Consequential Value

When Mark McGwire was smacking homers 3 times a week on his way to breaking Baseball’s home run record, he kept saying odd things like, “I’m in awe of myself,” or “I keep amazing myself.” While it was happening, I actually thought of these comments as humble. In retrospect of course, it seems much more likely that he was simply shocked at the power of the steroids he was (allegedly) injecting. He might have been more honest if he had said, “I knew they were good, but–whoa!–whoda thought it?”

Slugger Boy and I have something in common: we amazed ourselves. He blew up something like 71 home runs in the Bigs; I ran 20 kilometers in something called, “The Country Music Marathon.” He trained with the aid of HGH; I sucked down margaritas. He apparently had no idea he could break Major League records; I had no idea I could run that far. He was a balding red head with a Van Dyke beard; me, too! See? I nearly qualify for the Hall of Fame…just like McGwire!

Boy, have I digressed (and I haven’t even started).

A fourth of my company (Thomas Nelson, Inc.) at the sincere behest of our faithful leader, CEO Michael Hyatt, hoofed through this marathon–some of us, of course, far better than others. I was one of them–the others. But much to the shock of my family (brothers, parents, children) who know how much I’ve hated running over the years, I actually finished. My time was a somewhat respectable 2:30:25 for a virgin half-marathoner, especially one who is over-50, over-weight, and under-motivated. The pictures planted in this post are merely there to prove to my family I actually did it.

Against the stride of my fellow running mates’ glowing testimonials, I’ve been a curmudgeon by comparison. I did not have fun. And I think they are all lying. Who are we trying to kid? It hurts too much to run 13 miles. Period. You get done and you can’t even step up a 6-inch curb without nearly collapsing from pain and loss of motor skill. My team didn’t even win–or lose! What’s that about? And what salesman thought up a sporting event where the participants pay to flagellate themselves? He should be collecting a royalty on every such race in the world.

If you want to read a truly honest (and hysterical) summary of the run, you need to read Joel Miller’s Running Fool recounting.

No, I did not have fun. But I was rewarded. In fact, not only did I think it was great that I did not die mid-contest, I proved I could do something that had alluded and frustrated me for years. Hyatt has this summary of the benefits of running the race: they are pretty much true for me, so I won’t repeat them. What matters is not that I had fun, but that I benefited. I am better for having run. The training, the run, and the completion of the run brought value to my life that I had not successfully accomplished before. And for that I am both amazed and grateful. I do plan on running it again. And as I have mentioned here before, it’s value–in a pastoral way–that Hyatt brought to our company’s life.

Don’t be content to give people just what they enjoy. It probably won’t last very long anyway. Try to give them what they need.

Here are my notes-to-self for next year:

1. Get farther up in the starting corrals. I ran an extra half-mile sideways because I had to keep moving around walkers and slower pokes than me. And it made my knees wobble at times. Scary.
2. Go ahead and kill anyone who says the last two miles are downhill-even if they just mean it metaphorically. They aren’t. They are the worst hills of the race and they hurt.
3. Don’t race with anything you haven’t trained in-including headphones. Two days before the race, I paid 50 bucks for fancy-schmancy headphones the boss recommended which stay on your ears better than anything on the market. Of course, you can’t actually hear music through them and that seriously messed with my mojo.
4. Be sure to complain about this year’s placement of the company tent. I didn’t need the extra mile tacked on the end of the race.
5. Run in the company T-shirt, even if it does feel like sandpaper. If I could give some other Nelsonite as much comfort as I received just to see a teammate in front of me, it will be worth it.
6. Eat the company food the night before. Darfons’ lasagna tasted like cardboard soaked in Ragu.
7. Try to figure out why I lost all feeling below my waist at mile 10 and don’t do that again.
8. Go to the bathroom as many times as necessary before lift off. It really hurts to run 7 miles when you gotta go. And never get a pre-race massage on your lower back when you gotta go, either.
9. Best pre-race purchase: nipple guards. Best post-race advice nobody told me: remove said nipple guards prior to publicly changing shirts.
10. Petition the boss for a one-day moratorium on our pro-health policies. Quality beer and cigars is definitely the way to celebrate. Joel Miller is a saint. Maybe we could pretend Thomas Nelson is Episcopal for a day, then HR could bring the cooler!

