May 21, 2020

#CX 53: Creating a Fanocracy w/ David Meerman Scott

In this episode of the #CX series, Ethan Beute, Chief Evangelist at BombBomb, talks with David Meerman Scott, author of Fanocracy, about creating fans from customers and customers from fans through human connection.


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Transcript
WEBVTT 1 00:00:04.040 --> 00:00:08.630 This is a powerful way to grow fans of a business. Create a youtube 2 00:00:08.669 --> 00:00:13.109 channel and do videos that drive people into your business and then use services like 3 00:00:13.189 --> 00:00:19.629 bomb bomb to communicate to people. We all want to turn our customers into 4 00:00:19.789 --> 00:00:25.059 fans, but we can also create fans and turn them into customers. Our 5 00:00:25.140 --> 00:00:29.420 guest here on the CX series of the BDB growth show wrote the book on 6 00:00:29.539 --> 00:00:33.259 how to do it. Our guest is David Merriman Scott. The book is 7 00:00:33.380 --> 00:00:37.649 fanocracy and it's one of more than ten best selling books that he's authored. 8 00:00:38.049 --> 00:00:43.170 Themes here in this conversation include human connection, giving things away for free, 9 00:00:43.450 --> 00:00:50.159 truly free getting facetoface, pursuing personal passion, taking a cautionary approach to being 10 00:00:50.320 --> 00:00:54.640 to day to obsessed and more. My name is Ethan Beaut I host this 11 00:00:54.719 --> 00:00:59.880 cx series and I'm also chief evangelist at bombomb. Enjoy a look at fanocracy 12 00:01:00.240 --> 00:01:07.189 with David Merman Scott. Our deep need for human connection, the contagiousness of 13 00:01:07.349 --> 00:01:12.310 passion, a healthy blend of art and science, the dehumanizing effects of automation 14 00:01:12.390 --> 00:01:18.230 and data obsession, a need to relinquish control over your product in your brand 15 00:01:18.549 --> 00:01:22.099 and turn it over to your fans, these things are important to me. 16 00:01:22.379 --> 00:01:26.700 They're important to customer experience and their foundational to the work of today's guest. 17 00:01:26.019 --> 00:01:30.939 He's a keynote speaker, Marketing Strategist, on Entrepreneur, start up advisor VC, 18 00:01:32.180 --> 00:01:36.370 partner in the best selling author of eleven books, including classics like the 19 00:01:36.450 --> 00:01:40.090 new rules of marketing at PR which is in its sixth edition, closing in 20 00:01:40.250 --> 00:01:44.409 on half a million copies sold and printed in dozens of languages. A Smart 21 00:01:44.409 --> 00:01:49.519 Passion Project Marketing Lessons from the grateful dead, with hub spot CEO Brian Halligan 22 00:01:49.840 --> 00:01:53.280 and his latest book, which I highly recommend, Fan accracy, turning fans 23 00:01:53.319 --> 00:01:59.359 into customers and customers into fans. David Meerman Scott, welcome to the customer 24 00:01:59.400 --> 00:02:04.590 experience podcast. Thank you, Ethan. I've done over a hundred podcasts in 25 00:02:04.670 --> 00:02:07.430 the last twelve months and that was by far the best introduction, so I 26 00:02:07.509 --> 00:02:12.229 appreciate that. That is really kind. I just I'm really happy to have 27 00:02:12.349 --> 00:02:15.550 you here. I love your work. I've read several of your books and 28 00:02:15.669 --> 00:02:19.259 and this latest one, Fan accracy, is just it's fun to read, 29 00:02:19.259 --> 00:02:23.580 it's easy to read and I really think it taps into this is obviously the 30 00:02:23.699 --> 00:02:28.300 theme of new rules and and real time marketing and PR as well. It 31 00:02:28.460 --> 00:02:32.650 just really taps into the state of affairs with a level of clarity that you 32 00:02:32.729 --> 00:02:38.289 don't find often rights. It's a blend of theory and tactics and really tapped 33 00:02:38.330 --> 00:02:42.409 into the moment, I feel. Thank you. Thank you very much for 34 00:02:42.610 --> 00:02:46.800 saying that, because that's actually exactly what I wanted to do and what I 35 00:02:46.919 --> 00:02:52.840 have been able to do in the past, and I think that now that 36 00:02:52.960 --> 00:02:55.240 we're starting a new decade, the decade of the S, I think we're 37 00:02:55.280 --> 00:03:00.430 in a new moment. The promise of Social Media Idia has always been, 38 00:03:00.949 --> 00:03:05.870 you know, unicorns and rainbows and communicating with people and everyone loves one another, 39 00:03:06.189 --> 00:03:08.710 but that's not the reality. Today. The reality is a can be 40 00:03:08.830 --> 00:03:15.219 a very dark and cold place for many people. There's polarization everywhere. The 41 00:03:15.379 --> 00:03:20.620 social networks themselves, used to be optimized for communicating with your friends, are 42 00:03:20.659 --> 00:03:25.219 now optimized for profit, and then you've got the the whole political world on 43 00:03:25.419 --> 00:03:30.129 social networks, which is, you know, just a dangerous zone for everybody 44 00:03:30.210 --> 00:03:35.930 involved. So I wanted to look at what's next and to me, true 45 00:03:35.969 --> 00:03:38.449 human connection. I mean it's not that, it's not that it's new. 46 00:03:38.650 --> 00:03:42.879 We've always had it. It's always been an important part of customer experience, 47 00:03:43.120 --> 00:03:47.680 but true human connection is what I think will be driving success in the S. 48 00:03:49.319 --> 00:03:53.479 I completely agree, and you use language around it that I use in 49 00:03:53.560 --> 00:03:55.789 describing some of the work that we do, which is is pendulum swing back 50 00:03:55.909 --> 00:03:59.750 away from a lot of the stuff that's come up and some of the stuff 51 00:03:59.750 --> 00:04:01.750 you refer to. So I'm going to ask you to find customer experience, 52 00:04:01.830 --> 00:04:04.349 but prior to that I'm going to ask a more personal question just to warm 53 00:04:04.389 --> 00:04:06.710 it up, and I'm going to ask you a little bit about parenting. 54 00:04:08.030 --> 00:04:12.020 So congratulations to you and your wife, because your daughter, Riicho, completed 55 00:04:12.060 --> 00:04:15.379 a neuroscience degree at Columbia. She's working on her medical degree at Boston University 56 00:04:15.379 --> 00:04:20.220 School of Medicine. She's an accomplished writer and she coauthored fan accuracy with you. 57 00:04:20.339 --> 00:04:25.370 So you know, based on the Research Infan accuracy, you point to 58 00:04:25.689 --> 00:04:30.649 fandom starting in adolescence. And so before for we get going on customer experience 59 00:04:30.810 --> 00:04:33.170 and Fan Accracy, I'd love to for you to talk briefly about your journey 60 00:04:33.209 --> 00:04:36.769 as a parent helping your daughter discover, explore and kind of live out these 61 00:04:36.850 --> 00:04:41.720 passions, because it seems like you've done a very good job. Thank you 62 00:04:41.800 --> 00:04:45.560 for that. And she's a better writer than me too, as you as 63 00:04:45.600 --> 00:04:48.839 you know because you read the book. We we originally, and you don't 64 00:04:48.839 --> 00:04:54.829 know this part, we originally wanted to create one voice. So we were 65 00:04:54.990 --> 00:05:00.149 coauthors and we created a unified voice that brought us together. It just wasn't 66 00:05:00.149 --> 00:05:04.629 working. It was too generic. So we ended up writing individual chapters. 