Category: Branding

The Super Bowl commercials that I loved.

So the game might not have been as good as people predicted. But the commercials were great. I thought this was one of the best overall crop of Super Bowl commercials since the dot com era when companies were burning money on clapping monkeys.

I know you have work to do today, so let’s get right to the things I loved.

And if you need links to see all the Super Bowl ads you can find them here.

Now, on to the Super Bowl commercials I liked!

Skechers. Martha Stewart Glide Stepping in her Skechers was both funny and surprising. And it’s not just surprising because she once went to jail for glide-stepping past insider trading laws.

YouTube TV: Their spot focused on how we miss important moments when watching sports on TV. Ironically, I had to rewind the commercial twice to hear what it was about because people in my Super Bowl viewing center were being too loud for me to hear. (It has to be annoying to watch the game with someone who is actually studying the commercials and taking notes. Sorry, Fam.)

Pfizer: The boy boxer fighting cancer to L.L. Cool J’s ‘Mama Said Knock You Out’ was arresting, interesting, epic and important. The message at the end, that Pfizer is on a mission to cure 8 cancers by the year 2030 was big. Go Pfizer. I hope you win!

T-Mobile: Introducing Starklink for everyone, everywhere was an attention-getting announcement. If I can see the sky, I can connect to the Starlink network. They went big, not funny. And it made me pay attention. Because my travels and adventures take me to the middle of nowhere. Time will tell whether this was an announcement of a huge shift, or a beta max moment.

Little Caesars: The Eyebrow gag was wacky and very in line with the Little Caesars brand I knew in my twenties. I always like it when a brand gets back to what has worked for it in the past. Especially a brand that sells Pizza Pizza.

Homes.com: The 2 spots about their legal inability to claim that they are the best were funny, well-written, well-directed and well-acted. Like Baby Jessica. They did a good job of simply telling us they are the best. (Or that they think they are the best.) I have sat in many meetings with buzz-killing lawyers who were trying to shoot down all of the crafty ways I came up with to write around their objections. So this spot really hit homes.com for me.

Budweiser: The Clydesdales never disappoint. That little fella has a bright future. It was good to see Budweiser doing Budweiser things.

Ray-Ban Meta: The 2 commercials I saw were both really funny and clearly conveyed how the Ray-Ban Meta glasses benefit you. They made me like the idea of the glasses and what they can do for me. Plus, the glasses look like the Ray-Bans I already wear. So I assume they studied me to determine what the world would wear. Which would mean they thought I was the most average human. Hmmm.

IndyCar: was among the very best advertisers of the night. Their interesting, if not over-the-top micro biographies of some of their top drivers was well played. I have spent a lot of time marketing racing. And it is all about the connection to the driver. Formula-1 has done a great job with this. NASCAR has always had an every-man, or every-Danica appeal. Good to see IndyCar figuring out the formula. Because once you know a bit about the drivers you should care about, you find yourself following the storyline of the sport, even casually. Plus, they showed the really, really good looking drivers, that even the ladies who aren’t into racing will find interesting. It’s the law of attractive.

Doritos: Sure, I’m down for aliens and earthlings both loving Doritos and fighting over them in a death match. Plus, the UFO blows up. And that’s good television. When in doubt, lean on extreme consequences.

Mountain Dew Baja Blast: The spot featuring the singer Seal as a real seal was super silly. (But he was not playing the Real Seal that certifies that a product is made with real dairy ingredients.) I loved this commercial. And I love lime. I am big on silly. And this was ridiculously silly. (If you are going silly, go all the way. No one wants somewhat silly, Billy.)

Instacart: This spot was big and entertaining. And I realized I could get all my favorite brands through Instacart. Not to be confused with IndyCar. Although they both have drivers. And milk.

Coors Light: The slothy Case of The Mondays spot was fun to watch. Sloths doing most things that require swift action is funny. And this was done well. And slow. While insightfully reflecting how football fans feel the day after enjoying a lot of NFL football. Especially after watching the Sunday night game from the East Coast. Which is why I live on the Midwest Coast.