Epilogue: That %(!@^ Joel has already asked me to run another half-marathon in October. And I’m probably just gullible enough to do it.

The Chicago Sun-Times’ usual modus operandi is to report the life and times of the City of Big Shoulders with an unrepentant swagger and bravado just this side of the National Enquirer. Giant-lettered headlines filling half the front page–ala The New York Post–and a constant retelling and regaling of the city’s plentiful scandals make the Sun-Times an interesting read if not a guilty pleasure.

Today’s headline? SOX DOLL BLOW UP. In case you hadn’t heard, the White Sox had a couple of blow up dolls of nude women in their locker room in an attempt to fire up the otherwise flaccid Sox’s season. So today the town and the paper are giving the Sox and its unrepentant manager the strapping they deserve–story and commentary have spilled way out of Sports, seeping into nearly every section.

But also today begins an inspirational storyline that will continue through the paper for a few days and on the Sun-Time’s blog for weeks to come. Entitled, “Conquering cancer and heart failure…with Jesus, doctors and common sense,” the blog will chronicle the “the story of the healing process” that Lacy J. Banks–a Sun-Times sportswriter of 35 years–is experiencing and expecting.

Banks, who has also been a Baptist preacher for the past 35 years, has brain cancer, conjestive heart failure, and prostate cancer. But his blog is completely full of hope and the expectation of the miraculous. I’m sure he’ll write of pain at times, but it’s clear that–unlike many of the soul-despairing scripts of our time–Jesus is in the center of Mr. Banks’ soul…and that will make for refreshing reading. As debilitating as his diseases are, his attitude is far more infectious:

In other words, I have promoted myself to being CEO, as best I can, of my medical dream team, where, first and foremost, God is my primary-care physician.

The “comments” themselves can cure you of what ails you.

What a gem among the pyrite. To speak of God as lovingly and blatantly as Mr. Banks does seems, at least at first blush, to be the total antithesis of the Sun-Times’ mission. But then newspapers should be about truth–and Mr. Banks definitely has a handle on Truth that matters.

The Sun-Times is to be applauded for employing a man of Mr. Banks’ character, for keeping him writing during hard times, and for finding a way to bring words of true importance to its “pages.” Mr. Banks’ blog really classes up the joint.

Do you know what this gadget is? I didn’t when I first saw it, but I’m on the dense side. Maybe you know.

Since it said something about “dental” on it (I had picked it up at a Benefits Fair at my company from, as you can see, Principal Financial Group/Group Dental Insurance), I assumed it had something to do with what dentists do. You know, teeth.

Yup, you stick the end of a toothpaste tube through that tiny little slot in between the “Financial” and the “Dental”–it squeezes the toothpaste out of the tube. It’s the best tool I’ve ever seen that does this particular job. I figure we’ve got a week’s worth of extra brushing out of our tube. We’ll be using this little beauty from now on.

What’s this thingy called? A toothpaste wringer? A Crest pincher? A Sensodine squeezer? A Colgate constrictor?

It has since occurred to me that dentists give some of the best premiums of any business. They give what you can use AND it is directly related to them. Samples of toothpaste, floss, toothbrushes…. Ever got a pen?

Every time you use their little appliances (that usually have their name and phone number on them) you probably think of them: oh, yeah, you need to schedule that cavity eradication appointment and you’re behind on your cleanings. You have to intentionally ignore the guilt feelings of inaction every time you brush.

So here is a way to create real consequential value: make sure that what you give is directly connected to your business and the real need of your customer.

To see how infrequently this kind of spot-on premium is offered, you’d think it’s hard to do–as hard as pulling teeth.

Sometimes it’s the little things.

I’ve been going to doctors’ offices for, er, several years, and what I saw last week was a first. I took my step-daughter to Premier Radiology here in Nashville for some tests and lo-and-behold there was hard candy at the check-in counter! Then I saw drinks, chips and cookies right there in the waiting room!