67 00:05:04.670 --> 00:05:08.740 I wrote about half, she wrote about half, and we let our own 68 00:05:08.779 --> 00:05:13.019 voices shine through and we actually say, you know, Chapter Three by David, 69 00:05:13.060 --> 00:05:17.620 Chapter Four by Rico, and it worked out great because her voice shines 70 00:05:17.899 --> 00:05:25.850 through in that way. And being a millennial, mixed race woman, neuroscientist 71 00:05:25.970 --> 00:05:30.449 who loves Harry Potter is really different than being a middle aged white guy who 72 00:05:30.490 --> 00:05:34.170 loves live music, especially the grateful dead. So we were able to really 73 00:05:34.209 --> 00:05:39.120 have different perspectives. But you know, we only have one child, my 74 00:05:39.240 --> 00:05:46.199 wife and I, and we were focused from the very beginning and treating always 75 00:05:46.279 --> 00:05:51.470 having her with us. We only had a babysitter once one time in our 76 00:05:51.509 --> 00:05:56.589 entire lives, when she was young, we decide to go to a Madonna 77 00:05:56.670 --> 00:06:00.430 concert and we had a babysitter, but otherwise us. We took her everywhere, 78 00:06:00.870 --> 00:06:01.990 everywhere, you know it. And as she was three years old, 79 00:06:02.029 --> 00:06:04.100 she went to the restaurant, she was four years old, she went to 80 00:06:04.180 --> 00:06:10.540 the play, because we exposed her to many different things and then let her 81 00:06:10.660 --> 00:06:13.980 make decisions as soon as she was able. So as soon as she was 82 00:06:14.019 --> 00:06:16.060 able to choose which restaurant to go to, Susie, she was able to 83 00:06:16.220 --> 00:06:20.050 choose what play to go to, choose what movie to see, what book 84 00:06:20.170 --> 00:06:27.290 to read. That those were her decisions and she made choices that were right 85 00:06:27.449 --> 00:06:32.800 for her and we never second guess those choices. And if she would do 86 00:06:32.920 --> 00:06:36.120 something a little bit odd and get into a little bit of trouble with that 87 00:06:36.199 --> 00:06:39.720 was her choice and then she had to dial back from it. So so 88 00:06:40.800 --> 00:06:46.600 she's really doing some wonderful things in her career. She's going to be graduating 89 00:06:46.639 --> 00:06:49.790 from medical school and May and then we'll be embarking on her residency program and 90 00:06:49.829 --> 00:06:54.870 emergency medicine and doing so as a Wall Street Journal best selling author. So 91 00:06:55.110 --> 00:06:58.430 that's kind of awesome, so cool. That's so great. Congratulations to all 92 00:06:58.509 --> 00:07:01.139 three of you. So let's move into customer experience. When I say that, 93 00:07:01.379 --> 00:07:05.259 what does it mean to you? So I think of customer experiences, 94 00:07:05.500 --> 00:07:12.620 everything that sort of outside of the product and service itself. And so how 95 00:07:12.699 --> 00:07:17.689 does the organization treat you as a person? What are the intangibles that go 96 00:07:17.889 --> 00:07:23.730 along with the delivery of that product or service? You know, what are 97 00:07:23.769 --> 00:07:31.279 the what are the the overall ways that an organization engages with you as a 98 00:07:31.480 --> 00:07:36.560 customer, when you're a customer, but also as you're evaluating a particular productors 99 00:07:36.600 --> 00:07:40.480 service and and in fact, just before we get on the phone, I 100 00:07:40.519 --> 00:07:45.589 had an opportunity to contact the Wall Street Journal because I wanted to cancel my 101 00:07:45.709 --> 00:07:50.990 digital subscription. And you know, when you cancel a product, that's customer 102 00:07:51.110 --> 00:07:56.430 experience and I'm I'm happy to say they did a good job with my cancelation. 103 00:07:56.509 --> 00:07:58.819 They did try to keep me, but they weren't obnoxious about it. 104 00:07:59.500 --> 00:08:03.339 Yeah, it's a careful balance there, especially at that point of exit. 105 00:08:03.620 --> 00:08:05.860 And in the fact of the matter is you might be back one day. 106 00:08:05.060 --> 00:08:09.500 You know, your situation today might change. And I told the REP that 107 00:08:09.699 --> 00:08:13.610 when I was younger I subscribe to the print publication and I was just trying 108 00:08:13.649 --> 00:08:16.850 to digital publication. Several decades later and who knows, me, you're right, 109 00:08:16.889 --> 00:08:20.370 maybe I'll come back. Yeah, and so it versus, you know, 110 00:08:20.449 --> 00:08:22.769 burning you on the way out and you're like, okay, I'm done. 111 00:08:22.810 --> 00:08:26.959 Yeah, that's right. So, for folks that aren't familiar, could 112 00:08:28.000 --> 00:08:33.240 you give a just a definition of fan accuracy when you know the subtitle in 113 00:08:33.399 --> 00:08:37.559 part speaks for itself, but you just give a little definition to fan accuracy, 114 00:08:37.600 --> 00:08:39.759 because obviously it'll be part of, you know, the ongoing conversation here. 115 00:08:39.879 --> 00:08:46.149 Yeah, sure. So it's when fans rule and it's an organization that 116 00:08:46.429 --> 00:08:52.789 puts customers and I had of everything that it does. It's an organization and 117 00:08:52.909 --> 00:08:58.899 a feeling of true humanity, a true human connection. What does that look 118 00:08:58.980 --> 00:09:03.779 like in practice? So, and I know that's a huge question because you 119 00:09:03.899 --> 00:09:09.620 give her so many styles of businesses and organizations in the book. I mean, 120 00:09:09.009 --> 00:09:13.289 for folks who are listening, that sounds awesome, right. You know, 121 00:09:13.289 --> 00:09:16.370 if you're in an organization you want to be more human centered in and 122 00:09:16.490 --> 00:09:20.929 build community and build true fandom, and you can. But the thing, 123 00:09:22.129 --> 00:09:24.679 one of the things, many things I enjoyed about the book is it's just 124 00:09:24.799 --> 00:09:28.720 a range of examples in there from, you know, car insurance to government 125 00:09:28.759 --> 00:09:35.159 agencies, BE TO BE BTC. Everything now batteries, batteries, batteries, 126 00:09:35.159 --> 00:09:39.950 stir so, batteries. Yeah, so we went into the book five years 127 00:09:39.990 --> 00:09:43.830 ago. RACO's twenty six now, so she was twenty one at the time, 128 00:09:43.429 --> 00:09:46.909 and we went into this idea of the fact that she and I are 129 00:09:46.990 --> 00:09:52.259 both passionate about a few things. I'm incredibly passionate about live music. I've 130 00:09:52.259 --> 00:09:56.500 done, I went to spend two seven hundred and ninety live shows, including 131 00:09:56.820 --> 00:10:01.340 seventy five grateful dead concerts, and I've got a grateful dead wall of hand 132 00:10:01.500 --> 00:10:05.860 fame in my office. I own a great road case that was used in 133 00:10:05.980 --> 00:10:09.610 eight hundred fifty concerts by the grateful dead. So I'm a I'm a dialed 134 00:10:09.690 --> 00:10:13.450 in Fan and my daughter Raco is really into Harry Potter, not only as 135 00:10:13.490 --> 00:10:18.610 she read every books in every movie multiple times, she wrote an eighty five 136 00:10:18.690 --> 00:10:22.679 thousand word I'll turn to vent into the Harry Potter series where DRACO Malfoy is 137 00:10:22.720 --> 00:10:24.600 a spy for the order of the Phoenix. put down a fan fiction site. 138 00:10:24.919 --> 00:10:28.600 It's been downloaded thousands and thousands of times, comments and on hundreds of 139 00:10:28.679 --> 00:10:35.029 times. So we entered this project as fans of the things that we love 140 00:10:35.710 --> 00:10:43.549 and our thesis was that any organization, any company, any product, service 141 00:10:43.669 --> 00:10:46.710 idea can build fans. That was our thesis and we've proven that to be 142 00:10:46.830 --> 00:10:54.580 absolutely correct. And one of the my favorite examples of that is haggarty insurance 143 00:10:54.940 --> 00:11:01.899 and they do automobile insurance and I've asked thousands of people in my presentations around 144 00:11:01.899 --> 00:11:07.330 the world, in multiple countries, how many people love auto insurance, and 145 00:11:07.529 --> 00:11:11.570 nobody ever raises their hand. It's a terrible product. Nobody wants to buy 146 00:11:11.610 --> 00:11:13.490 it. You know, when you put on your credit card, your right 147 00:11:13.610 --> 00:11:16.850 that check. It's no fun at all. And furthermore, no one wants 148 00:11:16.889 --> 00:11:22.440 to use the product because I hope you've crashed your car. Right. So 149 00:11:22.519 --> 00:11:26.840 that the terrible thing. And so I was talking to the CEO of Haggarty 150 00:11:26.919 --> 00:11:31.360 Insurance, is name is Mikheil Haggarty's the entrepreneurial founder and CEO of the of 151 00:11:31.440 --> 00:11:37.710 the company and he and they do classic Car Auto Insurance. And he says, 152 00:11:37.710 --> 00:11:43.230 David, everyone hates my product. My product sucks. So I can't 153 00:11:43.350 --> 00:11:48.019 markt the way everybody else does. I can't become the low cost provider I 154 00:11:48.100 --> 00:11:52.179 don't want to do that. I don't want to out and outspend on advertising. 