WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.980 Welcome back to the deep dive. I want you to 00:00:02.980 --> 00:00:05.480 do a mental exercise with me for a second. Picture 00:00:05.480 --> 00:00:07.820 the business section of a bookstore. OK. Or, 00:00:07.919 --> 00:00:10.140 you know, maybe just scroll through the business 00:00:10.140 --> 00:00:12.759 and money category on Amazon. What do you see? 00:00:12.980 --> 00:00:16.679 A sea of sameness. A lot of guys in suits with 00:00:16.679 --> 00:00:19.260 their arms crossed. Yes. A lot of titles promising 00:00:19.260 --> 00:00:21.859 you can, you know, get rich in four hours or 00:00:21.859 --> 00:00:24.440 something. Exactly. It's a wall of navy blue 00:00:24.440 --> 00:00:30.199 and corporate headshots. But then. There's this 00:00:30.199 --> 00:00:32.979 one cover that always stands out. It's usually 00:00:32.979 --> 00:00:35.719 stark white, maybe a weird cartoon on it, or 00:00:35.719 --> 00:00:38.799 just a really bold sans serif title and the author 00:00:38.799 --> 00:00:41.320 photo. It's not a guy in a suit. It's a bald 00:00:41.320 --> 00:00:43.960 guy with funky, colorful glasses who looks less 00:00:43.960 --> 00:00:47.399 like a CEO and more like, I don't know, a wildly 00:00:47.399 --> 00:00:49.979 successful art teacher. That is a terrifyingly 00:00:49.979 --> 00:00:52.840 accurate description of Seth Godin. Today, we 00:00:52.840 --> 00:00:54.659 are opening up the file on Seth Godin. And I 00:00:54.659 --> 00:00:55.899 think for a lot of people listening, they're 00:00:55.899 --> 00:00:57.619 going to nod and say, yeah, the marketing guy, 00:00:57.719 --> 00:00:59.520 the purple cow guy. And look, they wouldn't be 00:00:59.520 --> 00:01:02.299 wrong. Right. That's the brand. But looking through 00:01:02.299 --> 00:01:05.799 this stack of research, the biography, the early 00:01:05.799 --> 00:01:09.760 ventures, the forgotten books, I realized that 00:01:09.760 --> 00:01:13.260 labeling him just a marketing guy is actually 00:01:13.260 --> 00:01:16.200 kind of lazy. It is. It misses about 90 % of 00:01:16.200 --> 00:01:18.319 the architecture underneath. I completely agree. 00:01:18.459 --> 00:01:20.879 If you stop at marketing, you're missing the 00:01:20.879 --> 00:01:23.569 actual story. Because the Seth Godin story isn't 00:01:23.569 --> 00:01:26.069 really about advertising. No. It's about the 00:01:26.069 --> 00:01:29.049 Internet. It's about, you know, how human beings 00:01:29.049 --> 00:01:32.150 behave when you suddenly give them infinite connection 00:01:32.150 --> 00:01:34.269 and an infinite choice. And that's our mission 00:01:34.269 --> 00:01:36.049 today. We are going to peel back the layers. 00:01:36.150 --> 00:01:37.629 We aren't just going to list his bestsellers. 00:01:37.629 --> 00:01:40.250 We're going to try to figure out how a guy who 00:01:40.250 --> 00:01:42.709 started out as a hardcore computer scientist, 00:01:42.930 --> 00:01:45.670 I mean, literally writing code, ended up becoming 00:01:45.670 --> 00:01:48.170 this sort of philosopher king for the creative 00:01:48.170 --> 00:01:50.719 class. And along the way, we have to talk about 00:01:50.719 --> 00:01:53.640 some truly weird stuff. We really do. We have 00:01:53.640 --> 00:01:55.280 to talk about the fact that he sold a company 00:01:55.280 --> 00:01:59.500 to Yahoo for nearly $30 million. Yes. But we 00:01:59.500 --> 00:02:00.900 also have to talk about the fact that he wrote 00:02:00.900 --> 00:02:03.700 a book called The Smiley Dictionary. I am still 00:02:03.700 --> 00:02:06.079 not convinced that isn't a prank. But we have 00:02:06.079 --> 00:02:08.199 the receipts and the source material. I've seen 00:02:08.199 --> 00:02:11.150 the cover. It is very real. And honestly, it 00:02:11.150 --> 00:02:12.770 might be one of the most important things he 00:02:12.770 --> 00:02:14.530 ever wrote. If you look at it through the right 00:02:14.530 --> 00:02:17.069 lens, it tells you everything about where his 00:02:17.069 --> 00:02:20.650 head was at in the early 90s. So, OK, we have 00:02:20.650 --> 00:02:23.710 a massive bibliography. We have the dot com boom 00:02:23.710 --> 00:02:26.889 and bust. And we have this whole philosophy of 00:02:26.889 --> 00:02:30.490 work that has influenced millions. Where do we 00:02:30.490 --> 00:02:32.810 even begin to make sense of all this? You have 00:02:32.810 --> 00:02:35.259 to start with the hardware. I mean, before the 00:02:35.259 --> 00:02:36.979 software, before the philosophy, there's the 00:02:36.979 --> 00:02:39.280 hardware. And for Godin, that starts in college. 00:02:39.620 --> 00:02:41.740 Okay. If you were to look at his transcript from 00:02:41.740 --> 00:02:44.199 Tufts University, you'd see a double major that 00:02:44.199 --> 00:02:46.360 honestly shouldn't make sense together. It's 00:02:46.360 --> 00:02:49.159 just, it's jarring. Right. Usually you see things 00:02:49.159 --> 00:02:52.259 that pair nicely, like economics and political 00:02:52.259 --> 00:02:55.879 science or biology and chemistry. Exactly. Sensible 00:02:55.879 --> 00:02:58.460 pairings. Godin did computer science and philosophy. 00:02:58.759 --> 00:03:01.620 That sounds like the setup to a joke. A coder 00:03:01.620 --> 00:03:04.340 and a philosopher walk into a bar. It does. But 00:03:04.340 --> 00:03:06.560 think about that combination for a second. It 00:03:06.560 --> 00:03:10.620 is the absolute key to unlocking his entire worldview. 00:03:11.139 --> 00:03:14.439 How so? Well, computer science is about systems. 00:03:14.479 --> 00:03:17.879 It's binary. It's logic. If this, then that. 00:03:18.060 --> 00:03:20.620 It's the rigid architecture of how things work. 00:03:20.800 --> 00:03:23.479 It's structural. It's the ones and zeros. OK, 00:03:23.580 --> 00:03:26.120 so he has the logic. He understands fundamentally 00:03:26.120 --> 00:03:28.759 how the machine operates. Exactly. He speaks 00:03:28.759 --> 00:03:30.740 the language of the digital world. But then you 00:03:30.740 --> 00:03:34.129 have philosophy. And that's the why. Right. That's 00:03:34.129 --> 00:03:37.430 ethics, epistemology, human behavior. It's the 00:03:37.430 --> 00:03:39.889 messy gray stuff that you can't just solve with 00:03:39.889 --> 00:03:42.530 an algorithm. So from day one, from his college 00:03:42.530 --> 00:03:45.530 years, Godin is looking at the world and specifically 00:03:45.530 --> 00:03:48.129 the emerging digital world through these two 00:03:48.129 --> 00:03:50.289 lenses simultaneously. That's a really good point. 