Uber Eats: We’ve seen the brand highlight the football and food connection before. But this went deeper, broader and funnier than ever. It was kinda like the 1883 and 1923 of Yellowstone. But funnier. And with less death. Good work Uber Eats and Matthew McAlrightAlrightAlright. You really delivered.

WeatherTech: I love wild older women. And the WeatherTech women were like a pack of wild honey badgers who didn’t give an eff. Because they were using protection. WeatherTech protection.

Google Pixel Gemini: The story of the stay-at-home Dad who had raised his daughter, or daughters, or kids, and was now getting some help interviewing to get back into the outside the home workspace was very touching. Even for this stay-at-work Dad.

Rocket: These people created a great spot selling the importance, value and comfort of home, using John Denver’s Take Me Home, Country Road as the songtrack. It was interesting, memorable and emotional. They were smart to focus on the love for home, not on the mortgage rates at a time when all mortgage rates are Rocky Mountain High. But then they took a great spot and improved it by cutting to the entire Superdome singing Take Me Home Country Road, while the Rocket signage lit up the stadium, and the broadcasters called out the fact that this special moment was brought to you by Rocket. They crushed it with the live broadcast integration. Side Note: I couldn’t help but think that song must have been what people were singing at the Superdome during Hurricane Katrina.

He Gets Us/Jesus: This spot was powerful. It was beautiful and human. I loved it. It was very touching. It was one of the top 3 spots I was most jealous of. (I will be attaching this evaluation to the application I submit at the Pearly Gates.)

Liquid Death: I liked this spot with people singing about drinking on the job. It is very in line with the brand. After all, they portray interesting misdirection in everything they do. Because Liquid Death is basically well-marketed water, and a tiny bit of tea. But it sounds badass. So good-on you for leaning into that misdirection on a massive stage and recruiting more pseudo-rebels to the brand.

ChatGPT: This spot was beautiful and intriguing. I loved the graphics and animation. I would need to watch it again to follow the storyline of the evolution of human innovation. I am not sure I could have held out until the last couple of seconds of this 60 second/$16 million spot to reveal my logo.

NFL: The ‘I am Somebody’ spot and the spot about getting flag football for girls into high school sports in all 50 states were interesting and positive, and they shined a very positive light on the NFL. I don’t think they needed Mullet Brad to be the enemy of girls’ flag football. I know several of those guys, and I think they would think it was cool for girls, including their daughters, to play football.

Ram: The Goldilocks spot featuring The Golden Boy Glen Powell was epic, funny and badass. It was a fun twist on a classic story we all know. Not only was it really fun to watch, it highlighted the new products in the Ram lineup, which included a lot of electricity. (I also wish I had created this spot.)

Hellmann’s: The reprisal of the classic fake orgasm scene from When Harry Met Sally was fun and funny. And it made a clear point about how Hellmann’s makes a sandwich taste mindblowing. It would have been easy to overdo or underdo this scene. Clearly, they hit the right spot.

Pringles: The flying mustaches delivering Pringles cans to those facing a Pringles outage was interesting and memorable. I don’t love a recipe that includes both hair and food for appetite appeal reasons. But I get that the super stache is part of Pringles’ brand iconography. Plus, it provided for some memorable gags that weren’t related to grossness.

Nike: The Nike women in sports spot was huge. Building on the insight that women often feel as if they can’t win no matter what they do is a strong approach. The line, ‘You can’t win. So win.’ creates a great rallying cry and motivator for female athletes to say screw it, just do it. The spot was beautiful to watch, really well shot, and featured a broad range of world-class athletes. Plus Led Zepplin’s Whole Lotta Love was a killer tune to play under the action.

YourAttentionPlease.com: The focus on the breast was a great attention trap. It got us to lean in and then punched us right in the face with a critical message about the need for more attention to breast care so we can knock out breast cancer and save lives. Great spot!