155 00:11:52.220 --> 00:11:56.899 I can't compete with the Geckos of the world. So he said we're 156 00:11:56.980 --> 00:12:03.929 going going to go out and specifically set out to build fans, and so 157 00:12:03.690 --> 00:12:11.570 he's developing a human connection with potential and existing customers. So initially what they 158 00:12:11.610 --> 00:12:16.039 did was they went to classic car shows around the North America hundreds of year, 159 00:12:16.879 --> 00:12:20.240 he and his people and they would meet with people who love classic cars. 160 00:12:20.840 --> 00:12:26.440 So they're taking existing fans of classic cars and then connecting with those people 161 00:12:26.480 --> 00:12:33.669 as a like minded part of that tribe of enthusiasts. And then that developed 162 00:12:33.830 --> 00:12:37.950 some people who then joined their their company as customers. And then they created 163 00:12:37.990 --> 00:12:45.019 a drivers club to bring different owners of classic cars together in a in a 164 00:12:45.100 --> 00:12:50.740 both a virtual and a physical way. They created valuations reports, so using 165 00:12:50.860 --> 00:12:54.820 their data for how much they're ensuring cars for, how much is your car 166 00:12:54.019 --> 00:12:58.730 worth? And they have now an incredible amount of data that practically any classic 167 00:12:58.850 --> 00:13:03.289 car you can get evaluation for. And all of the end they have a 168 00:13:03.370 --> 00:13:07.289 youtube channel with over a million subscribers. But all of these things have developed 169 00:13:07.330 --> 00:13:15.000 a human connection, a true human connection with with cut potential and existing customers. 170 00:13:15.679 --> 00:13:20.840 Where the Haggarty is now has a fandom of their own. They have 171 00:13:20.080 --> 00:13:24.480 hundreds of thousands of people who are fans of them, including me, and 172 00:13:26.120 --> 00:13:31.509 I actually we got a card from them. It arrived several days ago. 173 00:13:31.350 --> 00:13:37.389 I've got it right here and it's my fifteen and anniversary card. I've been 174 00:13:37.429 --> 00:13:41.460 a customer. Wow, I've been a customer of Agarty for fifteen years now. 175 00:13:41.460 --> 00:13:43.779 They enture my one thousand nine hundred and seventy three Land Rover and they 176 00:13:43.940 --> 00:13:50.100 sent me an anniversary card thanking me for their for my business on there. 177 00:13:50.139 --> 00:13:54.419 And you know, they're being a customer of their insurance company and Mikhel Haggarty 178 00:13:54.500 --> 00:13:58.129 told me they would. We're crushing it. Where now the largest classic car 179 00:13:58.210 --> 00:14:01.929 insurer and the entire world. We're going to grow by two hundred thousand new 180 00:14:01.970 --> 00:14:05.929 customers this year. Everybody loves what we do and it's all built on fandom. 181 00:14:05.970 --> 00:14:11.679 It's all built on a human relationship that develops into people who become fans 182 00:14:11.480 --> 00:14:16.919 of a company that sells a product that everybody hates. Love it and it 183 00:14:18.039 --> 00:14:20.440 really I mean that example is so good. It speaks to the subtitle the 184 00:14:20.480 --> 00:14:24.149 book, which is turning fans into customers and customers into fans. And so 185 00:14:24.269 --> 00:14:28.710 this idea that by approaching, and I love the way that you positioned what 186 00:14:28.789 --> 00:14:31.269 Machel wanted to do there, which is I want to create fans, and 187 00:14:31.350 --> 00:14:35.429 it wasn't I want to turn my customers into fans, it's I want to 188 00:14:35.470 --> 00:14:39.419 create something that people can be fanatical about, connect people together and, by 189 00:14:39.460 --> 00:14:41.820 the way, some of them are going to become customers and some of the 190 00:14:41.899 --> 00:14:45.299 customers are going to participate in the fandom. So it really speaks to that, 191 00:14:45.419 --> 00:14:48.539 given take and working both sides of it, you're not just trying to 192 00:14:48.659 --> 00:14:52.299 take. Typically, when people think about this, it's take a customer and 193 00:14:52.379 --> 00:14:54.970 turn them into an advocate or a fan or whatever you want to call so 194 00:14:54.049 --> 00:14:58.570 I love this, this idea of building that in up front. So folks 195 00:14:58.610 --> 00:15:03.929 that are listening, if you have not visited Bombombcom podcast, you're missing out 196 00:15:03.049 --> 00:15:07.840 on video clips of these conversations and I just got a really nice tour of 197 00:15:09.320 --> 00:15:13.399 David's grateful dead collection on his wall, as well as that travel box and 198 00:15:13.600 --> 00:15:16.960 the card from haggerty. So if you want to see some of the stuff 199 00:15:16.200 --> 00:15:18.440 that we're talking about, to see the guests. I'm putting it all up 200 00:15:18.919 --> 00:15:24.549 in blog posted bombombcom podcast. So, speaking of the grateful dead, I 201 00:15:24.789 --> 00:15:28.509 feel like this book is kind of a natural extension of marketing lessons from the 202 00:15:28.509 --> 00:15:31.590 grateful dead in that, you know, picks up the lessons, it expands 203 00:15:31.669 --> 00:15:35.980 on them and again, as I already said, it illustrates the ice some 204 00:15:35.019 --> 00:15:41.100 of the ideas with a much broader range of companies, organizations, fandoms, 205 00:15:41.139 --> 00:15:43.620 things that we can connect to. What do you say? That's fair? 206 00:15:43.659 --> 00:15:48.580 Yeah, absolutely, and that book, marketing lessons from the grateful dead, 207 00:15:48.620 --> 00:15:52.009 came out about a decade ago. So Brian Halligan, who's the CEO hub 208 00:15:52.090 --> 00:15:56.850 spot, and I wrote that together and Build Wall in the NBA Basketball Hall 209 00:15:56.929 --> 00:16:00.889 of fame or worked the forward to our book, and so we were exp 210 00:16:00.929 --> 00:16:04.639 Bryant and I were exploring the ideas of how did the grateful dead build fans 211 00:16:06.279 --> 00:16:10.799 and can the ideas about how the grateful dead built fans be applied to other 212 00:16:10.919 --> 00:16:14.679 businesses? And the answers yes. So you're up. You're very perceptive and 213 00:16:15.000 --> 00:16:21.350 in asking me that, because indeed, having already written one book about this 214 00:16:21.590 --> 00:16:26.230 idea of growing fans and in that case very specifically using the techniques of the 215 00:16:26.269 --> 00:16:33.460 greatful dead did helped me to give a much broader thought to fandom in general 216 00:16:33.620 --> 00:16:37.940 and then bring my daughter and Rico, as a very different person of mixed 217 00:16:37.940 --> 00:16:41.259 race, millennial woman, to figure out how this can apply to all different 218 00:16:41.460 --> 00:16:45.860 kinds of people and cultures and ideas and products and services. And one of 219 00:16:45.899 --> 00:16:49.450 the things that grateful dead did that is so was so unique still is so 220 00:16:49.490 --> 00:16:55.850 unique, is unlike every other band, the grateful dead allowed fans to record 221 00:16:56.009 --> 00:17:03.160 concerts. So fans could bring in professional level recording here and they, the 222 00:17:03.359 --> 00:17:07.519 grateful dead, actually gave them a special place that they could go to right 223 00:17:07.559 --> 00:17:10.839 behind the mixing board. They even had power strips you could plug into. 224 00:17:11.279 --> 00:17:14.319 I mean it was and you could, you could put your microphones up in 225 00:17:14.359 --> 00:17:17.109 the air on stands. I mean they let, they really let you go 226 00:17:17.230 --> 00:17:22.069 to town and record the shows and the only rule was that you can't sell 227 00:17:22.269 --> 00:17:27.750 the resulting recordings, but people could freely trade. Initially in the early days 228 00:17:27.789 --> 00:17:32.339 it was cassette tapes and it became MP three files. You could trade the 229 00:17:32.420 --> 00:17:34.500 tapes, you could give them away as long you don't sell them, and 230 00:17:34.740 --> 00:17:41.099 that then generated an incredible passion for people who listen to the grateful dead in 