00:03:50.409 --> 00:03:52.949 He understands how the machine is built, but 00:03:52.949 --> 00:03:55.150 he's obsessed with how humans are going to live 00:03:55.150 --> 00:03:57.439 inside it. You know, that makes so much sense 00:03:57.439 --> 00:03:59.060 because a lot of the other tech giants we talk 00:03:59.060 --> 00:04:00.860 about, you know, the Zuckerbergs or the Gates 00:04:00.860 --> 00:04:03.879 of the world, they are so heavy on the CS side. 00:04:04.060 --> 00:04:06.300 They build the tool, but they sometimes seem 00:04:06.300 --> 00:04:09.159 genuinely surprised by how people end up using 00:04:09.159 --> 00:04:12.539 it or misusing it. Godin seems to have anticipated 00:04:12.539 --> 00:04:15.479 the human element from the very jump. Precisely. 00:04:15.479 --> 00:04:18.279 That dual major is the foundation. He understands 00:04:18.279 --> 00:04:20.500 the tech, but he explains it through philosophy. 00:04:20.579 --> 00:04:22.939 He sees the network, but he's interested in the 00:04:22.939 --> 00:04:24.959 people on the network. And he didn't just stop 00:04:24.959 --> 00:04:26.639 there, did he? He went on to business school. 00:04:26.740 --> 00:04:29.259 He did. He went on to earn an MBA from the Stanford 00:04:29.259 --> 00:04:31.879 Graduate School of Business. So now he has the 00:04:31.879 --> 00:04:35.519 academic trifecta, code, thought, and commerce. 00:04:35.819 --> 00:04:38.120 A triple threat. So he graduates. We're talking 00:04:38.120 --> 00:04:40.720 mid-'80s now. The personal computer revolution 00:04:40.720 --> 00:04:43.439 is just starting to heat up. He gets a job at 00:04:43.439 --> 00:04:45.500 a software publisher, a company called Spinnaker. 00:04:46.339 --> 00:04:49.120 But he doesn't stay long. No. And this is where 00:04:49.120 --> 00:04:51.800 we see the first real flash of the entrepreneur 00:04:51.800 --> 00:04:56.269 gene. It's 1986. He leaves Spinnaker. And he 00:04:56.269 --> 00:04:59.750 takes $20 ,000 of his savings. Wow. Which, by 00:04:59.750 --> 00:05:02.410 the way, in 1986 is a significant chunk of change. 00:05:02.649 --> 00:05:04.970 That's a serious bet on yourself. I mean, for 00:05:04.970 --> 00:05:06.509 a young guy in his mid -20s, that's probably 00:05:06.509 --> 00:05:09.509 everything he had. It likely was a huge risk. 00:05:09.670 --> 00:05:13.370 And with that money, he founds Seth Godin Productions. 00:05:13.529 --> 00:05:16.509 Which sounds so massive and impressive. Like, 00:05:16.529 --> 00:05:19.370 he's got a soundstage in Hollywood and a fleet 00:05:19.370 --> 00:05:22.560 of production trucks. The reality is... much 00:05:22.560 --> 00:05:25.939 grittier. He's in New York City. He is operating 00:05:25.939 --> 00:05:28.579 out of a studio apartment. I just love this image. 00:05:28.779 --> 00:05:31.680 You know, the garage startup is the classic Silicon 00:05:31.680 --> 00:05:34.920 Valley cliche. Right. But the studio apartment 00:05:34.920 --> 00:05:37.139 startup is the New York version. You can just 00:05:37.139 --> 00:05:39.579 picture him, you know, boxes of books everywhere, 00:05:39.720 --> 00:05:42.019 maybe a radiator hissing in the corner, eating 00:05:42.019 --> 00:05:44.540 takeout from a carton, trying to build an empire 00:05:44.540 --> 00:05:47.019 in 400 square feet. And the business he built. 00:05:47.259 --> 00:05:49.939 wasn't software. It wasn't consulting. It was 00:05:49.939 --> 00:05:52.459 something called book paddaging. OK, I have to 00:05:52.459 --> 00:05:54.319 admit, when I saw that term in the notes, I had 00:05:54.319 --> 00:05:56.019 to double check what it meant. Most people do. 00:05:56.160 --> 00:05:58.339 I assumed it meant he was literally, you know, 00:05:58.360 --> 00:06:00.759 putting books into boxes for shipping. A lot 00:06:00.759 --> 00:06:02.439 of people think that, but it's actually this 00:06:02.439 --> 00:06:06.459 fascinating sort of hidden layer of the publishing 00:06:06.459 --> 00:06:09.060 industry. Explain it to me. OK, think of a movie 00:06:09.060 --> 00:06:11.160 producer. The producer comes up with the concept, 00:06:11.399 --> 00:06:14.120 hires the scriptwriter, hires the director, casts 00:06:14.120 --> 00:06:17.699 the actors, shoots the film, and then sells the 00:06:17.699 --> 00:06:20.060 finished movie to a studio like Warner Brothers 00:06:20.060 --> 00:06:22.399 to distribute. Okay, so the studio just puts 00:06:22.399 --> 00:06:24.399 their logo on it and puts it in theaters. They're 00:06:24.399 --> 00:06:26.800 the distribution channel. Exactly. A book packager 00:06:26.800 --> 00:06:29.699 does the exact same thing, but for books. They 00:06:29.699 --> 00:06:32.279 come up with an idea and say... A complete guide 00:06:32.279 --> 00:06:35.980 to house plants. Right. They hire a writer to 00:06:35.980 --> 00:06:37.980 write it, an illustrator to draw the plants, 00:06:38.160 --> 00:06:40.860 a designer to lay out the pages. They create 00:06:40.860 --> 00:06:44.139 the entire digital file, the package, and then 00:06:44.139 --> 00:06:46.740 they sell that finished asset to a big publisher 00:06:46.740 --> 00:06:49.100 like Penguin or Random House. And the publisher 00:06:49.100 --> 00:06:50.759 just handles the printing and getting it into 00:06:50.759 --> 00:06:53.319 Barnes & Noble. That's it. They take on the manufacturing 00:06:53.319 --> 00:06:56.420 and distribution risk. Godin's company was the 00:06:56.420 --> 00:06:58.959 creative engine. So he's an idea factory. He's 00:06:58.959 --> 00:07:01.410 not sitting there waiting for ink. to strike 00:07:01.410 --> 00:07:04.629 to write the great American novel yeah he's spotting 00:07:04.629 --> 00:07:07.970 a market niche assembling a team and shipping 00:07:07.970 --> 00:07:10.810 a product shipping that is the operative word 00:07:11.709 --> 00:07:14.889 This period, working out of that apartment, must 00:07:14.889 --> 00:07:17.670 have taught him that creativity isn't about being 00:07:17.670 --> 00:07:20.610 a tortured artist waiting for the muse to strike. 00:07:20.829 --> 00:07:23.269 It's a job. It's a job. It's a practice. It's 00:07:23.269 --> 00:07:25.389 about production. It's about deadlines. It's 00:07:25.389 --> 00:07:28.110 about getting the work out the door. That mentality, 00:07:28.269 --> 00:07:31.949 that shipping is a skill in and of itself, becomes 00:07:31.949 --> 00:07:35.110 a huge pillar of his philosophy later on in his 00:07:35.110 --> 00:07:37.009 career. Okay, so he's in the apartment. He's 00:07:37.009 --> 00:07:40.670 packaging books, making a living. But the internet 00:07:40.670 --> 00:07:44.149 is coming. The wave is building. The mid -90s 00:07:44.149 --> 00:07:45.889 are approaching. And this leads us to what I 00:07:45.889 --> 00:07:48.829 think is his first major mainstream success, 00:07:49.189 --> 00:07:51.230 although at the time it was still pretty niche. 