I looked around for the box to put a buck in or a coin slot on the soft drink fridge–because a doctor’s office would never serve free food–but eventually I found a little sign that said, “Snacks Compliments of Premier Radiology.” Even classier, the cookies were the Otis Spunkmeyer kind that you bake in-house.

How I’ve longed for this kind of perk from the medical community over the years. You have to sit in those antiseptic waiting rooms for what seems like hours at a time with only old magazines to keep you company. IF they happened to have a drink machine near by–and that’s a giant “if”–you’d be out top dollar for a swig.

Interestingly, I think the gesture was largely symbolic–I didn’t see the huddled, limping hordes amassing themselves around the snack bar. But it’s a quality gesture–it beats the cookie dough out of a pen (from a drug company). What I’m saying is: it probably didn’t cost Premier all that much to bring a little personal touch to its clients lives. It might even mentally prepare you for your x-ray: maybe you could become predisposed to believing that it might be a good experience–after all, they seem to care…

What I don’t understand is why a radiology practice would offer such nicities. It’s not like you are going to come back of your own wishes for your annual check up. Maybe Premier Radiology actually sees their clients as more than fleshy dollar signs.

Imagine how the doctors we choose to patronize might benefit from spending a couple bucks and spreading a little unsolicited goodwill on its patients before they actually see the doctor. Maybe even doctors with poor bedside manner could overcome their bad rep with a little caring waiting room manner.

You may recall a post I did a while back about the company that employs me, Thomas Nelson, Inc., committing themselves to improving the health of its employees by offering incentives to get healthier. One of those incentives was running in a local race–the Country Music Marathon (or half-marathon)–on the company’s dime, plus a $100 gift certificate for finishers.

The Tennessean, one of the local dailies, ran an article on the subject a couple days prior to the race about not only Thomas Nelson but other area companies who were encouraging their employees to run. Included in the article were Healthways who entered 170 people (they seemed to be everywhere at the race), Smyrna’s Stonecrest Medical Center who had a team of 55 plus another 15 family members, and Chick-fil-A.

It seems some other companies get it: do things that bring real value to your employees’ lives, appear to be doing it over and above what’s expected, and the company can benefit from having more productive employees and improving their brand equity from their own ranks. Interestingly, my personal experience that participation in the race wasn’t about receiving the company’s money, but about the symbolic effort on their part, is also alluded to in the article by a woman who said that what she has received in terms of new friends outweighed the company’s investment in her.

One final note. Shock, shock. This article wasn’t in the Business Pages–it was in the Sports Pages. Like I said, the stories about positive, consequential value for humans are rarely on the Business Pages. There, however, you can read all about our lay-offs. Did lay-offs have more business value than investing in the health of employees?

I know I haven’t written in a while. Part of it: I’ve been busy. The bigger part: it’s hard to find good promotions, services, and offers that actually offer real value to the consumer. You know where these stories are not? The Business Pages. The Business Pages are all about money–making it, losing it, calculating it. Not much there about people, unless a particular people was instrumental in making or losing it.

So where, then, do you find a story about a “good deal”? Well, sometimes I find them on TV shows like CBS Sunday Morning that actually devote time each week to contributions people make to better the world.

Take this past Sunday’s 60 Minutes. Though known for its “hard-hitting” journalism that strikes fear in the hearts of evil-doers, yesterday they had two stories that focused more on the good hearts and potential of humans than on what’s screwed up about them, er, us.

The first: The Kanzius Machine: A Cancer Cure?. If it weren’t on 60 Minutes, you’d probably conclude that this story about John Kanzius who may have developed a cure for cancer with pie pans and radio waves was pure quackery. But look for more on the Kanzius Machine from legitimate sources. It all started with a guy who could no longer look into the hollow eyes of cancer-filled children and wanted to at least try to do something.