231 00:17:41.220 --> 00:17:47.930 these freely recorded initially cassette tapes and then MP three files, and then they 232 00:17:47.930 --> 00:17:49.329 would say, you know what, this is great, I want to go 233 00:17:49.410 --> 00:17:52.609 to a grateful dead concert too, or I want to buy a studio album 234 00:17:52.730 --> 00:18:00.480 too. And that actually created one of the most popular touring bands in American 235 00:18:00.640 --> 00:18:06.240 history. And even now, twenty five years after Jerry Garcia died, the 236 00:18:06.759 --> 00:18:11.920 surviving members of the grateful dead are still touring. Dead and company with John 237 00:18:11.000 --> 00:18:15.150 Mayer and the Jerry Garcia Roll is still touring and I'm still going. I 238 00:18:15.349 --> 00:18:19.750 went in two thousand and nineteen. I went to seven concerts. Wow, 239 00:18:21.029 --> 00:18:26.789 and the tickets are expensive. I've probably spent four or five thousand dollars in 240 00:18:26.950 --> 00:18:30.539 two thousand and nineteen on the grateful bed and it all goes back to when 241 00:18:30.579 --> 00:18:36.660 I was a teenager and I heard music coming out of my friends stereo system 242 00:18:36.700 --> 00:18:40.940 and that got me hooked on the band. And this idea of giving something 243 00:18:41.019 --> 00:18:45.650 away completely free without any expectation of anything in return, is one of the 244 00:18:45.809 --> 00:18:52.890 chapters in fanocracy, and any organization can do that. So we have an 245 00:18:52.049 --> 00:18:57.960 a cool example of Dura cell batteries. And what Dura cell does is they 246 00:18:59.000 --> 00:19:04.400 have a something called the power forward program where when when there's a natural disaster, 247 00:19:04.440 --> 00:19:08.759 hurricane, flood, fire, something like that, and power goes out, 248 00:19:10.470 --> 00:19:14.950 they have a fleet of trucks that go to the place where the power 249 00:19:15.029 --> 00:19:19.910 outage is to give away Free Dura cell batteries, absolutely no obligation, nothing 250 00:19:19.950 --> 00:19:25.579 in expectation of anything in return. They just give away free battery. Is 251 00:19:25.660 --> 00:19:27.900 when people need them. Now. What's interesting about this is this is when 252 00:19:27.940 --> 00:19:32.700 batteries are in the most demand. They could price gouge, you know, 253 00:19:32.779 --> 00:19:36.220 people are willing to pay five ten dollars for a pack of batteries that are 254 00:19:36.259 --> 00:19:40.210 normally two dollars ninety five cents. But durass doesn't do that. They just 255 00:19:40.329 --> 00:19:45.009 give them away for free, and that good will is something that people remember 256 00:19:45.250 --> 00:19:48.930 for many years. They tell their friends, they tell their colleagues. What 257 00:19:48.089 --> 00:19:53.039 I see, though, are way too many organizations, especially be to be 258 00:19:53.160 --> 00:19:57.119 companies, doing the opposite. What a typical be to be company does is 259 00:19:57.319 --> 00:20:00.640 they create a white paper or an ebook or some other piece of content and, 260 00:20:02.359 --> 00:20:06.200 rather than give it away for free with no out no expectation of anything 261 00:20:06.200 --> 00:20:11.349 in return, like the grateful dead and Dura cell. They slap the requirement 262 00:20:11.430 --> 00:20:14.910 that you have to give an email address in order to get that white paper 263 00:20:14.950 --> 00:20:19.269 or ebook or other piece of online content. That sets up an adversarial relationship. 264 00:20:19.589 --> 00:20:22.980 It's not a good way to build fans, because what you're doing is 265 00:20:23.019 --> 00:20:27.579 you're saying, oh no, I'm not going to give you anything unless you 266 00:20:27.819 --> 00:20:33.220 give me something first. Yeah, you must get you must give me your 267 00:20:33.259 --> 00:20:37.970 email address before I'll give you my white paper, and that's an that's an 268 00:20:37.970 --> 00:20:41.130 adversarial relationship, it's a it's a it's a business contract, if you will, 269 00:20:41.730 --> 00:20:47.609 rather than giving away something for free. So I recommend that people take 270 00:20:47.690 --> 00:20:52.640 a page out of the grateful dead playbook or the dursell playbook and make that 271 00:20:52.759 --> 00:20:57.000 white paper or ebook complete and totally free, with no registration at all, 272 00:20:57.920 --> 00:21:03.279 because that's what will allow your content to spread and that, well, that's 273 00:21:03.400 --> 00:21:07.150 what will help you to build fans. I love it so UN gate that 274 00:21:07.269 --> 00:21:11.670 content for starters. Don't price couch just because you can. Right respect people 275 00:21:11.710 --> 00:21:19.299 as humans. I really appreciate the specifically named artists that protect the price integrity 276 00:21:19.579 --> 00:21:22.900 of tickets to live shows. Like you named like eight or ten of them 277 00:21:23.180 --> 00:21:26.099 and it because there's so many bands and, of course, some of the 278 00:21:26.140 --> 00:21:30.180 venue owners in. It's all at this point conglomerated. That are you know, 279 00:21:30.259 --> 00:21:33.730 you wind up, the tickets go on sale at ten am. By 280 00:21:33.890 --> 00:21:37.130 ten O one, it's completely sold out and you know, two thirds of 281 00:21:37.170 --> 00:21:41.369 the venue is now marked up at, you know, four hundred percent of 282 00:21:41.410 --> 00:21:45.130 the original ticket price. And so I appreciate that you called out folks that 283 00:21:45.170 --> 00:21:49.960 are intentionally doing the opposite of that and welcoming people in it at acceptable and 284 00:21:51.079 --> 00:21:55.480 appropriate prices. And and what that's all about. It's a different chapter. 285 00:21:55.720 --> 00:22:00.839 Chapter. We're talking about transparency and telling the truth. Is that, you 286 00:22:00.960 --> 00:22:04.069 know, it's a really big part of customer experience to always tell the truth. 287 00:22:04.150 --> 00:22:08.789 Isn't anything. I mean, so many companies hide behind, you know, 288 00:22:10.029 --> 00:22:15.710 legal ease or they make an excuse for something that goes wrong or, 289 00:22:15.099 --> 00:22:21.140 in this example of tickets, they blame the venue or they blame ticket master 290 00:22:21.180 --> 00:22:29.619 or the other ticketing systems for for what's going on. And fans, customers, 291 00:22:29.779 --> 00:22:33.730 have a horrible experience buying tickets. You know, you want to go 292 00:22:33.809 --> 00:22:36.569 to the big concert, you want to go see whatever band it is, 293 00:22:37.130 --> 00:22:41.410 and you go to the you go to the ticketing system at ten am, 294 00:22:41.490 --> 00:22:44.519 as you said, and all of a sudden all the tickets are gone. 295 00:22:44.559 --> 00:22:48.079 But you go onto stubhub and there's thousands and thousands of tickets of the same 296 00:22:48.079 --> 00:22:52.839 show that you couldn't get on the primary market available at a huge markup on 297 00:22:52.920 --> 00:22:57.910 the secondary market. It's really disconcerting and it's a horrible, horrible customer experience. 298 00:22:59.670 --> 00:23:04.309 So what what some bands, the rolling stones, Jack White and there's 299 00:23:04.309 --> 00:23:11.109 a bunch of other ones, have done is they've figured out different ways to 300 00:23:11.630 --> 00:23:18.779 make it way more transparent and way more honest and give the true fan an 301 00:23:18.859 --> 00:23:25.099 opportunity to buy tickets on the primary market. And it turns out that fans 302 00:23:25.220 --> 00:23:27.609 don't have a problem with a highly priced ticket. You know, if you 303 00:23:27.730 --> 00:23:30.970 have to pay four hundred dollars for a good seat to the rolling stones, 304 00:23:32.529 --> 00:23:36.609 fans understand that and you know if you're willing to pay it, you want 305 00:23:36.609 --> 00:23:41.759 to pay it to the band, not to some scalper. So these bands 306 00:23:41.839 --> 00:23:45.680 have figured out ways to sell directly to you and if you want to pay, 307 00:23:45.759 --> 00:23:48.880 that's fine. It's kind of like when you buy airline seats. You 308 00:23:48.960 --> 00:23:52.279 know if you want to spend the big bucks to sit in business class. 