the attorneys and the parties in the case “speak” first and most often. Does he look guilty or innocent? How fast does she talk? What do his eyes do when he answers a question? Is the defendant’s suit nice…but not too nice? How does the attorney look at the judge? Does it look like they played 18 holes together yesterday? I later practiced law and, from what I experienced and from what more experienced attorneys told me, jurors are like communication sponges…

read more…

3 Easy ways to lose your identity.

1. Have too many of them.

Not everything in your organization needs a name, logo and stylesheet all to itself. When you overbrand, you dilute your core message. When everything has it’s own identity, you end up competing with yourself. It’s like Fight Club all over again.

 

2. Borrow it from Someone else.

It’s easy to get inspired by design. Somethings are just drop dead beautiful. But it’s hard to be yourself, if you’re trying to be somebody else. Be inspired, but design yourself, don’t design to be somebody else.

 

3. All Sparkle, No Substance.

Design is great, when it communicates truth. if you’re trying to sell yourself as more than you really are, eventually, people will figure you out. You can only fool people for so long. A candy coated brussels sprout isn’t going to hide the bitter taste when you bite into the core.

As a designer, I’ve been guilty of all of these, but I always strive to be a better communicator.

2008 – Get ready, or eat Sanctuary’s dust.

Things that are happening at Sanctuary this year:

1.  We launched Love Minneapolis. A place for people to “just show up and serve.” There’s been two events and already we’re extending far beyond our doors. 
2. We have a series of Amazing Hip Hop Sunday’s featuring the 3 of the hottest acts in Hip Hop. Starting this weekend with The Ambassador also of Cross Movement. This guy is amazing. The real deal. Not “Christian Hip Hop,” but Hip Hop that’s Christian. We can’t advertise it, because we already know that there won’t be any open seats unless the temps drop below 0 again. Soon to come Phil Jackson and his crew from Tha House. Urban D and others from Crossover Church (#21).
3. We’re adding another service. We’ve been maxed at 1000 for a long time. It’s time to open the doors a little earlier. I’m betting we’ll double in size this year.
4. Efrem will be speaking somewhere that might shine a bit of a spotlight on what we’re doing.
5. We’re tightening the belt. We’re moving to a new office. We’ll start a capitol campaign for our first semi-permanent facility. 

Things I’m helping with to prepare:

1. IT. IT. IT. First ever server (OS X of course).  
2. Updating our database.
3. Bringing giving online
4. Bringing event registration online.
5. Helping design our video structure and bringing streaming video online.
6. Finding better communicators than me to be on my team.
7. Finding more talented designers than me to help polish the rough spots.
8. Moving towards a multi-nodal staffing structure in the areas of IT and Communications  in one grandios place called the Communications Technology Department.
9. Moving our website to Media Temple with imap mail (yeah! offsite and still imap with our domain name!)
10. Moving to a new domain…you’ll see…hopefully this is smooth.
11. A refresh
12. Taking my DAWG day every month to remember why I do what I do (Day Alone With God).

I promise not to get all Obama crazy on this blog…

However, I can’t believe how well done this video is…

I couldn’t turn it off. 

Imagine building your entire brand on the hope for something better. On the hope that we want to take care of each other. On the reality that if we don’t actively participate in our future, the future will be dictated to us.

Sound like anyone you know?

7 Poor Communication Skills to Avoid

7 Poor Communication Skills to Avoid

1. Contacting others only when you need something.
2. Not following up, or closing the loop.
3. Not returning telephone calls or email messages.
4. Foregoing basic courtesy.
5. Not listening.
6. Telling lies.
7. Spewing chronic negativity.

All i can say is guilty, guilty, guilty.

This post was a summary of this post, which was a summary of this post.

Placate or Initiate

I was  at a major retailer that can remain nameless, let’s just call them Bullseye. I love Bullseye. I love how Bullseye takes the time to find the balance of Design and Utility. I love the way Bullseye presents itself and makes itself guest focused.

I had a recent experience at Bullseye where i was the guest and I was clearly not the focus….

I recently spent over an hour trying to resolve a “customer service” issue with Bullseye. Out of that hour, I spent at least 45 minutes of my time by myself. Waiting. Waiting…and waiting some more. And while I waited for Bullseye to fix their mistake, I waited by myself, clueless as to what was being done to resolve my problem…

And when the manager came back, he made an attempt to appease me with $15 in Bullseye cash.

I didn’t ask for it. I’ll be honest, at that point I didn’t even want it. I didn’t want to be placated with their solution, I wanted them to initiate a conversation with me, about what might make me feel resolved regarding this situation.

I often placate. I try to silence problems by applying what I think to be the best solution, without initiating a conversation around what might be a real solution for the other party. 

I think I need to do a much better job of initiating conversations, rather than offering placating solutions…. 

The Dissemination of Brand Ideas and the Long Tail of Brand Communication

There’s a great new manifesto over at Change This.

Essientially, I think it asks the question:  Who else could be your customer if you were not beholden to one idea for brand communication?

In the new age of micro media devices (no longer just 3 major tv networks and 4 major radio networks rather millions of outlets through websites, blogs, podcasts, iptv, and more….) the old idea that your brand represents one message that has to hit a mass of people is slowly dying. 

 

Who could your customer be if you knew you could communicate to them on their time, in their space, in their language and lifestyle?

 

You’re no longer trying to communicate with 51% of your potential market with one message, but using an array of messages to communicate with 100% of your potential market.

 

The author asks us to focus on these two imperatives to reach the alternate audience instead of the mass audience: 

• Make everything available
• Help me find it.  

He offers these steps to reach the alternate audience:

1. Seek help in populating the curve.
2. Time is a natural elongating-agent.
3. Ones and twos add up to quite a few.
4. Employ recommendation and word-of-mouth buzz.
5. Don’t predict; measure and respond.
6. Context is more important than content.
7. Context is more important than content. (know what messages can’t help you)
8. Trade control for influence. 

What does this mean for the church?

I hate commoditizing Jesus, but I wonder who we’re missing with the Gospel by deploying mass market campaigns over micro-market campaigns.

 

hmm…

so I read this post from shawn and… 

Here’s the deal:

Invention is something from nothing.

Innovation is something new from something previous.

Renovation is returning something to the way it was.  

In the end, it’s all just buzz words. Jesus left us with a job to do. Make discples of all nations, love God, love your neighbor as yourself

The real question is, was there movement from the message?Did people respond in the way you wanted?If not, you may have to do one of the above.