00:07:51.879 --> 00:07:53.939 Let's talk about Yo -Yo Dine. Yo -Yo Dine. Now, 00:07:53.980 --> 00:07:56.120 for the film buffs out there, for the real nerds, 00:07:56.120 --> 00:07:57.639 that name might ring a bell. Well, absolutely. 00:07:57.759 --> 00:07:59.680 That's from The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai 00:07:59.680 --> 00:08:01.839 Across the Eighth Dimension. Correct. The fictional 00:08:01.839 --> 00:08:04.100 defense contractor. Which just tells me so much 00:08:04.100 --> 00:08:06.259 about him. It tells me Godin isn't just a suit. 00:08:06.379 --> 00:08:08.560 He's a sci -fi nerd. Yeah. He's got that cult 00:08:08.560 --> 00:08:10.920 classic appreciation. It's a little bit of a 00:08:10.920 --> 00:08:13.379 wink. It signals he's part of the culture, you 00:08:13.379 --> 00:08:17.199 know? He gets it. He founded YoYo Dine in 1995 00:08:17.199 --> 00:08:20.379 with a guy named Mark Hurst. And the concept 00:08:20.379 --> 00:08:24.360 was, for 1995, absolutely revolutionary. Set 00:08:24.360 --> 00:08:26.459 the scene for us. What was online marketing in 00:08:26.459 --> 00:08:30.379 1995? Online marketing in 1995 basically meant 00:08:30.379 --> 00:08:34.399 a banner ad, a static image that you... hopefully, 00:08:34.480 --> 00:08:36.820 maybe, clicked on. The digital billboard era. 00:08:37.080 --> 00:08:39.340 That's a perfect way to put it. You go to a website, 00:08:39.580 --> 00:08:41.779 maybe Netscape Navigator, and there's a flashing 00:08:41.779 --> 00:08:44.279 rectangle at the top that says, click here for 00:08:44.279 --> 00:08:47.000 soda. And you just, you know, train your eyes 00:08:47.000 --> 00:08:49.120 to ignore it. Banner blindness. Banner blindness 00:08:49.120 --> 00:08:51.600 was born then. Godin looked at that and said, 00:08:51.679 --> 00:08:53.779 this is boring. This is annoying. This doesn't 00:08:53.779 --> 00:08:56.460 work. He understood that on the internet, the 00:08:56.460 --> 00:08:59.500 user has the mouse. They have the control. If 00:08:59.500 --> 00:09:02.019 you annoy them, they leave. It's one click. So 00:09:02.019 --> 00:09:03.620 what did Yo -Yo Dine do differently? Instead 00:09:03.620 --> 00:09:06.399 of just showing you an ad, Yo -Yo Dine used contests, 00:09:06.480 --> 00:09:09.000 online games, and scavenger hunts to market companies 00:09:09.000 --> 00:09:11.019 to its users. Wait, so instead of just showing 00:09:11.019 --> 00:09:13.240 me an ad for a new car, they'd made me play some 00:09:13.240 --> 00:09:16.149 kind of game to win a prize. Exactly. And to 00:09:16.149 --> 00:09:18.090 play the game, you had to interact with the brand. 00:09:18.250 --> 00:09:20.110 You had to learn about the car's features to 00:09:20.110 --> 00:09:22.549 answer a question. It was engaging. It was fun. 00:09:22.789 --> 00:09:25.490 And most importantly, it required the user's 00:09:25.490 --> 00:09:28.870 active participation and consent. Ah, consent. 00:09:28.970 --> 00:09:31.309 That's the key word. This is the seed of what 00:09:31.309 --> 00:09:33.750 he would later codify and name permission marketing. 00:09:34.169 --> 00:09:36.149 He wasn't interrupting you while you were trying 00:09:36.149 --> 00:09:38.230 to do something else. He was inviting you to 00:09:38.230 --> 00:09:41.399 play. And clearly, people wanted to play. And 00:09:41.399 --> 00:09:43.740 investors want it in. Yeah. Because the numbers 00:09:43.740 --> 00:09:46.200 here are pretty staggering for the mid -90s. 00:09:46.200 --> 00:09:50.059 They are. In August 1996, a venture capital firm 00:09:50.059 --> 00:09:53.620 called Flatiron Partners invested $4 million 00:09:53.620 --> 00:09:58.220 in Yo -Yo Dine. $4 million. Right. In 1996 money, 00:09:58.340 --> 00:10:01.039 that is serious, serious capital. That's, we 00:10:01.039 --> 00:10:03.360 believe this is the future money. It was a huge 00:10:03.360 --> 00:10:05.720 vote of confidence. And that was for a 20 % stake 00:10:05.720 --> 00:10:07.519 in the company. So the valuation was already 00:10:07.519 --> 00:10:09.820 at $20 million. Wow. But the real payoff came 00:10:09.820 --> 00:10:12.379 just two years later. years later in 1998 the 00:10:12.379 --> 00:10:15.059 dot -com bubble is inflating excitement is at 00:10:15.059 --> 00:10:17.360 a feeble pitch and yoyodyne gets acquired by 00:10:17.360 --> 00:10:21.110 one of the giants by yahoo for how much $29 .6 00:10:21.110 --> 00:10:25.210 million. Wow. So in just a few years, he goes 00:10:25.210 --> 00:10:28.309 from the studio apartment book packager to selling 00:10:28.309 --> 00:10:31.909 a company for nearly $30 million to one of the 00:10:31.909 --> 00:10:34.470 titans of the early internet. And part of the 00:10:34.470 --> 00:10:36.889 deal, which is crucial, was that he became Yahoo 00:10:36.889 --> 00:10:39.750 vice president of direct marketing. That is a 00:10:39.750 --> 00:10:42.529 massive shift. I mean, just culturally. Going 00:10:42.529 --> 00:10:44.769 from being your own boss, naming your company 00:10:44.769 --> 00:10:47.549 after a quirky sci -fi movie, to being a VP at 00:10:47.549 --> 00:10:50.789 Yahoo. In the late 90s. That's corporate. That's 00:10:50.789 --> 00:10:53.289 the big leagues. It is. And it gave him a huge 00:10:53.289 --> 00:10:55.629 platform and, you know, a front row seat to the 00:10:55.629 --> 00:10:57.929 explosion of the commercial web. But what's so 00:10:57.929 --> 00:10:59.769 interesting is that while all this high level 00:10:59.769 --> 00:11:02.049 corporate maneuvering is happening, he's still 00:11:02.049 --> 00:11:04.350 writing. He's still that guy from the book packaging 00:11:04.350 --> 00:11:06.929 days. He can't stop shipping. He can't. And this 00:11:06.929 --> 00:11:08.570 brings us to a part of his career that I think 00:11:08.570 --> 00:11:10.950 is often overlooked, but is absolutely hilarious 00:11:10.950 --> 00:11:14.169 and so, so insightful. Are we talking about the 00:11:14.169 --> 00:11:16.340 pen name? Because I was hoping we would. We are 00:11:16.340 --> 00:11:18.480 talking about the pen name. Yeah. Did you know 00:11:18.480 --> 00:11:22.080 Seth Godin published books under the name FX9? 00:11:22.759 --> 00:11:26.940 FX9. It sounds like a droid from Star Wars. Yeah. 00:11:27.059 --> 00:11:29.539 Or maybe a secret agent. What is that about? 00:11:29.720 --> 00:11:32.550 It's so strange. And you have to wonder. Why 00:11:32.550 --> 00:11:36.009 the pseudonym? Was it to publish more volume 00:11:36.009 --> 00:11:38.289 without, you know, diluting the Seth Godin brand? 