Angel Soft: Sponsoring the bathroom break was smart, cute and timely. I didn’t go. But I appreciated the moment and the reminder. Plus, I liked the term potty-tunity.

Reese’s: This was a fun spot, full of visual gags and shock. The spot also made me aware that Reese’s has a chocolate lava product. And because of the connection with real volcanic lava in the commercial, I will remember the name when I am at the store. (And I hope I don’t accidentally buy that hard-working man soap.) Good marketing basics, well executed.

Nerds Gummy Clusters: This spot, featuring Shaboozey, was shabeautiful and interesting to watch. It was eye candy for candy. Which I loved.

Lays: The spot with the little girl growing her own potato plant on her family’s potato farm told a beautiful and heartwarming story. It helped position the Lay’s brand as a brand that starts with a wholesome agricultural product grown on family farms for generations. It’s a great way to reposition potato chips. Which are not traditionally seen as healthy or wholesome. So it’s good to get on RFK Jr’s good side.

Taco Bell: I saw the promotional commercials calling for non-famous people to be featured in their Super Bowl commercial. The end result came together really nicely. Plus, it featured famous people, like LeBron James, while saying the spot can’t have famous people. So they played it both ways, and won both ways. Kinda like the Eagles.

Bud Light: The big men of the cul-de-sac spot was my favorite commercial of the Super Bowl. I liked it so much I instantly rewound it to watch it again. The spot, featuring Shane ‘Whatchu Talk’n Bout’ Gillis, Post Malone and the Manning who can’t kick field goals, was great in every way a funny spot can be great. Starting with my favorite line of any commercial during the game, ‘I accidentally threw a lame party.’ Then Malone and Gillis become neighborhood heroes, getting the party started right. There was too much to love to mention it all here. I look forward to watching more from these suburban heroes.

Poppi: I totally relate to the problem raised in this spot. I sometimes want a soda pop, but the sugar can be too much to be worth it. I have tried Poppi and like it as an interesting alternative. And I would order it at a restaurant if it was on the menu. (So get on the menu.)

Stella Artois: The David Beckham twin thing was fun, funny and engaging. Good story telling. Good gags. Good writing. And they both loved the same beer. That’s how you know they were really brothers.

Dove: The little girl running in the spot was a great setup to the real problem of negative female body image issues. Let’s stop that. This was a great example of how a strong, insightful idea doesn’t need a lot of window dressing to be powerful. It just needs to be shared.

Bosch: This was a nice way to make sure people knew about both the great appliances and power tools that Bosch makes. Because if you love one, you will likely love the other too.

Totino Pizza Rolls: This spot was killer. Litterally. They killed an alien. And nobody really felt that bad. Which was both surprising and funny.

GoDaddy: I loved this spot. GoDaddy really does help you when you don’t know what you are doing. They help you look like you do know what you are doing through great website stuff.

Fetch: I liked that they were giving away a ton of money to generate interest and engagement, Mr Beast-style. However, the production value made the brand feel low-rent. So next time, spend a little more on your production value and give a little less away.

Ritz: The saltiness thing played well for me. Good casting. Good insight.

Haagen-Dazs: The Not So Fast, Not So Furious twist was a fun way to remind people to slow down and chill with some super premium ice cream.

Thanks for reading!

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, or who loves to talk Super Bowl commercials, please share this with them.

+For more of the best life lessons I have learned check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

How to build your personal brand, even without TikTok.

A good friend called me this week to tell me he had started a new business. Because his new entrepreneurial adventure would require him to sell himself to others, he asked me for my best advice on how to build a personal brand. I’m not sure if he asked me because I have spent my entire career building brands, because he admired my personal brand, or because he wanted to understand where I went wrong. I was afraid to ask. After a moment of reflection, I shared my best advice on building a personal brand. And here it is for you.

Influencers know something that other people don’t:

It is not about who you know. It really is about who knows you. 