309 00:23:52.759 --> 00:23:55.869 Well, you know you're going to pay more. If you want to spend 310 00:23:56.029 --> 00:23:57.789 less money, you can sit in the back. And the same things true 311 00:23:57.869 --> 00:24:00.829 of sitting in a rolling stone show. You know want to pay a little 312 00:24:00.829 --> 00:24:04.309 bit extra or a lot extra, you can be up front. If you're 313 00:24:04.470 --> 00:24:07.710 not willing to pay the extra, you're going to be in the back. 314 00:24:07.950 --> 00:24:17.059 And so this idea of transparency and honesty as a really important aspect of fandom 315 00:24:17.099 --> 00:24:22.420 and a really important aspect of customer experience is something that we can all work 316 00:24:22.579 --> 00:24:26.650 on and it's fairly simple. Yeah, I think honesty and transparency, of 317 00:24:26.730 --> 00:24:32.130 course, are part of the trust building process. When you have trust establish 318 00:24:32.170 --> 00:24:33.569 it's when we can be a little bit more vulnerable with each other, and 319 00:24:33.609 --> 00:24:37.450 when we can be a little bit vulnerable with each other is how we build 320 00:24:37.529 --> 00:24:41.039 real, true human connection, which kind of see, there's so many places 321 00:24:41.079 --> 00:24:44.160 I want to go. I just love all the material, but where I 322 00:24:44.200 --> 00:24:48.440 want to go next is is around that human connection, because a lot of 323 00:24:48.480 --> 00:24:51.319 the work that we do here at Bombom we make it really easy to record 324 00:24:51.359 --> 00:24:56.470 and send lightweight videos in place of faceless digital communication, right nails, text 325 00:24:56.509 --> 00:25:00.710 messages, social messages and you have some really cool research in the book about 326 00:25:00.710 --> 00:25:07.740 facetoface communication, physical proximity, and it has implications for video to so I 327 00:25:07.900 --> 00:25:11.579 love you to a drive by on that proximity layer and how it translates even 328 00:25:11.619 --> 00:25:17.500 through the screen. No, it's incredibly important and I believe it's so important 329 00:25:17.660 --> 00:25:22.970 that bombomb is is just going to do so well going forward, because what 330 00:25:22.170 --> 00:25:27.130 we did was, as my daughter Raycod did a neuroscience to undergraduate neuroscience degree 331 00:25:27.289 --> 00:25:32.890 at Columbia University and as we were talking about this idea of fandom, one 332 00:25:32.890 --> 00:25:36.519 of the things that we really wanted to do was dig into what's actually going 333 00:25:36.640 --> 00:25:40.799 on in our brains when we become a fan of something. What's happening, 334 00:25:40.960 --> 00:25:44.240 and we wanted to be able to talk about that in the book and figure 335 00:25:44.279 --> 00:25:47.279 out whether that leads to any prescriptions, and the answer as it does. 336 00:25:48.039 --> 00:25:52.710 So we spoke with a number of different important neuroscientists about what's happening in our 337 00:25:52.789 --> 00:25:59.509 brains and it turns out that all of us are hardwired to feel safe and 338 00:25:59.750 --> 00:26:03.230 comfortable within our own tribe of people, and this goes back, you know, 339 00:26:03.420 --> 00:26:07.859 tens and tens of thousands of years because if you're within your tribe, 340 00:26:07.900 --> 00:26:11.579 you're safe and comfortable. If you're outside of your tribe, you're vulnerable to 341 00:26:11.700 --> 00:26:18.299 attack, and we modern humans can't help the fact that we're still concerned about 342 00:26:18.380 --> 00:26:22.569 that. And so it turns out the closer you get to somebody physically, 343 00:26:23.049 --> 00:26:30.009 the more powerful the shared emotions, either positive or negative. One neuroscientist named 344 00:26:30.009 --> 00:26:36.119 Edward t hall actually identified different levels of proximity. Further than about twelve feet 345 00:26:36.160 --> 00:26:42.680 away is he called public space, and in public space we humans know the 346 00:26:42.839 --> 00:26:48.029 people are further than twelve feet away from us. We understand that, but 347 00:26:48.190 --> 00:26:52.630 we don't yet begin to track them in our subconscious. Once people get within 348 00:26:52.910 --> 00:26:57.109 about twelve feet. That's called social space. Inside of twelve feet to about 349 00:26:57.150 --> 00:27:02.380 four feet, we track the people that get into our social space. So 350 00:27:02.539 --> 00:27:04.980 if you walk into a crowded room, you can't help the fact that you're 351 00:27:06.339 --> 00:27:11.259 you're scanning people within about twelve feet to find out, is there anybody here 352 00:27:11.259 --> 00:27:15.890 I know? Is there anybody here from my tribe? Is there danger here? 353 00:27:15.650 --> 00:27:18.569 And so this is why when you walk into a room with your friends, 354 00:27:18.609 --> 00:27:22.970 you feel great and when you walk into a crowded elevator you feel nervous. 355 00:27:22.250 --> 00:27:26.569 You can't help that. That's hardwired into our brain. And then inside 356 00:27:26.609 --> 00:27:32.200 of four feet is called personal space. That's like cocktail party distance or when 357 00:27:32.319 --> 00:27:36.319 close friends are together, maybe over an intimate meal, that kind of thing. 358 00:27:36.799 --> 00:27:41.319 Even more powerful connections. So what this means for us to grow fans 359 00:27:41.519 --> 00:27:48.869 is, can you figure out ways to get your customers or potential customers into 360 00:27:48.549 --> 00:27:53.710 social space or even personal space of you and your employees? Or, even 361 00:27:53.710 --> 00:27:59.259 better, can you get your customers into the social and personal space of other 362 00:27:59.500 --> 00:28:03.940 customers? So this is why a physical event, a customer event, you 363 00:28:04.019 --> 00:28:07.619 know, your client conference, your sales kick off, these things are really 364 00:28:07.740 --> 00:28:14.690 important in a world of digital communications, having those physical events are are amazingly 365 00:28:14.809 --> 00:28:19.130 important and Nice. I speak all over the world at customer events and many 366 00:28:19.210 --> 00:28:25.170 of them are lovefests, you know, where you've got a thousands or even 367 00:28:25.329 --> 00:28:30.519 tens of thousands of people that converge on a city and it's and it's fans 368 00:28:30.759 --> 00:28:34.559 of that company getting together. Really powerful stuff, well worthy investment, even 369 00:28:34.599 --> 00:28:38.680 if you're losing money on ticket sales. But then some people say, well, 370 00:28:38.680 --> 00:28:41.589 David, you know we can't do those physical events or clients are all 371 00:28:41.589 --> 00:28:45.470 over the world or we run a virtual business or whatever it is, and 372 00:28:45.549 --> 00:28:51.269 that's where video services like bomb bomb, as well as things like youtube for 373 00:28:51.430 --> 00:29:00.619 providing marketing videos, incredibly powerful because it turns out through something called Mirror neurons, 374 00:29:00.259 --> 00:29:04.299 which are the part of our brains that fire when we see or even 375 00:29:04.380 --> 00:29:11.569 just hear somebody doing something, can be very applicable when it comes to video, 376 00:29:11.809 --> 00:29:17.769 because the virtual proximity found on a video camera is really powerful, and 377 00:29:17.809 --> 00:29:21.529 I'm going to demonstrate that now. So here's another clip that might go on 378 00:29:21.650 --> 00:29:25.759 your your site, that I've got a lemon in one hand and a slice 379 00:29:25.759 --> 00:29:30.039 of lemon in another hand. Now, if I take a bite of this 380 00:29:30.200 --> 00:29:34.880 slice of lemon, wow, it's really powerful to take a bite of a 381 00:29:34.920 --> 00:29:40.750 slice of lemon right my eyes closed and scrunch up. My mouth starts to 382 00:29:40.990 --> 00:29:45.630 water. It's my mouth puckers up a little bit. I mean powerful thing 383 00:29:45.869 --> 00:29:51.309 to bite into a lemon. And just by seeing this, Ethan, I 384 00:29:51.430 --> 00:29:53.660 bet you're feeling some lemon to yeah, I full little. I felt a 385 00:29:53.700 --> 00:29:56.940 little pull in the in the front of my mouth, as you're like. 386 00:29:56.700 --> 00:30:00.420 I know it's weird, right, and even people who are aren't seeing the 387 00:30:00.539 --> 00:30:06.579 video clip but are here just hearing me talk about it, are probably tasting 388 00:30:06.619 --> 00:30:10.329 a little bit of lemon. So this is the concept of mirror neurons, 389 00:30:10.450 --> 00:30:15.250 because your brain is firing as if you took the bite of Lemon yourself. 