00:11:38.409 --> 00:11:40.669 Was he just having fun with it? I don't know 00:11:40.669 --> 00:11:42.470 the answer, but the books he wrote during this 00:11:42.470 --> 00:11:45.549 how -to era in the early 90s are just fascinating 00:11:45.549 --> 00:11:48.190 cultural artifacts. Okay, I have the list here, 00:11:48.250 --> 00:11:49.809 and I just have to read some of these titles 00:11:49.809 --> 00:11:51.490 out loud because they perfectly capture that 00:11:51.490 --> 00:11:53.669 moment in time when the internet was this scary, 00:11:53.710 --> 00:11:56.149 confusing new thing for most people. Please do. 00:11:56.269 --> 00:11:59.019 First up, The Smiley Dictionary. Published in 00:11:59.019 --> 00:12:02.759 1993. 1993. Let that sink in. There are no emojis. 00:12:02.940 --> 00:12:05.159 There are no smartphones. We are talking about 00:12:05.159 --> 00:12:07.639 typing a colon and a close parenthesis to make 00:12:07.639 --> 00:12:09.700 a happy face. And he wrote a whole book about 00:12:09.700 --> 00:12:12.980 it. A dictionary. A guide to emoticons. That 00:12:12.980 --> 00:12:15.019 is incredible. I imagine it was literally just 00:12:15.019 --> 00:12:17.460 pages of assy art. Here is how you type a rose. 00:12:17.740 --> 00:12:20.019 Here is a winking face. It was an anthropology 00:12:20.019 --> 00:12:22.519 textbook for the earliest days of internet culture. 00:12:22.720 --> 00:12:26.419 It really was. And then we have... Oh, this one 00:12:26.419 --> 00:12:29.639 is gold. Email addresses of the rich and famous, 00:12:29.820 --> 00:12:33.000 published in 1994. You can imagine how useful 00:12:33.000 --> 00:12:35.639 that book is today. Right. I mean, in a world 00:12:35.639 --> 00:12:38.259 where we are so obsessed with privacy and spam 00:12:38.259 --> 00:12:41.919 filters and data protection, the very idea of 00:12:41.919 --> 00:12:44.539 publishing a book listing the personal email 00:12:44.539 --> 00:12:47.960 addresses of celebrities is just wild. It's unthinkable 00:12:47.960 --> 00:12:51.220 now. But I guess back in 94, if you had an email 00:12:51.220 --> 00:12:53.500 address, you were sort of an early adopter. You 00:12:53.500 --> 00:12:55.399 kind of wanted people to write to you. Exactly. 00:12:55.399 --> 00:12:57.799 It was a much smaller community. It was a novelty. 00:12:58.059 --> 00:13:00.639 If you had Bill Gates's email address, there 00:13:00.639 --> 00:13:02.779 was a non -zero chance he might actually read 00:13:02.779 --> 00:13:05.019 your email. It speaks to the sort of innocence 00:13:05.019 --> 00:13:07.700 of that time. And there's more. Point and click 00:13:07.700 --> 00:13:11.039 internet. Get online in less than an hour. And 00:13:11.039 --> 00:13:13.200 the video renter's bible. You see the theme here. 00:13:13.279 --> 00:13:15.440 Right. These titles seem funny and dated now. 00:13:15.639 --> 00:13:17.240 But if we connect this to the bigger picture, 00:13:17.460 --> 00:13:20.039 they show us exactly what Godin's role was. He 00:13:20.039 --> 00:13:22.100 was a translator. Explain that. In the early 00:13:22.100 --> 00:13:24.899 90s, the digital world was inaccessible to 99 00:13:24.899 --> 00:13:27.840 % of people. It was clunky. It was text based. 00:13:28.039 --> 00:13:30.279 It was scary. You needed a guide. You needed 00:13:30.279 --> 00:13:32.000 someone to hold your hand and say, OK, here is 00:13:32.000 --> 00:13:34.559 how you make a smiley face or here is how you 00:13:34.559 --> 00:13:37.460 send an electronic mail. So before he was teaching 00:13:37.460 --> 00:13:39.740 people business strategy, he was just teaching 00:13:39.740 --> 00:13:43.519 literacy. Digital literacy. Precisely. He was 00:13:43.519 --> 00:13:45.759 bridging that huge gap between the confusing 00:13:45.759 --> 00:13:48.639 new web and the average consumer. And that skill, 00:13:48.740 --> 00:13:50.720 that ability to take something complex and make 00:13:50.720 --> 00:13:53.480 it simple, accessible, and human, that is the 00:13:53.480 --> 00:13:55.720 through line to all of his more famous, more 00:13:55.720 --> 00:13:58.259 philosophical work later on. Which brings us 00:13:58.259 --> 00:14:01.000 perfectly to the marketing philosopher era. This 00:14:01.000 --> 00:14:03.379 is the Seth Godin most people know, the guy who 00:14:03.379 --> 00:14:05.419 writes these short, punchy books that completely 00:14:05.419 --> 00:14:07.659 change how you see your work. And we have to 00:14:07.659 --> 00:14:09.700 start with the big one, the one that really defined 00:14:09.700 --> 00:14:12.039 his post -Yahoo career, permission marketing. 00:14:12.299 --> 00:14:15.480 Published in 1999. And the subtitle is key here, 00:14:15.620 --> 00:14:18.940 turning strangers into friends and friends. into 00:14:18.940 --> 00:14:21.379 customers. This is a direct reaction to his work 00:14:21.379 --> 00:14:23.679 at YoYo Dime, wasn't it? It was the theory behind 00:14:23.679 --> 00:14:26.039 the practice. It was the codification of it. 00:14:26.139 --> 00:14:27.679 He was looking around at the state of advertising 00:14:27.679 --> 00:14:30.480 and he saw that the dominant model for a century 00:14:30.480 --> 00:14:33.080 had been what he called Interruption marketing. 00:14:33.320 --> 00:14:35.820 Right. You're watching your favorite TV show. 00:14:35.940 --> 00:14:38.320 We interrupt it with a commercial. You're reading 00:14:38.320 --> 00:14:40.059 an article in a magazine. We interrupt it with 00:14:40.059 --> 00:14:42.480 a full page ad. You're driving down the highway. 00:14:42.740 --> 00:14:45.139 We interrupt your view with a billboard. The 00:14:45.139 --> 00:14:47.759 whole model is based on grabbing attention you 00:14:47.759 --> 00:14:51.419 didn't offer. Exactly. Stealing attention. Godin 00:14:51.419 --> 00:14:54.200 argued that in a digital world where the consumer 00:14:54.200 --> 00:14:57.600 has the remote control, the mouse, the back button. 00:14:58.609 --> 00:15:00.870 Attention is scarce. You can't just steal it 00:15:00.870 --> 00:15:02.909 anymore. You have to earn it. You need permission. 00:15:03.129 --> 00:15:05.090 You need permission to talk to people. You offer 00:15:05.090 --> 00:15:07.809 them something of value, a newsletter, a contest, 00:15:08.110 --> 00:15:11.210 useful information in exchange for the privilege 00:15:11.210 --> 00:15:13.490 of their attention over time. It seems so obvious 00:15:13.490 --> 00:15:17.889 now. This is the entire foundation of. Email 00:15:17.889 --> 00:15:20.809 newsletters, subscription models, YouTube channels. 00:15:20.870 --> 00:15:23.190 The entire creator economy runs on this principle. 