The more people who know about you, what you know, and what you are doing, the better. The Kardashians have built an empire on this simple principle. And the fact that so many people can actually spell Kardashian is proof that it works.

The first thing you should consider when building your personal brand is to start a blog, vlog, podcast, newsletter, social media feed, or other regularly published knowledge. (Which would include having your own TV show like the Kardashians.)

When I first started The Weaponry, I also started The Adam Albrecht Blog. It has been an amazing vehicle to share my thoughts, ideas, successes, and learnings with the world. Literally. My blog has been read in over 150 countries. Who knew there were over 150 countries? (Geographers and cartographers knew. There are actually 195 countries.)

A regular commitment to sharing your knowledge and experience through blogging helps build your personal brand and reputation. For the past 9 years, I have shared my thoughts, experiences and perspectives two to three times per week. This creates a steady stream of value-adding content that I can then share on various other channels, including LinkedIn, Facebook, X, Medium, Reddit, Instagram and Threads. However, as of this morning, we Americans can no longer share our expertise or best dance moves and lip-syncing skillz on TikTok. Because apparently national security is more important.

As of this publishing, I have written and published 1,045 blog posts that I can share across my social media ecosystem. As a result, my business and I are both top of mind when people have relevant opportunities. I regularly hear from people that I haven’t seen in a long time who tell me that they think of me often. This is what sharing your content does for you. This makes it great for building your brand but terrible if you are in the witness protection program.

Podcasts, newsletters, vlogs, columns, and social media channels all work too. The key is to share information and value with the world broadly so that more people than you could reach through individual messages know about you, your skills, experience, philosophies, and your business offering.

While you may create your platform to help support your business, you never know where your platform may lead. My blog readers encouraged me to write a book. Which sounded crazy-hard, until 2020, when I suddenly had plenty of time on my over-sanitized hands to do crazy-hard things. I published my first book in 2021, building on the content I had first created for my blog. 

My first book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say?, created amazing new opportunities for me as a paid speaker, and as a guest on TV shows and podcasts. Those opportunities helped raise my profile, and enabled me to share more about my business and my personal perspective on a wide range of topics. 

In 2024 I also started publishing Adam’s Good Newsletter. The reach of the newsletter now exceeds the reach of my blog. And the newsletter is a great vehicle to share good news and information about all of my activities, interests and offerings. 

Having your own newsletter also means that you own a media channel. While Facebook, LinkedIn and X continue to modify their algorithm to their own advantage, making it harder and harder for you to share your message without paying for exposure, like at those clubs, you control everything about the way your message is shared in a newsletter. And the audience you develop for your newsletter becomes one of your greatest assets. 

What’s more, a newsletter created through a newsletter service provider like Mailchimp (which I use), Substack or others, enables you to see when readers have opened your newsletter, and which links interested them enough to click on them. This feedback enables you to create an even more valuable offering, both for your readers and for yourself and your business.

Key Takeaway 

Always remember, it’s not about who you know. It’s who knows you. Develop a platform to share what you know and what you are experiencing with others. This not only creates value for your audience, it raises your profile. It means that people will think of you more often, even when you are not thinking of them. As a result, you won’t just seek out your own new opportunities, the dynamic flips, and both people and opportunities find their way to you. Which changes everything. Kinda like a TikTok ban.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+For more of the best life lessons I have learned check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

Why logic isn’t enough to win at marketing.

As the Founder & CEO of the advertising and idea agency, The Weaponry, I get to work on a lot of great brands with a lot of great people. But as someone passionate about great creative work it may surprise you to hear that one of my favorite brands to work on is in a historically conservative category. Yet we have developed a brand personality and creative work for our client that is full of the type of personality and wit that is more common in categories like soda pop or men’s deodorant. #ImOnAHorse.

But like most brands, our fun client also has a lot of legitimate reasons to choose it the way choosey moms choose JIF. So a while back the marketing team decided to emphasize those legitimate reasons to choose the brand in a fairly straightforward way. The personality was downplayed. Features and benefits took center stage. And the brand started feeling, well, flat. Kinda like soda pop after someone left the cap off of the bottle for a few days, in Iowa.