The second, even more valuable story–El Sistema: Changing Lives Through Music–tells about Venezuala’s concerted attempts to train its children in classical music. In America, where music training is the first program to be cut when budgets get thin, the story in the poverty-stricken Venezuala is quite different

Nearly 300,000 kids like Paola are in “the system.” There are 176 orchestras for children, 216 for young people, and 400 more ensembles, orchestras and choirs. The sound of children playing classical music is everywhere. If it seems they’re playing as if their lives depend on it, Dr. Abreu says they do.

“Eight hundred thousand children have passed through the system in 32 years,” he told Simon.

“The majority of them have not, will not become musicians?” Simon asked.

“Music produces an irreversible transformation in a child. This doesn’t mean he’ll end up as a professional musician. He may become a doctor, or study law, or teach literature. What music gives him remains indelibly part of who he is forever,” Abreu said.

We need more people in the world like Dr. José Antonio Abreu who, with 11 children and deep belief that the spiritual benefits of music could change a nation’s children and who they become as adults, will step out and make it happen.

I recently shopped at Dick’s Sporting Goods for some running gear. As a reluctant if cranky retail shopper, the experience was made tolerable by an on-the-ball associate who saw me lusting after the sports watches, actually knew something about them, and could answer my questions. As I left, she gave me my receipt and told me if I went to their website and answered their survey, I would get a $10 coupon on my next purchase…which I could apply to that watch if I still wanted it. Like I said, she was pretty sharp.

So I went home and with visions of a new watch dancing in my head I filled out the survey (which took about 10 minutes, maybe less). Sure enough, up popped my coupon, which I printed, and am saving for my next trip to Dick’s.

Compare this experience to a similar online survey I was asked to fill out for a Marriott Courtyard in Milwaukee where I recently stayed. (Marriott almost always sends me one of these surveys.) It took every bit of 10 minutes and I got a ‘thank you’ for it.

I have filled out my last hotel customer experience survey (or anybody else’s) that doesn’t offer me something of tangible value for my time. Though I don’t recommend giving me a discount on future stays (since businesses usually pay the freight and it’s hard to pass coupons on to them), Marriott could have offered:

• 500 (loyalty) points
• Free breakfast/lunch/drink at my next stay at the chain
• Music to download
• A book about travel
• Donate something of serious value to the underprivileged.

Just to name a few. And don’t give me a contest to enter.

How hard is this, People? If your customers’ opinions are that important to you, wouldn’t it be worth it to offer something of value in return? In my experience, you don’t usually appreciate the advice you get unless it costs you something anyway. Chances are: Marriott isn’t paying particularly close attention to the surveys.

Long before Starbucks moved into every crack of the known universe, I learned the joys of drinking quality coffee and lattes from a place in Raleigh, NC known as Cup-a-Joe. As coffee houses go, it was a dive. 2nd- and 3rd-hand metal tables from our grandmothers’ kitchens (that always snagged my pants), beat up old airplane seats and graffiti decorated the place. People could smoke and Bohemians, executives, and NC State students of all stripe all sipped comfortably together like they were from the same family. Musicians played in a nook on the weekends. And that smell! They roasted their own, so that godawful pungent odor filled your nostrils. An acquired taste for sure, but I grew to long for that smell.

Word was they served 3000 cups a day from 6am to midnight. It’s still the best place in America to find a good cup of joe. No sanitized Starbucks comes close.

Because of a recent report on the National Geographic Channel, an article in my church bulletin (pg. 24), and a visit to a local gift shop, I’m trying to change my coffee buying habits. I’m coming to learn about the importance of buying “fair trade” products–particularly coffee.Turns out that–not unlike post-civil war America where slavery was replaced by sharecropping (slavery through debt management)–the largest coffee conglomerates in the world (like Maxwell House, Sara Lee, Folgers, and Starbucks) once wiped out rich rainforests to create coffee farms and now contract farmers in traditional sharecropping fashion to produce what has become the world’s Number 2 (behind oil) commodity.