00:15:23.370 --> 00:15:26.470 But in 1999, that was a radical shift. It was. 00:15:26.570 --> 00:15:29.090 He was basically predicting the death of the 00:15:29.090 --> 00:15:32.190 mass market TV ad model and the rise of the direct 00:15:32.190 --> 00:15:34.850 -to -consumer relationship. He saw that the power 00:15:34.850 --> 00:15:37.289 was shifting from the broadcaster to the person 00:15:37.289 --> 00:15:39.450 holding the mouse. And then he just keeps building 00:15:39.450 --> 00:15:43.470 on these ideas. A few years later, 2003, he drops 00:15:43.470 --> 00:15:46.559 Purple Cow. Transform your business by being 00:15:46.559 --> 00:15:49.740 remarkable. I love the central metaphor of this. 00:15:49.799 --> 00:15:52.840 It's so simple and sticky. The idea is that if 00:15:52.840 --> 00:15:54.659 you're driving down the road and you see a cow, 00:15:54.899 --> 00:15:58.379 it's fine. It's a cow. You see 10 cows, 100 cows. 00:15:58.500 --> 00:16:00.639 You stop noticing them. They're boring. Yeah. 00:16:00.720 --> 00:16:02.840 But if you saw a purple cow. You would stop the 00:16:02.840 --> 00:16:04.559 car. You would get out. You would take a picture. 00:16:04.600 --> 00:16:06.080 You would tell all your friends about the purple 00:16:06.080 --> 00:16:07.759 cow you saw. You would post it on Instagram. 00:16:07.960 --> 00:16:10.190 You would. Yeah. And his point was that in a 00:16:10.190 --> 00:16:12.850 world of infinite choice, good is no longer good 00:16:12.850 --> 00:16:15.870 enough. Good is the brown cow. It blends in. 00:16:16.250 --> 00:16:18.929 To succeed in a crowded market, you have to be 00:16:18.929 --> 00:16:21.350 remarkable. Literally. Worth making a remark 00:16:21.350 --> 00:16:23.789 about. I want to push on this one a bit. Because 00:16:23.789 --> 00:16:27.049 on the surface, it sounds a little, I don't know, 00:16:27.070 --> 00:16:30.450 simplistic. Be different. Okay, thanks, Seth. 00:16:31.009 --> 00:16:33.240 But there's more to it than just be weird. Right. 00:16:33.340 --> 00:16:35.100 It's not just about dying the cow purple. Oh, 00:16:35.100 --> 00:16:37.480 absolutely. It's not about being weird for weird 00:16:37.480 --> 00:16:39.740 sake. It's about the underlying economics of 00:16:39.740 --> 00:16:42.860 a crowded marketplace. Godin argues that in a 00:16:42.860 --> 00:16:45.200 digital world, consumers have infinite choices. 00:16:45.679 --> 00:16:48.620 If you want to buy a toaster, you can go on Amazon 00:16:48.620 --> 00:16:50.799 and find 5000 different toasters in 10 seconds. 00:16:50.879 --> 00:16:53.330 Right. In that environment, if your toaster is 00:16:53.330 --> 00:16:56.610 just very good, nobody cares. Very good is the 00:16:56.610 --> 00:16:58.929 default. It's the brown cow. It blends in with 00:16:58.929 --> 00:17:02.029 all the other very good toasters. But if you 00:17:02.029 --> 00:17:05.230 build a toaster that, I don't know, perfectly 00:17:05.230 --> 00:17:08.410 imprints the day's weather forecast onto the 00:17:08.410 --> 00:17:10.670 bread. It has a purple cow. You might not sell 00:17:10.670 --> 00:17:12.349 a billion of them, but the people who buy it, 00:17:12.349 --> 00:17:14.150 the people who want weather toast, will tell 00:17:14.150 --> 00:17:15.769 everyone they know. Exactly. Hey, look at my 00:17:15.769 --> 00:17:18.410 weather toast. The marketing is built into the 00:17:18.410 --> 00:17:20.789 product, not slapped on afterwards with advertising. 00:17:21.210 --> 00:17:23.750 The remarkability of the product itself is what 00:17:23.750 --> 00:17:25.730 drives the growth. That's the core distinction. 00:17:26.130 --> 00:17:29.470 And then in 2007, he releases what I think is 00:17:29.470 --> 00:17:31.609 one of his most personal and challenging books, 00:17:31.809 --> 00:17:34.069 The Dip. A little book that teaches you when 00:17:34.069 --> 00:17:36.720 to quit and when to stick. This one was a huge 00:17:36.720 --> 00:17:40.299 bestseller, New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street 00:17:40.299 --> 00:17:42.440 Journal. This one always resonated with me because 00:17:42.440 --> 00:17:43.920 it flies in the face of everything we're taught 00:17:43.920 --> 00:17:46.740 from kindergarten. Winners never quit and quitters 00:17:46.740 --> 00:17:48.940 never win. And Godin just calls that out as total 00:17:48.940 --> 00:17:51.759 nonsense. He argues that winners actually quit 00:17:51.759 --> 00:17:54.700 all the time. Really? All the time. They quit 00:17:54.700 --> 00:17:56.900 the wrong thing so they can free up their resources 00:17:56.900 --> 00:17:59.940 to focus on the right things. Strategic quitting 00:17:59.940 --> 00:18:03.539 is a superpower. But the trick is knowing when 00:18:03.539 --> 00:18:06.680 to quit. What is the dip he talks about? OK, 00:18:06.779 --> 00:18:10.160 so the dip is that long, grueling slog between 00:18:10.160 --> 00:18:12.940 starting something new and mastering it. You 00:18:12.940 --> 00:18:14.839 start learning to play the guitar. It's fun for 00:18:14.839 --> 00:18:17.099 the first week. Then it gets really hard. Your 00:18:17.099 --> 00:18:19.039 fingers hurt. You can't make the chords sound 00:18:19.039 --> 00:18:22.119 right. You suck. That's the dip. And that's where 00:18:22.119 --> 00:18:24.200 most people give up. That's where almost everyone 00:18:24.200 --> 00:18:27.359 quits, Godin says. If the prize at the end is 00:18:27.359 --> 00:18:29.869 worth it. If you really want to be a rock star 00:18:29.869 --> 00:18:32.549 or a fluent Spanish speaker or a great programmer, 00:18:32.789 --> 00:18:35.470 you have to push through the dip. Because the 00:18:35.470 --> 00:18:38.230 dip is the very barrier to entry that keeps everyone 00:18:38.230 --> 00:18:41.670 else out. Scarcity is created by the dip. But 00:18:41.670 --> 00:18:44.130 what if you're just in a dead end? You're working 00:18:44.130 --> 00:18:46.230 hard but not getting anywhere. That's what he 00:18:46.230 --> 00:18:48.750 calls a cul -de -sac. It looks like you're moving, 00:18:48.849 --> 00:18:50.990 but you're just going in circles. You're at a 00:18:50.990 --> 00:18:53.630 job with no upward mobility, for example. No 00:18:53.630 --> 00:18:55.369 matter how hard you work, you're not going to 00:18:55.369 --> 00:18:57.410 get to a different destination. So what's the 00:18:57.410 --> 00:19:00.589 advice? His advice is ruthless. Quit the cul 00:19:00.589 --> 00:19:03.170 -de -sacs immediately and unapologetically. The 00:19:03.170 --> 00:19:05.509 moment you realize you're in one, get out. But 00:19:05.509 --> 00:19:09.069 never, ever quit in the dip just because it's 00:19:09.069 --> 00:19:11.789 hard. Quit because the destination isn't worth 00:19:11.789 --> 00:19:13.930 the journey, not because the journey itself is 00:19:13.930 --> 00:19:15.990 difficult. That distinction is crucial. It's 00:19:15.990 --> 00:19:19.150 strategic quitting versus reactive emotional 00:19:19.150 --> 00:19:21.609 quitting. It brings critical thinking to the 00:19:21.609 --> 00:19:24.349 whole concept of perseverance. It's not about 00:19:24.349 --> 00:19:26.910 blind grit. It's about smart grit. We also have 00:19:26.910 --> 00:19:29.569 Tribes, which came out in 2008. The subtitle 00:19:29.569 --> 00:19:33.490 is We Need You to Lead Us. This feels like it 00:19:33.490 --> 00:19:35.849 predates the whole influencer era, but it's talking 00:19:35.849 --> 00:19:39.369 about exactly that. It is. It's incredibly prescient. 