I could tell that we were starting to drift slowly off course. The fun brand we had built was an honest reflection of the reason customers loved the organization. The people and culture of the place were great. We simply made sure that it shined bright like a diamond in the marketing too.

So we met with our client and shared our concerns. I told the client that we were getting too logical. We were focusing on rational reasons to choose our brand. And our endearing personality, the fun, cool, the funny, was fading into the background. As we focused on our features and benefits, things that many of our competitors could also promote, we were losing our differentiation. And we were in danger of losing our emotional magnetism.

As marketers, we must never forget this fundamental law:

To be wildly successful, you need your audience to love you, not logic you.

Our superstar clients understood the problem. And we made appropriate adjustments. Starting with our next creative campaign, we put our personality front and center as we promoted the great reasons to believe in the brand.

Today, when I see our work I love everything about the brand. The personality is fun, smart and clever. It provides a smile if not a laugh. There is a clear reason to choose the brand in every marketing morsel. People comment on the work all the time. And the brand is enjoying strong growth and success across the board. Which I love most of all, Scarecrow.

Key Takeaway

Resist the temptation to focus fully on your features and benefits. Brands should have personalities, just like people. Invest time and energy in developing a great personality that grabs attention and magnetizes your audience to the brand. Make your customers and prospects love you, not logic you. Because once you win their hearts, everything else will follow.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+For more of the best life lessons I have learned check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

Why our football team rebranded the water boy this season.

There is a boy on the 7th-grade football team I coach named Josh. He’s a good athlete. He can run the ball well, he’s a strong receiver, and he’s a great defender. He plays both running back and linebacker. And he is one of the most energetic and enthusiastic kids on the team. And I have a special affinity for energetic and enthusiastic types.

While Josh has a broad range of valuable football-related skills, one thing he doesn’t do very well is ride a bike. And unfortunately at the beginning of the season, Josh fell off his bike and broke his arm. Boo. He has been in a light blue cast, that extends to his upper arm since the second week of the season. I expect he inherited this biking inability from his father, Mike, whom I have known since we were athletes at the University of Wisconsin.

Despite the broken wing, Josh and his positive attitude come to practice every day. He helps the coaches run drills. He plays practice quarterback and hands off the ball for running back drills with his good arm. He cheers. He encourages. He laughs at my jokes. He has all the valuable intangibles.

On Saturdays during our games, Josh is in charge of the water. On most teams, this role is called the waterboy. But I never liked that term. It has always felt diminutive, even before Adam Sandler and Fonzy’s hilarious hit movie Waterboy. (You can do it!)

The role of keeping our players hydrated during games is extremely important. And Josh approaches the role with such enthusiasm that I felt we needed to rename the position.

So on game days, we don’t call Josh the waterboy. We call him Aquaman.

The name is fun. It feels as important as the job really is. Just like the superhero Aquaman, Josh and his bottles of magic liquid have special powers that are used for good. Those bottles of water that Josh brings to his teammates on the field and on the sideline help the players in their moments of greatest need. In fact, there are many times during a game when the players need Aquaman more than they need the coaches. (Don’t tell Josh I said that, or he may get a big head and his bike helmet will no longer fit. And he needs that helmet.)

Key Takeaway

Names matter. They affect the way you think. They affect the way you feel. If you want more out of a role, consider the title you use for it. If you want people to love your product, service, process or place, carefully consider the name you give it. Perception is reality. And a more attractive name creates a more attractive brand. And better brands get better results.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+For more of the best life lessons I have learned check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

3 ways to make it easy for opportunities and people to find you.

Great opportunities are created through your interactions with other people. This means that your engagement with other humans is core to your experience on the planet, and presumably on the international space station.

However, before you can develop new friends, partners, collaborators, employers, employees or supporters you need to be discoverable. Like a Bluetooth device. And the easier you are to be found the easier it is for opportunities to find you.