390 00:30:15.730 --> 00:30:21.009 Here's where that that up applies to video. When you watch a video of 391 00:30:21.289 --> 00:30:25.680 people cropped as if you're in personal space, so about four feet away, 392 00:30:26.319 --> 00:30:32.160 looking directly at the camera, people think they're people. Intellectually know they're just 393 00:30:32.359 --> 00:30:36.509 on a camera. I'm not actually in the same room, but your subconscious, 394 00:30:36.509 --> 00:30:41.869 your mirror neurons, tell you that you're actually in close physical proximity. 395 00:30:41.910 --> 00:30:45.990 You're in the personal space of the person who's on the screen. This is 396 00:30:45.109 --> 00:30:49.059 precisely why we feel we know movie stars, even though we've never met a 397 00:30:49.420 --> 00:30:52.859 that movie star and intellectually we know they're just an image on a screen, 398 00:30:52.940 --> 00:30:57.180 we feel you know them. So this is a powerful way to grow fans 399 00:30:57.220 --> 00:31:03.059 of a business. Create a youtube channel and do videos that drive people into 400 00:31:03.059 --> 00:31:07.809 your business, and then you services like bomb bomb to communicate to people using 401 00:31:07.849 --> 00:31:15.369 video, because that's an incredibly powerful way to build fans by establishing a virtual 402 00:31:15.130 --> 00:31:22.640 close proximity to existing and potential customers. I love it that psychological proximity is 403 00:31:22.799 --> 00:31:25.279 such a big deal. Like it's easy for us to quantify things when we've 404 00:31:25.319 --> 00:31:27.799 done it through surveys and mountains of anecdotes and things like. I get more 405 00:31:27.920 --> 00:31:33.190 replies and responses, I get more clicks through my emails, I convert leads 406 00:31:33.190 --> 00:31:34.910 at a higher rate, I can stay in touch more effectively in all these 407 00:31:34.950 --> 00:31:40.549 other, you know, kind of quantifiable benefits. But this other side of 408 00:31:40.630 --> 00:31:44.029 it we hear all the time, but it's hard to put a number two 409 00:31:44.069 --> 00:31:45.990 and that one of the most common things I hear from people that use our 410 00:31:47.109 --> 00:31:51.380 service often is people feel like they know me before they ever meet me. 411 00:31:51.700 --> 00:31:53.900 And that's exactly what you're talking about. It's a really interesting dynamic and I 412 00:31:53.940 --> 00:32:00.299 get that reply myself and it's rooted in neuroscience, and that's what's so fascinating 413 00:32:00.380 --> 00:32:02.809 to me about is at this is real stuff. This is not just like, 414 00:32:04.089 --> 00:32:07.609 you know, marketing materials from bomb on. This is a real stuff. 415 00:32:07.769 --> 00:32:13.289 You know, it's really rooted in neuroscience. Some evidence that we've found, 416 00:32:13.329 --> 00:32:19.640 which is so interesting, is that the average social media post that includes 417 00:32:19.720 --> 00:32:22.000 video crop, if you're looking at the camera, crops, if it's four 418 00:32:22.079 --> 00:32:27.319 feet away or photographs looking at a camera as if it's about four feet away. 419 00:32:27.359 --> 00:32:30.630 And by the way, that includes a Selfie, because your arm is 420 00:32:30.670 --> 00:32:37.430 about four feet long. So if you're doing a selfie right you're in personal 421 00:32:37.470 --> 00:32:45.299 space with that camera. Those posts, video and photographs included, get way 422 00:32:45.500 --> 00:32:50.660 more social interaction then posts that are just text or images that are not of 423 00:32:50.819 --> 00:32:55.700 people. So it's all kind of evidence that this concept around neuroscience of proximity, 424 00:32:55.740 --> 00:33:04.450 virtual proximity, is true. 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I think 441 00:34:25.230 --> 00:34:29.869 a lot of people when we're having this customer experience conversation, we talked about 442 00:34:29.909 --> 00:34:35.670 the relationship of company to customer or or employeed a customer. But what what 443 00:34:35.869 --> 00:34:38.340 it is? Running throughout fan accuracy and in and your one of your last 444 00:34:38.579 --> 00:34:45.260 responses, is it's not just company to a customer or employeed a customer, 445 00:34:45.659 --> 00:34:50.539 it's customer to customer and it's employee to employee. And that, and I 446 00:34:50.619 --> 00:34:52.849 thought about that too, is you're talking about honesty and transparency. It's like, 447 00:34:53.610 --> 00:34:55.730 you know, what kind of company do you want to work for one 448 00:34:55.769 --> 00:35:00.050 that you can respect because it's honest and transparent, or or not. So 449 00:35:00.489 --> 00:35:05.170 talk a little bit about this give and take all the way around. For 450 00:35:05.289 --> 00:35:09.679 like a holistic fan accuracy. It includes those three stakeholders and more. Yeah, 451 00:35:09.880 --> 00:35:14.719 so one of the things that was kind of surprising to us is that 452 00:35:15.440 --> 00:35:20.199 once we started talking to people over the last five years about fans, fandom 453 00:35:20.239 --> 00:35:23.710 and and what they're a fan of and and just the idea of how and 454 00:35:23.789 --> 00:35:30.630 why people become fans, people would write up, because everybody loves to talk 455 00:35:30.670 --> 00:35:37.219 about the thing they're passionate about. and IT TURNS OUT THAT PASSION IS INFECTIOUS. 456 00:35:37.099 --> 00:35:43.420 When you're passionate about something, that passion shines through and the the the 457 00:35:43.579 --> 00:35:47.019 person that you're speaking with, does not have to share the same passion as 458 00:35:47.059 --> 00:35:52.570 you do, and this is why sometimes that people who are fans of rival 459 00:35:52.769 --> 00:35:58.849 sports teams can have really good, strong relationships because they recognize in each other 460 00:35:59.369 --> 00:36:02.650 that even though I love the Red Sox and you love the Yankees, for 461 00:36:02.849 --> 00:36:07.599 example, you're both passionate about baseball and you can both understand that passion. 462 00:36:08.280 --> 00:36:15.079 And so this becomes a really important concept around fanocracy, that passion is infectious. 463 00:36:15.079 --> 00:36:20.789 It leads to how do you hire the right people? People who are 464 00:36:20.789 --> 00:36:25.030 already have passion in their life for something are much more likely to be passionate 465 00:36:25.070 --> 00:36:30.309 about you and your brand and your business and share that passion with customers. 