00:19:39.470 --> 00:19:41.970 He identified that the Internet had completely 00:19:41.970 --> 00:19:45.130 demolished the traditional barriers to leadership. 00:19:45.430 --> 00:19:47.589 What do you mean? Well, you used to need a factory 00:19:47.589 --> 00:19:50.750 or a union or a political party or a TV network 00:19:50.750 --> 00:19:53.250 to lead people. You needed institutional power. 00:19:53.569 --> 00:19:56.789 He said now you just need a blog. You need a 00:19:56.789 --> 00:19:59.670 Twitter account. You can gather a tribe of like 00:19:59.670 --> 00:20:03.650 minded people around an idea. be vintage typewriters, 00:20:03.750 --> 00:20:06.430 vegan cooking, libertarian politics, whatever. 00:20:06.650 --> 00:20:08.490 The internet allows anyone to find the others. 00:20:08.630 --> 00:20:12.210 Exactly. And a tribe needs a leader. It needs 00:20:12.210 --> 00:20:14.250 someone to connect them and give them a direction. 00:20:14.369 --> 00:20:17.109 That, he argues, is the big opportunity of our 00:20:17.109 --> 00:20:18.890 time. But with that opportunity comes a lot of 00:20:18.890 --> 00:20:21.349 responsibility, which he talks about in his 2010 00:20:21.349 --> 00:20:24.400 book, Linchpin. Yes. Are you indispensable? This 00:20:24.400 --> 00:20:26.200 is where the philosophy gets very personal. He's 00:20:26.200 --> 00:20:28.079 not talking to the CEO anymore. He's talking 00:20:28.079 --> 00:20:30.460 to the employee. And what's the message? He's 00:20:30.460 --> 00:20:33.099 saying, look, the industrial economy is dying. 00:20:33.579 --> 00:20:36.460 The whole system was built on you being a compliant 00:20:36.460 --> 00:20:39.599 cog in a machine. If your job is just to follow 00:20:39.599 --> 00:20:42.099 the instructions in the manual, you are going 00:20:42.099 --> 00:20:44.539 to be replaced. By a cheaper cog somewhere else 00:20:44.539 --> 00:20:47.880 or by a computer program. Which is terrifyingly 00:20:47.880 --> 00:20:50.859 relevant in the age of AI, more than ever before. 00:20:51.220 --> 00:20:53.720 So what's the solution? how do you avoid becoming 00:20:53.720 --> 00:20:56.400 obsolete his solution is to become a lynchpin 00:20:56.890 --> 00:20:59.029 A linchpin is the person who holds it all together. 00:20:59.289 --> 00:21:01.970 You have to bring what he calls emotional labor 00:21:01.970 --> 00:21:05.390 and art to your work. Art in an office job. Art 00:21:05.390 --> 00:21:07.569 in the sense of doing the things that aren't 00:21:07.569 --> 00:21:09.630 in the manual. Showing initiative, connecting 00:21:09.630 --> 00:21:12.089 with customers on a human level, solving a problem 00:21:12.089 --> 00:21:14.509 no one asked you to solve. That human connection, 00:21:14.630 --> 00:21:17.150 that unique contribution is the only thing that's 00:21:17.150 --> 00:21:19.809 truly scarce and valuable. Be the person they 00:21:19.809 --> 00:21:21.369 can't write a manual for. That's it, exactly. 00:21:21.670 --> 00:21:23.490 And I have to mention one more title from this 00:21:23.490 --> 00:21:26.289 era just because it's so provocative. All marketers 00:21:26.289 --> 00:21:29.569 are liars. Laughs. Yes, that one definitely gets 00:21:29.569 --> 00:21:31.910 a reaction. That was from 2005. It sounds so 00:21:31.910 --> 00:21:34.349 cynical. Then you read the subtitle. The power 00:21:34.349 --> 00:21:36.730 of telling authentic stories in a low -trust 00:21:36.730 --> 00:21:39.289 world. So he's not actually saying you should 00:21:39.289 --> 00:21:41.970 lie. No, no, quite the opposite. He's playing 00:21:41.970 --> 00:21:44.230 with the word lie. What he means is that all 00:21:44.230 --> 00:21:47.210 marketers, and really all of us, tell stories. 00:21:47.349 --> 00:21:50.529 And a story, by its very definition, is a fabrication 00:21:50.529 --> 00:21:53.450 of sorts. It's a narrative. When you buy a pair 00:21:53.450 --> 00:21:55.130 of Nike shoes, you aren't just buying rubber 00:21:55.130 --> 00:21:57.789 and foam and canvas. You are buying the story 00:21:57.789 --> 00:22:01.250 that you are an athlete. The story of just do 00:22:01.250 --> 00:22:03.720 it. That story is a lie. In the sense there's 00:22:03.720 --> 00:22:06.440 a fabrication, a narrative overlay on a physical 00:22:06.440 --> 00:22:09.220 object. Right. But it becomes true for the consumer 00:22:09.220 --> 00:22:11.779 if it helps them achieve their goals, if it makes 00:22:11.779 --> 00:22:14.279 them feel the way they want to feel. The lie 00:22:14.279 --> 00:22:16.660 is the story we tell ourselves. But, and this 00:22:16.660 --> 00:22:19.660 is the key, if that story isn't authentic, if 00:22:19.660 --> 00:22:21.480 it's an actual deception, like the shoes fall 00:22:21.480 --> 00:22:23.500 apart after one run, the story fails, and you 00:22:23.500 --> 00:22:26.519 lose trust forever, it's about the power of narrative, 00:22:26.579 --> 00:22:28.890 not the utility of deceit. It's just amazing 00:22:28.890 --> 00:22:31.329 how he turns these concepts out. He's not just 00:22:31.329 --> 00:22:33.210 reporting on the state of business, he's giving 00:22:33.210 --> 00:22:35.730 us a new vocabulary to talk about it. The dip, 00:22:35.869 --> 00:22:39.150 purple cow, permission marketing, linchpin. He's 00:22:39.150 --> 00:22:41.029 naming the phenomena that we all experience at 00:22:41.029 --> 00:22:43.859 work. That is his true genius, I think. He gives 00:22:43.859 --> 00:22:46.480 language to these abstract feelings and anxieties 00:22:46.480 --> 00:22:48.640 we have about our careers and our creative work. 00:22:48.819 --> 00:22:51.420 He makes the intangible tangible. But he didn't 00:22:51.420 --> 00:22:53.220 just write books during this period. He kept 00:22:53.220 --> 00:22:55.380 building things. We talked about Yo -Yo Dine, 00:22:55.420 --> 00:22:56.960 but that wasn't the end of his startup career. 