The best way to be found is to do the opposite of what you would do if you were on the FBI’s Most Wanted List. Or Sasquatch. Or Olivia Newton John’s ex-husband. Because to be discovered by others, you must do things that raise your profile so that you ping on other people’s radars.

You can be discovered in a few simple ways.

  1. Show up. Be visible in the real world. Go to events. Be seen in public. Meeting people for meals or beverages isn’t just about showing up for the person you are meeting with. It is also about raising your visibility to everyone else at those establishments. This creates both a higher level of awareness and chance encounters. It increases your level of familiarity with others. That is where real relationships start. It’s also why the Loch Ness Monster never gets invited to birthday parties.

2. Share messages. Create and share your messages with the world. Make them easy to find. This includes blog posts, columns, letters to the editor, news releases, message board posts, podcasts, and video content. You can share social posts on any and all social media. Comments in those same places too. This makes it easier for people to see your name, your ideas and your personality. By sharing your messages you are reaching many people at the same time. This could be dozens, hundreds, thousands, or even millions of people simultaneously. Which is much easier and more scaleable than sharing your message one-on-one, like Hall and Oates.

3. Talk Value. This happens when you do something good, interesting, surprising, or noteworthy, and others start to talk about you when you are not around. This means that others are amplifying your message for you. When others share messages about you, recommend you, promote you, wonder about you, ask about you, or admire you aloud, your message spreads far beyond your ability to share on your own. This is how people like the Kardashians, Mother Teresa, and Santa got famous.

Key Takeaway

Great things happen as a result of awareness. Make sure you are being seen, heard, and talked about for the good things you do. That’s how great people and great opportunities discover you.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+For more of the best life lessons I have learned check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

How a strong brand voice helps you stand out from the crowd.

I love the song We Are The World. It was one of the biggest hits of my early childhood. It is up there with other timeless classics like Karma Chameleon, Rhinestone Cowboy, and Pac-Man Fever.

We Are The World, was written by Lionel Richie and Michael Jackson, and produced by Quincy (Don’t-Call-Me-Adams) Jones. The song features 50 of the biggest musical acts of the 1980s, plus Dan Akroyd.

The iconic song was recorded after the 1985 American Music Awards show and was released by the supergroup USA for Africa. It is catchy, beautiful and poignant. It tells listeners that it’s time to help aid the people of Africa who were suffering from devastating food shortages because of famine. I’m guessing it’s one of the most uplifting songs about starving ever recorded.

Listening Now

When I hear the song today, the thing that stands out is that I can instantly recognize each of the singers’ voices. Despite the fact that there are 21 soloists in the song. And each of them only sings a line or two. So why is it that nearly 40 years after the song was released I can still identify each voice?

Different is Better Than Better

Because each singer’s voice is unique. They all sound distinctly different. When you listen to the song you realize that one reason these singers became popular is that they have their own unique sound. Which makes them special and easily identifiable, even when they aren’t wearing their signature glove.

Developing Your Voice

If you have a business or work in marketing or advertising, you have to think about developing your unique brand voice. It is how you get recognized and remembered. It is how the Search & Rescue team spots you in the Sea of Sameness. You need to position your brand as different from everyone else. Unless you are a counterfeit brand. If that’s the case you should study every move your model brand makes. And every breath that your model brand takes. I’ll be watching you.

Study To Stand Out

Know what others in your category do and say. But then either do or say different things, or do and say the same things differently. And say, say, say what you want. That’s how you stand out. Like Paul McCartney and MJ.

Your Personal Brand

If you have a personal brand, and we all do, think about developing and nurturing your own unique style. This could be your own unique way of talking, walking, acting, or dressing. You can distinguish yourself with all of those things or anything else that feels unique and interesting to you.

Through my blog posts and books, I have developed my own writing style. Which is typically laced with pop culture references and random things I think are funny. Like the bones in my elbows.