466 00:36:30.789 --> 00:36:37.739 When you bring customers together who are passionate about your brand, they share the 467 00:36:37.820 --> 00:36:40.019 fact that they're passionate about what you do, about your company, about what 468 00:36:40.179 --> 00:36:45.820 you do, and that is something that then that passion goes both ways, 469 00:36:46.099 --> 00:36:51.969 and so these things are all really, really important and I think, very 470 00:36:52.130 --> 00:36:57.849 often overlooked. Another thing that's overlooked, which we found to be really cool, 471 00:36:58.250 --> 00:37:04.760 is that people who share their private passions in their professional life generate way 472 00:37:04.960 --> 00:37:08.280 more engagement than those who don't. And we found a dentist. His name 473 00:37:08.440 --> 00:37:14.519 is Dr John Rashi, and Dr Murrashi came to me about two years ago 474 00:37:14.639 --> 00:37:17.789 and said, David, I'm a dentist in southern California. There's tens of 475 00:37:17.949 --> 00:37:22.309 thousands of dentists in southern California. You know, how can I stand out 476 00:37:22.469 --> 00:37:27.070 when we all have the same websites? We all show pictures of dirty, 477 00:37:27.269 --> 00:37:30.579 crooked teeth turning into straight white teeth? How can I stand out and we 478 00:37:30.699 --> 00:37:36.300 just started to talk about what we're passionate about, and Dr Murrashi is passionate 479 00:37:36.420 --> 00:37:42.019 about skateboarding. He's also passionate about bow ties, and I said, well, 480 00:37:42.059 --> 00:37:45.449 that's it. Mean, let's just like focus on that. Dr Murash 481 00:37:45.489 --> 00:37:49.769 he's so he did. He he sort of doubled down on this idea of 482 00:37:49.889 --> 00:37:54.250 skateboarding and and bow ties. So he normally wears bow ties and he's got 483 00:37:54.489 --> 00:37:59.239 his white, like Kurtle lap coat thing, dentist coat on. He's got 484 00:37:59.679 --> 00:38:04.719 skateboards in his office hanging on the walls. He skateboards from one examination room 485 00:38:04.800 --> 00:38:07.079 to another. His instagram, which, by the way, has more than 486 00:38:07.119 --> 00:38:13.710 thirteen thousand followers, a dentist with more than thirteen thousand followers, he's got 487 00:38:13.750 --> 00:38:19.869 a whole bunch of photographs and even some video of him skateboarding. Sometimes he's 488 00:38:19.949 --> 00:38:24.510 skateboarding wearing a bow tie. And what he told me was just this idea 489 00:38:24.590 --> 00:38:30.619 of showcading, showcasing what he's passionate about in his personal life. SKATEBOARDING has 490 00:38:30.820 --> 00:38:35.980 nothing to do with dentistry, but but what a cool customer experience to say 491 00:38:36.780 --> 00:38:42.769 my dentist is a great skateboarder. My dentist loves to Skateboard and he told 492 00:38:42.849 --> 00:38:50.730 me that he's grown his business by thirty percent a year just by talking about 493 00:38:50.809 --> 00:38:53.530 the fact that he's into skateboarding and showing that when he's in his office and 494 00:38:53.889 --> 00:38:59.239 and having the instagram focus on skateboarding. There's so much good stuff going on 495 00:38:59.480 --> 00:39:02.400 there and I think vulnerability is part of it. This idea that this dentist 496 00:39:02.559 --> 00:39:07.239 who you know to three decades ago is supposed to act as if I'm supposed 497 00:39:07.239 --> 00:39:10.510 to act as if I'm this, you know, all put together dentist that 498 00:39:10.829 --> 00:39:14.789 conforms to whatever the image of a dentist is. In this idea of like 499 00:39:15.190 --> 00:39:19.030 this comfort of being yourself, is fundamentally attractive to other people. And again, 500 00:39:19.030 --> 00:39:21.789 to your point, it doesn't matter if I love skateboarding. I love 501 00:39:21.869 --> 00:39:24.099 the fact that he loves what he loves and he wears it on his sleeve 502 00:39:24.179 --> 00:39:29.059 and he is who he is going exactly. And so you have a choice. 503 00:39:29.780 --> 00:39:34.539 What's behind you in the in the office? Is it all of your 504 00:39:34.619 --> 00:39:38.369 wonderful dental degrees? That's exactly what every other dentist does, or is it 505 00:39:38.489 --> 00:39:43.889 a couple of skateboards or pictures of you skateboarding? I mean to me. 506 00:39:44.090 --> 00:39:46.289 The difference is clear and to me I know what I would sign up for. 507 00:39:46.730 --> 00:39:50.849 As long as he's a good dentist. I'd much sure other have the 508 00:39:50.849 --> 00:39:54.960 skateboarder than the the button down. All business. I went to Harvard. 509 00:39:55.000 --> 00:40:00.679 Guy Totally. You've been super generous with your time. I want to ask 510 00:40:00.760 --> 00:40:02.039 you, or at least get your response to, a few quotes from the 511 00:40:02.039 --> 00:40:06.400 book that are all kind of around a theme before we get to our standard 512 00:40:06.400 --> 00:40:08.070 closes. That is that? Okay? Here it sounds good. Okay, 513 00:40:08.110 --> 00:40:13.590 cool. So there's an underlying theme in the book we've it's been kind of 514 00:40:13.630 --> 00:40:16.710 at the tip of the conversation as we've gone and I've been thinking about it 515 00:40:16.710 --> 00:40:22.300 a lot, which is all of this. Is just how we make people 516 00:40:22.340 --> 00:40:24.059 feel like. That's what this is all about. So I want to read 517 00:40:24.059 --> 00:40:28.460 a few quotes and just get your get your reaction to it. A fandom 518 00:40:28.500 --> 00:40:32.659 business is human centered instead of data obsessed. A number can be a ceiling 519 00:40:34.260 --> 00:40:37.489 if a person is too focused on it and it alone. We see many 520 00:40:37.570 --> 00:40:43.889 consumers becoming more and more distant from brands that rely entirely on automated processes. 521 00:40:44.170 --> 00:40:49.889 And what I'm getting here is like the data obsession focus on numbers, automation 522 00:40:49.929 --> 00:40:54.760 versus human centered and focusing on the process, not just the outcome. Like 523 00:40:55.119 --> 00:40:58.760 what is the role of feeling in all of this to you, and and 524 00:40:58.920 --> 00:41:01.599 and what kind of pushback have you gotten about quantification of these things that are 525 00:41:01.639 --> 00:41:07.989 difficult to quantify? Yeah, good, good series of questions. So I 526 00:41:07.110 --> 00:41:13.230 think you're right that this is very much the human connection. It is very 527 00:41:13.309 --> 00:41:16.869 much a feeling. I mean, you know your theme and what this podcast 528 00:41:17.030 --> 00:41:23.300 is about. It's a customer experience. And that's not to say that you 529 00:41:23.380 --> 00:41:29.860 don't use data, that you don't use technology. You certainly can. You 530 00:41:29.980 --> 00:41:35.369 may remember one of the stories in the book that I absolutely love is a 531 00:41:35.530 --> 00:41:42.849 company called me UNDIS and they're an underwear subscription company. So it's completely data 532 00:41:42.889 --> 00:41:50.679 driven in the sense that they sell underwear and you buy a subscript option, 533 00:41:50.760 --> 00:41:53.960 so you get a new pair of underwear every month, and so it's highly 534 00:41:54.119 --> 00:41:58.920 data driven in that once you subscribe, you know they got to take your 535 00:41:58.960 --> 00:42:01.630 credit card. Every month they have to send you a link to the available 536 00:42:02.309 --> 00:42:07.469 underwear that you can choose for that particular month. They know your size, 537 00:42:07.670 --> 00:42:10.590 they know which style you like, whether it's boxes or briefs or whatever it 538 00:42:10.710 --> 00:42:15.860 is, and so very, very, very data driven on the back end. 539 00:42:15.260 --> 00:42:22.460 But that's just to drive the humanity, because they love sharing customer stories, 540 00:42:22.500 --> 00:42:28.179 they love sharing photos of their customers in their underwear. They have video 541 00:42:28.300 --> 00:42:31.809 of their customers in their underwear and they have just a fun vibe. You 542 00:42:31.929 --> 00:42:37.969 know, their tagline is ten million happy butts and going strong. I mean 543 00:42:37.050 --> 00:42:43.730 that's just fun and human and interesting. So I don't think it's an either 544 00:42:43.730 --> 00:42:47.440 or, but I do think that so many companies are only obsessed with numbers 545 00:42:47.800 --> 00:42:52.880 and not obsessed with the humanity of it. And I think in our world 546 00:42:52.920 --> 00:42:58.559 where there's so much more data, I mean you log into Netflix or whatever 547 00:42:58.670 --> 00:43:05.710 video service you use and it's so data driven that you don't see films outside 548 00:43:05.750 --> 00:43:08.869 of the ones that are similar to what you've seen in the past. I 549 00:43:09.030 --> 00:43:14.139 think that's wrong. I think that, yes, you should be able to 550 00:43:14.260 --> 00:43:17.179 see films similar to what you have, but that should be a choice. 551 00:43:19.059 --> 00:43:22.980 It shouldn't be that you're that's the default that you can't get away from. 552 00:43:22.579 --> 00:43:30.610 You know, I I watched a number of documentaries, especially some music documentaries, 553 00:43:30.650 --> 00:43:34.050 when I first subscribe to Netflix. I can't get away from them. 554 00:43:34.170 --> 00:43:37.489 Now every time I log in a Netflix they're showing me the same damn thing. 