00:22:57.240 --> 00:23:01.740 In 2006, he launches Squidoo. Squidoo. This is 00:23:01.740 --> 00:23:03.960 a real blast from the past for anyone who was 00:23:03.960 --> 00:23:07.259 online in the mid -2000s. A real Web 2 .0 classic. 00:23:07.519 --> 00:23:09.220 I remember Squidoo. It was this platform where 00:23:09.220 --> 00:23:12.289 you could make a page about... Well, about anything, 00:23:12.509 --> 00:23:14.670 really. They called them lenses. You would build 00:23:14.670 --> 00:23:16.750 a lens on a specific topic you were passionate 00:23:16.750 --> 00:23:19.970 about. Say, growing heirloom tomatoes or a guide 00:23:19.970 --> 00:23:22.049 to vintage guitars. It was sort of like Wikipedia, 00:23:22.349 --> 00:23:25.549 but opinionated and run by just one person. It 00:23:25.549 --> 00:23:28.309 had a personality. Exactly. It was user -generated 00:23:28.309 --> 00:23:30.390 content before that was a huge buzzword. And 00:23:30.390 --> 00:23:32.349 the business model was that the creator of the 00:23:32.349 --> 00:23:34.950 lens would share in the revenue from any ads 00:23:34.950 --> 00:23:37.480 or affiliate links on that page. It sounds a 00:23:37.480 --> 00:23:39.519 lot like the creator economy we talk about today 00:23:39.519 --> 00:23:42.579 with platforms like Substack or Patreon. But 00:23:42.579 --> 00:23:45.539 this was way, way earlier. It was a clear precursor. 00:23:45.539 --> 00:23:47.519 He was way ahead of the curve on that. And it 00:23:47.519 --> 00:23:50.160 was hugely successful for a time. By July of 00:23:50.160 --> 00:23:53.640 2008, Squidoo was one of the 500 most visited 00:23:53.640 --> 00:23:56.619 sites in the world. Top 500 globally. That is 00:23:56.619 --> 00:23:59.359 massive scale. That's not a niche project. Not 00:23:59.359 --> 00:24:01.359 at all. It was a major player. And eventually, 00:24:01.500 --> 00:24:04.180 in 2014, he sold it to a competitor, Huppages. 00:24:04.819 --> 00:24:07.759 But if you track the... of his career, you see 00:24:07.759 --> 00:24:10.140 this fascinating shift. What's the shift? Yo 00:24:10.140 --> 00:24:12.440 -Yo Dine was doing marketing for big companies. 00:24:12.740 --> 00:24:15.339 The books were teaching marketing concepts to 00:24:15.339 --> 00:24:18.500 individuals. Squidoo was enabling millions of 00:24:18.500 --> 00:24:20.960 people to do their own marketing. So it's a democratization 00:24:20.960 --> 00:24:23.799 of the ideas. Exactly. And that trajectory continues 00:24:23.799 --> 00:24:26.480 because his next big moves were explicitly and 00:24:26.480 --> 00:24:29.460 directly educational. Right. In 2015, he founds 00:24:29.460 --> 00:24:32.000 the Alt -MBA. Which is not a traditional university 00:24:32.000 --> 00:24:34.359 degree. Don't let the name fool you. No, it's 00:24:34.359 --> 00:24:37.900 a four -week, very intense online workshop. It's 00:24:37.900 --> 00:24:41.380 cohort -based. It's peer -to -peer. It's designed 00:24:41.380 --> 00:24:43.980 to fundamentally change how you think and see 00:24:43.980 --> 00:24:46.519 the world, not just give you a credential to 00:24:46.519 --> 00:24:48.799 put on your resume. And around the same time, 00:24:48.900 --> 00:24:52.880 he also launched his podcast, Akimbo. So he moved 00:24:52.880 --> 00:24:56.140 from building tech companies to building people. 00:24:56.640 --> 00:24:58.140 Is that a fair way to put it? That's a beautiful 00:24:58.140 --> 00:24:59.759 way to put it. I think that's exactly right. 00:24:59.940 --> 00:25:02.920 He moved from building software to trying to 00:25:02.920 --> 00:25:05.900 upgrade people's mindware, if you will. I like 00:25:05.900 --> 00:25:08.380 that. He seems less interested in the technology 00:25:08.380 --> 00:25:11.039 itself now and more interested in the human operating 00:25:11.039 --> 00:25:13.619 system. He wants to help people overcome the 00:25:13.619 --> 00:25:15.880 fear, the resistance, that voice in their head 00:25:15.880 --> 00:25:18.119 that stops them from shipping their work. And 00:25:18.119 --> 00:25:21.400 the establishment, the world, has certainly recognized 00:25:21.400 --> 00:25:23.099 him for this work. We look to the awards list 00:25:23.099 --> 00:25:25.500 in the source material. It's not short. Not at 00:25:25.500 --> 00:25:27.500 all. This isn't just some guy with a popular 00:25:27.500 --> 00:25:30.000 blog. He was inducted into the American Marketing 00:25:30.000 --> 00:25:32.559 Association's Marketing Hall of Fame in 2018. 00:25:32.960 --> 00:25:34.900 Which is like the Cooperstown of advertising. 00:25:35.099 --> 00:25:37.500 It's the highest honor. It is. Time magazine 00:25:37.500 --> 00:25:41.119 named his blog one of the 25 best blogs of 2009. 00:25:41.880 --> 00:25:43.920 Forbes gave him Business Book of the Year back 00:25:43.920 --> 00:25:46.779 in 2004 for a book called Free Prize Inside. 00:25:47.450 --> 00:25:50.569 And in 2018, he won the Jack Covert Award for 00:25:50.569 --> 00:25:52.710 his overall contribution to the business book 00:25:52.710 --> 00:25:54.950 industry. So he's got the hardware to back up 00:25:54.950 --> 00:25:57.690 the theories. He's respected by his peers at 00:25:57.690 --> 00:26:01.150 the highest level. But despite all this, the 00:26:01.150 --> 00:26:03.730 millions from the Yahoo sale, the Hall of Fame 00:26:03.730 --> 00:26:06.630 induction, the global bestsellers, when we looked 00:26:06.630 --> 00:26:08.750 at the personal life section of the dossier, 00:26:08.869 --> 00:26:12.170 it was surprisingly... Well, normal. It really 00:26:12.170 --> 00:26:15.089 paints a picture of a very grounded life. He's 00:26:15.089 --> 00:26:16.869 been married to his wife, Helene, for a long 00:26:16.869 --> 00:26:19.349 time. They have two adult sons, and he lives 00:26:19.349 --> 00:26:21.309 in a town called Hastings -on -Hudson, New York. 00:26:21.450 --> 00:26:24.460 Which is a lovely... quiet suburb just north 00:26:24.460 --> 00:26:26.440 of New York City. It's not Silicon Valley. It's 00:26:26.440 --> 00:26:28.680 not a penthouse in Manhattan. It's a place where 00:26:28.680 --> 00:26:30.819 people commute and raise families. It kind of 00:26:30.819 --> 00:26:33.160 fits his philosophy, doesn't it? How so? He talks 00:26:33.160 --> 00:26:35.700 about doing work that matters, about being authentic, 00:26:36.019 --> 00:26:38.900 about connecting with your specific tribe. It 00:26:38.900 --> 00:26:41.000 doesn't require living in the epicenter of the 00:26:41.000 --> 00:26:43.980 hype cycle. In fact, being slightly removed from 00:26:43.980 --> 00:26:46.460 it probably helps him see the big picture more 00:26:46.460 --> 00:26:49.380 clearly. That makes a lot of sense. He's watching 00:26:49.380 --> 00:26:51.619 the chaos of the market from the quiet of Hastings 00:26:51.619 --> 00:26:54.440 on Hudson and sending out these daily dispatches 00:26:54.440 --> 00:26:56.720 on his blog to help the rest of us make sense 00:26:56.720 --> 00:26:59.759 of it all. Exactly. He's an observer, not just 00:26:59.759 --> 00:27:01.900 a participant. So let's try to summarize this 00:27:01.900 --> 00:27:04.960 entire deep dive. We started with a guy fresh 00:27:04.960 --> 00:27:07.740 out of college with this weird double major in 00:27:07.740 --> 00:27:10.539 a studio apartment with 20 grand packaging books. 