Enter ‘”fair trade.” Basically, coffee certified as “fair trade” means that the deal struck between the buyers and the coffee farmers is intended to provide (among other things) a “living wage” to the farmer. No sharecropping. No (what amounts to) slave labor. And with that comes more environmentally safe (organic), estate (single farm), and usually higher quality java. Take a look around in the marketplace and you will see lesser-known brands of coffee stamping “certified fair trade” symbols on their bags. Even Starbucks is getting on this bandwagon and offering a small percentage (6) of their coffee from this family friendly, globally-aware reserve of beans. All the coffee at Whole Foods is supposedly either fair trade, estate, or organic. By giving us the fair trade choice, some in the marketplace offer us the opportunity to make the world a more just place.

Yes, fair trade coffee often costs a little more. But if you are reading this blog, and surfing the net, you, like me, can probably afford the extra buck. When you can, choose fair trade. When we do, we are sending a message to the big conglomerates to take better care of the people who produce (what one of my workmates calls) “the nectar of the gods,” and we can know we are not drinking from the sisterns of some of the world’s most destitute people.

P.S. Imagine what could happen in the world if businesses insisted on using only fair trade coffee at their employee coffee stations! Hotels too!

“As the Economy Dips, Hollywood Usually Booms” read the headline from Associated Press feeds around the country, March 10th. I remember thinking how weird that sounded as I dove into the article.But it’s true: during every economic recession dating all the way back to the Great Depression, people buy movie tickets when they can’t afford, say, gas. The article explores the why of it, speculating that movies are–even for all the snacks’ pricey-ness–still the cheapest ticket in town, and they offer free therapy.

On one level the paradox of this situation fries me: when you have trouble paying rent, you don’t spend money on entertainment (at least this is what I try to teach my kids). On the other hand, I have argued that we all need music and art (which includes movies) no matter how hard times are. So a few observations:

1. Movies can be a good economic value in hard times. At an average $6.88 a ticket right now, going to movies and avoiding the snack counter is cheaper than many entertainment alternatives. It particularly makes economic sense if you’ve dropped your cable level down to basic, and you are now saving $100 a month in bills.
2. Movies, like art and music, are a spiritual solution–not necessarily a good one, but a spiritual one nonetheless. If movies are a place to escape our despair, then we are choosing movies to deal with what’s happening deep inside us: where we are spiritual. What would be nice (but is pure fantasy of course) would be more choices from Hollywood that would actually feed our spirits in a positive way rather than films that explore and exploit humanity’s worst attributes. Even better, we humans could do a better job selecting the movies we see, and start choosing movies that inspire, uplift and heal us rather than stuff that kills time at best or devolves us spiritually at worst.
3. The movie business is in a great position to be extraordinarily effective pastoral marketers. Hoping for this from most of Hollywood of course would be insane. But theater owners, chains, and operators are in a different position–movie-goers are in their stores. What if during hard economic times:

• theaters partnered with local business to provide goods and services (or coupons for them) that would be helpful?
• they showed $1 matinees that fed the heart and brain and spirit with good stuff (like The Chronicles of Narnia, The Passion of the Christ, October Sky, anything by Tyler Perry, etc.)?
• they reduced snack prices to something sensible?
• they gave away books that the movies were based on so consumers could keep the experience going at home?
• they let –and this is really weird–a financial counselor or even a family therapist set up shop in the lobby?
• theaters worked with HR departments to create a movie day for employees–to take the load off for a couple hours ?(talk about crazy!) or with non-profits to feed the souls of some of their clients?

I’ll bet you real marketers could even think up better suggestions and bring real, consequential value to the movie-going masses. Just put on your “pastoral” hats–and bring out the side of you that really cares about people. And who knows…you might even find a new consumer base and a more avid consumer base during the good times.

I don’t know Joe Pulizzi from Adam’s cat except that he commented on one of my posts.  But I traced him back to his blog, Junta 42 (also the name of his company), and was blown away.  He specializes in “content marketing,” regularly contributes to the Custom Publishing Council’s blog,  and clearly “gets it” when it comes to understanding the role “content” plays in marketing.

His blog is exceptionally well-written and goes out of its way to line you up to the right people.  If you do any kind of marketing at all (and who of us doesn’t), his summary of a conversation with Seth Godin (Seth Godin: “Content Marketing is the Only Marketing Left” and 10 New Marketing Lessons) is a must-read.