555 00:43:38.329 --> 00:43:44.280 And so, yeah, algorithms are important, but they can't be the 556 00:43:44.440 --> 00:43:50.559 soul driver of a how an organization communicates with customers. Great response. We 557 00:43:50.679 --> 00:43:53.079 will wind down on that. I appreciate your time so much. It's been 558 00:43:53.280 --> 00:43:57.110 it's been great. It's absolute pleasure for me. I hope you've enjoyed yourself 559 00:43:57.150 --> 00:44:00.230 and I know people of course, get tons of value out of out of 560 00:44:00.269 --> 00:44:02.150 the conversation. I know they will get value out of Fan accracy to when 561 00:44:02.190 --> 00:44:06.070 they pick it up and read it. I assume there's an audiobook as well. 562 00:44:06.469 --> 00:44:08.309 Yeah, and Raco and I read the Audio Book Ourselves, and so 563 00:44:08.789 --> 00:44:12.860 there's audio book and Ebook Format, if you're into that, and then good 564 00:44:12.900 --> 00:44:16.340 old fashioned hardcover. Love it and the book. The book premiered as a 565 00:44:16.380 --> 00:44:19.900 Wells's re journal best seller, so it's done really well. We really happy 566 00:44:19.900 --> 00:44:22.619 about that. Yeah, well deserved. Before I let you go, couple 567 00:44:22.699 --> 00:44:25.449 things. I would love to give you the chance to think or mentioned someone 568 00:44:25.489 --> 00:44:30.210 who's had a positive impact on your life or your career and to give a 569 00:44:30.250 --> 00:44:34.610 shout out to a company that maybe you haven't mentioned already the really appreciate for 570 00:44:34.650 --> 00:44:38.679 the experience they deliver for you as a customer. Sure so. Tony Robins 571 00:44:38.800 --> 00:44:44.159 wrote the forward to fan accuracy. Tony's my friend. I've spoken at Tony 572 00:44:44.199 --> 00:44:50.400 Robins business mastery events for six years now, between two and four events a 573 00:44:50.480 --> 00:44:57.150 year around the world, and you know he's a giant among public speakers and 574 00:44:57.949 --> 00:45:01.030 the fact that he has me for two hours on his stage several times a 575 00:45:01.070 --> 00:45:06.630 year, that he was willing to write the forward to my book is He's 576 00:45:06.670 --> 00:45:10.539 a true mentor and friend and I appreciate that. A company I totally admire 577 00:45:10.659 --> 00:45:16.699 that has a fabulous customer experience is called Grain surfboards. They make wooden surfboards 578 00:45:16.940 --> 00:45:21.179 and for those of you who are looking on video, there is my grain 579 00:45:21.260 --> 00:45:24.849 surfboard, but I make I made that surfboard. So what's cool about the 580 00:45:24.929 --> 00:45:30.730 customer experience there is you can either buy a wooden surfboard that they make in 581 00:45:30.730 --> 00:45:36.280 their factory or you can go and make the wooden surfboard in their factory with 582 00:45:36.440 --> 00:45:40.000 them yourself. It takes four days. It's amazing and I mean who does 583 00:45:40.199 --> 00:45:44.639 that? WHO allows you into their factory to let you make their product with 584 00:45:44.840 --> 00:45:47.239 them and I just love them for it. It's called Grain surfboards are in 585 00:45:47.280 --> 00:45:52.750 York Maine. So you can buy a wonderful wooden surfboard, sustainable for the 586 00:45:52.829 --> 00:45:55.469 environment, beautiful, or you could even make one yourself. Yeah, I 587 00:45:55.550 --> 00:45:59.190 love it's great story in the book is really fun to read. I love 588 00:45:59.269 --> 00:46:01.510 the reaction of the folks at grain that we're like yeah, we just we 589 00:46:01.630 --> 00:46:05.139 just get so fired up when it comes time to have one of these. 590 00:46:05.179 --> 00:46:07.900 You know, customers come in and make boards with us. Thing just again. 591 00:46:07.940 --> 00:46:10.780 It just speaks to the fanaccracy and in as far as community goes, 592 00:46:10.820 --> 00:46:14.300 of course, Tony Robbins, he said, is a giant on I want 593 00:46:14.300 --> 00:46:15.619 to give a couple things, which is not something that I always do on 594 00:46:15.659 --> 00:46:20.730 the show, but but your appearance here with me, and thank you again 595 00:46:20.809 --> 00:46:24.130 so much for your time, was triggered in part by a previous podcast guest, 596 00:46:24.130 --> 00:46:28.090 Samantha Stone, who is kind enough to send me as a copy of 597 00:46:28.289 --> 00:46:31.449 Fan accuracy signed by both you and your daughter and Hanley and Joseph Jaffe, 598 00:46:31.610 --> 00:46:36.880 previous podcast guests here on the customer experience podcast, whose work, like your 599 00:46:36.920 --> 00:46:39.599 own, David, was very, very influential with me. At a very 600 00:46:39.599 --> 00:46:44.920 important time in my life and career. And and a guy named Jakenzo who 601 00:46:45.079 --> 00:46:51.230 said that visionaries don't see the future, they see the present much more clearly, 602 00:46:51.469 --> 00:46:53.309 and that's how I think of your work, David. If Very God 603 00:46:53.349 --> 00:46:55.989 of very kind of you to say so. That's a cool quote too. 604 00:46:57.269 --> 00:47:00.750 Yeah, it is a's in a sharp dude. If people want to follow 605 00:47:00.750 --> 00:47:04.019 up, we already mentioned the book and the Digital Book in the Audiobook, 606 00:47:04.059 --> 00:47:06.619 but if people want to connect with you some other way, where would you 607 00:47:06.619 --> 00:47:14.059 send them? So we've got a really well done site at wwwofacacycom. There's 608 00:47:14.139 --> 00:47:20.570 videos, there's infographics that you can download, images, all sorts of cool 609 00:47:20.650 --> 00:47:24.969 stuff there to give you all all kinds of information about fan accuracy. On 610 00:47:25.449 --> 00:47:30.320 on twitter and Instagram, I am DM Scott. That's D M Scott, 611 00:47:30.480 --> 00:47:32.599 and if you want to connect with me on Linkedin, please do awesome. 612 00:47:34.039 --> 00:47:36.800 Thank you so much and and David. By the way, for listeners, 613 00:47:36.840 --> 00:47:40.559 David of course, was kind enough to move his camera around frequently throughout the 614 00:47:40.639 --> 00:47:45.429 episode and I will find all of those moments and several others and they'll be 615 00:47:45.469 --> 00:47:49.269 available at bombombcom slash podcast, or you can see video clips and get wound 616 00:47:49.269 --> 00:47:52.030 ups on these episodes. Thank you so much for your time, David, 617 00:47:52.070 --> 00:47:55.989 and thank you so much for listening. Thanks, Evan. I really appreciate 618 00:47:57.150 --> 00:48:01.780 this human centered approach to building our businesses, this human connection and with that 619 00:48:01.900 --> 00:48:07.500 grain surfboard story, the Co creation so many good ideas behind fan accuracy and 620 00:48:07.699 --> 00:48:12.619 in that conversation we talked about several things that are worth looking at. If 621 00:48:12.659 --> 00:48:17.090 you want to see some of the video from this episode, visit bombombcom slash 622 00:48:17.250 --> 00:48:24.769 podcast. That's bomb bombcomas podcast. We do short write ups of every episode. 623 00:48:24.849 --> 00:48:30.000 We include video clips, full audio and so much more. Again, 624 00:48:30.039 --> 00:48:34.679 my name is Ethan but chief evangelist at bombomb and you can learn more about 625 00:48:34.800 --> 00:48:40.119 each of these episodes at Bombombcom podcast. Thanks again for listening to the CX 626 00:48:40.199 --> 00:48:47.670 series here on be tob growth. I hate it when podcasts incessantly ask their 627 00:48:47.750 --> 00:48:52.150 listeners for reviews, but I get why they do it, because reviews are 628 00:48:52.309 --> 00:48:54.940 enormously helpful when you're trying to grow a podcast audience. So here's what we 629 00:48:55.019 --> 00:48:59.139 decided to do. If you leave a review for be tob growth and apple 630 00:48:59.219 --> 00:49:04.179 podcasts and email me a screenshot of the review to James At sweetfish Mediacom, 631 00:49:04.500 --> 00:49:07.820 I'll send you a signed copy of my new book. Content based networking. 632 00:49:07.099 --> 00:49:10.489 How to instantly connect with anyone you want to know. We get a review, 633 00:49:10.489 --> 00:49:13.650 you get a free book. We both win.