00:27:10.759 --> 00:27:13.599 Right. He creates a groundbreaking online marketing 00:27:13.599 --> 00:27:16.640 firm named after a cult sci -fi movie, sells 00:27:16.640 --> 00:27:19.579 it to Yahoo for millions, and becomes a VP. Then 00:27:19.579 --> 00:27:22.519 quits that. Then quits that and pivots to writing 00:27:22.519 --> 00:27:24.579 these incredibly influential books, creating 00:27:24.579 --> 00:27:27.980 a massive user -generated content platform, and 00:27:27.980 --> 00:27:30.460 ultimately evolves into a teacher and a philosopher 00:27:30.460 --> 00:27:33.640 of modern work. It is a career defined by one 00:27:33.640 --> 00:27:37.920 word, adaptation. He didn't just stay the yo 00:27:37.920 --> 00:27:40.140 -yo dine guy. He didn't just stay the permission 00:27:40.140 --> 00:27:43.259 marketing guy. He kept following the thread of 00:27:43.259 --> 00:27:47.150 how do humans connect in a digital age? from 00:27:47.150 --> 00:27:49.650 the early web to the modern creator economy. 00:27:50.089 --> 00:27:52.769 He never stood still. So for you, the listener, 00:27:52.950 --> 00:27:55.069 what are the big takeaways here? If I'm looking 00:27:55.069 --> 00:27:57.069 at this entire stack of sources, all these books 00:27:57.069 --> 00:27:59.470 and ventures, what should I walk away with and 00:27:59.470 --> 00:28:01.430 apply to my own life? I think there are three 00:28:01.430 --> 00:28:04.130 fundamental challenges that Godin leaves us with 00:28:04.130 --> 00:28:06.809 in his work. First, what I call the purple cow 00:28:06.809 --> 00:28:08.910 challenge. Okay. Look at your current project, 00:28:09.069 --> 00:28:12.750 your job, your side hustle, your art. Is it remarkable 00:28:12.750 --> 00:28:14.849 or are you just trying to be a slightly better, 00:28:14.910 --> 00:28:16.470 slightly cheaper version of the competition? 00:28:16.630 --> 00:28:18.569 Because if you're a brown cow, you're invisible. 00:28:18.829 --> 00:28:20.609 That's a tough question to ask yourself. It is. 00:28:20.670 --> 00:28:23.450 The second is the dip calculation. Be brutally 00:28:23.450 --> 00:28:25.869 honest with yourself. Are you in a dip that you 00:28:25.869 --> 00:28:28.130 need to power through to achieve mastery and 00:28:28.130 --> 00:28:30.250 get the reward on the other side? Or are you 00:28:30.250 --> 00:28:32.490 in a cul -de -sac where you're just wasting your 00:28:32.490 --> 00:28:34.829 energy going in circles? If it's a cul -de -sac. 00:28:35.130 --> 00:28:37.549 Get out. Quitting the wrong thing is a victory 00:28:37.549 --> 00:28:40.150 because it frees you up to find a better dip 00:28:40.150 --> 00:28:42.950 to invest in. Okay, that's two. And the third? 00:28:43.150 --> 00:28:46.210 Ship. Ship. Just ship. We talked about his book 00:28:46.210 --> 00:28:48.890 Packaging Days. He didn't wait for permission. 00:28:49.190 --> 00:28:51.789 He didn't wait for the perfect muse or the perfect 00:28:51.789 --> 00:28:54.150 conditions. He built the package and he shipped 00:28:54.150 --> 00:28:57.609 it. In 2020, he wrote a book called The Practice, 00:28:57.910 --> 00:29:00.369 which is all about this. And what's the core 00:29:00.369 --> 00:29:03.200 idea? That creativity isn't a magical event. 00:29:03.299 --> 00:29:05.960 It's a practice. It's a choice. It's an act of 00:29:05.960 --> 00:29:08.720 assertion. And it doesn't count if it just stays 00:29:08.720 --> 00:29:10.859 in your notebook or on your hard drive. You have 00:29:10.859 --> 00:29:13.660 to put it into the world, even if, especially 00:29:13.660 --> 00:29:16.180 if it might fail. That's the scary part, isn't 00:29:16.180 --> 00:29:18.380 it? Shipping means you might get criticized. 00:29:18.779 --> 00:29:20.779 People might not like it. And Godin would say, 00:29:20.880 --> 00:29:22.980 good. That means you've done something worth 00:29:22.980 --> 00:29:25.380 criticizing. That means you made a mark. The 00:29:25.380 --> 00:29:27.759 opposite of remarkable isn't bad. It's ignored. 00:29:28.349 --> 00:29:30.430 I want to leave the listener with one final image. 00:29:30.529 --> 00:29:32.609 I found a book title in his bibliography from 00:29:32.609 --> 00:29:34.650 2013 that I think is the perfect question to 00:29:34.650 --> 00:29:36.890 end on. The book is called What You're Gonna 00:29:36.890 --> 00:29:42.269 Do With That Duck. He really is the king of strange 00:29:42.269 --> 00:29:45.369 titles. He is. And it's such a weird question. 00:29:45.569 --> 00:29:48.309 But the metaphor in the book is this. You have 00:29:48.309 --> 00:29:50.309 this duck. You have this asset, this opportunity. 00:29:50.349 --> 00:29:52.430 You have this access to the Internet, to free 00:29:52.430 --> 00:29:55.470 tools, to potential audiences that your ancestors 00:29:55.470 --> 00:29:58.349 couldn't have even dreamed of. You have the duck. 00:29:58.410 --> 00:30:01.390 The question is the title. Exactly. Are you going 00:30:01.390 --> 00:30:04.529 to let it just sit there? Are you just going 00:30:04.529 --> 00:30:06.930 to collect information, read blogs, listen to 00:30:06.930 --> 00:30:08.990 deep dives like this one? Or are you going to 00:30:08.990 --> 00:30:11.460 do something with it? We are. Absolutely drowning 00:30:11.460 --> 00:30:15.000 in opportunity and information. But we are starving 00:30:15.000 --> 00:30:17.700 for real connection and meaningful work. Godin's 00:30:17.700 --> 00:30:20.799 whole career is a masterclass in using the tools 00:30:20.799 --> 00:30:22.599 of our time to actually make that connection. 00:30:22.920 --> 00:30:25.039 So that's the deep dive. Don't just be a brown 00:30:25.039 --> 00:30:27.980 cow. Don't get stuck in the cul -de -sac. And 00:30:27.980 --> 00:30:30.660 for the love of everything, ship your work. Find 00:30:30.660 --> 00:30:32.220 your duck and do something with it. Thanks for 00:30:32.220 --> 00:30:33.660 listening. I'll catch you on the next one.