Show Notes
Grab a cup of coffee because we’re not fooling around today! We get serious about some sticky topics like thinking critically, “being yourself” online and issues of race in our current culture. Yes, it’s all about business and marketing, and hopefully we’ll make you think a little harder about the bigger impact of what we say and do online.
In This Episode We Talk About
- The problem with CRM software and why it can be so frustrating for businesses to find the right software
- How you can make better decisions about the software that you use to support your business
- The importance of asking questions and challenging anyone you’ve hired to help with your marketing
- Avoiding scams that could lock you into contracts or siphon off your money or even outright steal your credit card number or personal info
- What to do when you get conflicting advice about what you should/shouldn’t be doing to market your business
- Why the mantra to “be yourself” is too often just lip service and how we deal with the haters
- The “Race Together” campaign started by Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz and the ensuing backlash
- What we think about the campaign and its relationship to the broader context of social media and the idea of being yourself
- Plus we debate adding a position on our podcast for Jillian Jackson as the Chief Executive Strong Black Woman, contemplate how easy it is to take someone’s words out of context and decide that not all backlash is bad
Links & Resources
- Listen to Mike Brooks of Nuclear Chowder Marketing talk about scammers
- Ralph’s video endorsing Ryan Hanley’s Content Warfare book
- A Letter from Howard Schultz to Starbucks Partners Regarding Race Together in which Howard Schultz does not apologize for drawing criticism
Your Marketing Action Item
From Ralph: Look up the movie Parallels – it’s on Netflix right now – and watch it in prep for Thursday’s podcast where we talk to the writer/producer/director about how he created and marketed his work and where the massive outpouring of love on social media came from.
From Carol Lynn: Send an email to [email protected] about a time you found yourself being criticized or “hated on” for something you posted on your blog or on social media. What did you do about it and how did it affect you?
Where To Listen
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I’m jealous. I want to be the WSS “strong black woman” but my skin color doesn’t correlate with the title. Dang it! Will you be adding a “strong white woman” SuperFred? It’s only fair. 😉
Humor aside, kudos for even saying the words, “race” and “racist”, on the podcast. It takes chutzpah to start a conversation on the topic. We need to clone you.
My perspective comes from a place of naivete and wishful thinking, I suppose. With all my heart (and every fiber of my being) I want to believe we left racism on the back of the bus a long time ago … but I guess not. I really thought, as a society, we’ve made strides in our progress to obliterate racism … but I guess not. Makes me kinda sad and takes me backward in time. 🙁
Well, you’re closer to the title than Dino…. at least you’ve got one of the two! I don’t have a problem having an actual open conversation about race or really much of anything as long as I’m having it with a reasonable person! It’s when you get stuck in that uncompromising mob mentality that it become fruitless.
Have we made progress as a country? Of course. The thing we have to realize though, is that you can change laws but you can’t change people. There is going to be “tribe mentality” I think as long as there is a human species. But that’s where the conversation comes in because you CAN change opinions and perspectives. Someone growing up in a single-race culture will see the world through that lens. Those are the barriers we have to break down. And we can’t do it by isolating ourselves and screaming at anyone who has a different perspective or even by criticizing people who “get it wrong”.
Well, let’s see how the rest of the campaign goes! Hopefully people will get over their “I need to be critical of something” phase and think about how to actually make things better.
Complainers gotta complain, Carol Lynn, but we can choose not to join their mob mentality. Sometimes I think people who get on that bandwagon have nothing better or constructive to do with their lives. They seem to feed off one another. So let’s just say they’re co-dependent type of people who are experts at enabling those behaviors. I love Ralph’s advice to untag yourself from such conversations. 🙂
You may not be surprised to learn that I am ditching my original Word Carnival topic in favor of this one. I have the perfect theme tie-in 🙂
Sounds like a darn good plan to me! Anxious to read your Word Carnival post. 😉
“Venomous Personal Attacks: You Haven’t Made It Until You’ve Been Hated”
Soon as you open your pie hole
About ethnicity or creed or race
Backlash from the vocal minority
Rushes in at a really quick pace
When that happens in social media
Abide by Ralph’s unwavering advice
UN-TAG yourself from conversations
Don’t look back and don’t think twice
If you’ve hired a marketing agency
It’s not insulting to be a bit skeptical
Challenge them by asking questions
No matter how detailed or technical
No CRM software is touted as perfect
Check the reviews and critical remarks
Only consider what’s pertinent to you
Utilize the free trial before you embark
If I have to hear it just one more time
I’m going to gripe and moan and whine
It’s ridiculous for someone to tell you
You need to “Just Be Yourself” online
Just for the record, it’s me — Melanie. To my knowledge, I’ve never been anyone else. 😉
If I have my accounting straight, this makes the 30th poem you’ve written for us. Holy cow! Time to get on that poetry page, eh?
I love your title, it’s so quotable. It’s a mini poem within a poem. In fact, I kind of want to take the whole first two stanzas and turn them into a standalone mini poem and plaster them everywhere!
Now, you need to take a superstar photo of yourself for me so we can put it on your page and honor you for your many wonderful words!
You’re a much better numbers cruncher than me, Carol Lynn. Glad you’re keeping count cause I have no idea how many poems have landed here — although I was sure it was more than ten. 😉
I desperately need to get some head shots done. Or at least a couple of nice candid shots … maybe outdoors. I love the outdoors. I’m thinking about tracking down a photography student who’s in need of a “subject” for his or her project/assignment. Thought it might be fun to go that route versus heading to a formal studio (Yuck).