My personal goal is to help everyone who reads my writings learn a little, laugh a little and lift a little. (Lift as in spirits, not dumbells.) I believe this is why I receive so many requests for speaking engagements. (But it could just be that other speakers are unavailable.)

Through the advertising and ideas agency, The Weaponry, I help brands create their own unique voice every day. I highly encourage you to find your way of standing apart from the crowd. Positive differentiation will ensure that more great opportunities find you simply because you own a distinct space in the minds of the opportunity holders. And that is a valuable place to be.

Key Takeaway

Discover and develop your unique brand voice. This is true whether you have a business brand to nurture or a personal brand to perfect. Stand apart from the crowd to get noticed. And people will be much more likely to recruit you to be part of their supergroup.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+For more of the best life lessons I have learned check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

No good at marketing yourself? Try these 5 things now.

I have had numerous conversations lately with people who have told me they don’t understand marketing and don’t know how to market themselves. I find this more frightening than the twin girls from The Shining. Because if you don’t understand basic marketing, you will lose out to someone who does.

It’s important to know that sales don’t go to the best products or services. And opportunities don’t go to the most worthy candidates. They often go to those who market themselves best. Which is the only way to explain the success of Bobcat Goldthwait.

You have to be able to market yourself. Because you are constantly being evaluated as a more or less worthy candidate than another person. The opportunity at stake could be a job, a sale, a spot on a team, or a date. With 8 billion people on the planet, there are always other options to choose from. Which means that people are deciding to swipe right or swipe left on you every day. To be a successful contestant on The Swipe Is Right, here are some marketing basics.

5 things to know about marketing yourself.

  1. It is not who you know, it is who knows you. It is important that you are both visible and discoverable. The first step to marketing is being findable. So make yourself easy to find. Be on social media. Especially LinkedIn. Show up at events. Join organizations. Participate. Don’t be Boo Radley. Or Sasquatch. Or translucent.

2. Share your successes. One of the best ways to market yourself is to share your successes. Share them as part of your social and professional profiles where appropriate. Make your successes part of your introduction to others, whether in person or via email or classic mail.

When people think of you, you want them to think of your successes. People have to know what you are good at. This makes you memorable for your strengths. Don’t be humble about your successes, or you are likely to lose out on opportunities to someone with lesser success. As Deion Sanders once said, ‘They don’t pay nobody to be humble.’ And Deion is the master of marketing. (He is also the master of having one too many vowels in his name.)

3. Gain Endorsements: Know which of your friends, family, or acquaintances have influence. Spend time with them. Highlight your relationship with them. Be seen with them. When people with influence endorse, support or choose you it carries weight with others. This is why celebrity spokespeople are valuable. They help drive sales of everything from peanut butter to hair replacement. You are known by the company you keep. And cool kids like to spend time with other cool kids. (And all the cool kids, they seem to fit in.)

4. Stand out. Have something in your style, dress, or language that makes you highly identifiable. You have to stand out from the crowd to be remembered. And you have to be remembered to have opportunities find you. The year that I first grew my hair longer, I was amazed at how much more people recognized and remembered me. I attribute much of that to the fact that I simply looked different from many of the people around me. My friend Tony Sharpe always wears black. T-Pain has AutoTune. Aaron Neville, Drew Brees, Post Malone, and Cindy Crawford are all known for things on their faces. Find your signature thang and leverage it.

5. Be the go-to for something. Great brands are synonymous with something specific. Think about what one valuable thing you stand for in the minds of others. It could be creativity or trustworthiness, hard work, problem-solving, willingness, funniness, or intelligence. Really it could be any single strength or positive trait that distinguishes you. Grab it. Own it. And anytime people feel they need that, they come to you. Because you’ve got the Motts.

Key Takeaway

The world is full of opportunities. To make sure you get your share of them it is important to learn basic marketing skills. Make yourself visible. Tout your wins. Associate with people that others know, like and respect. Develop an identifiable personal trademark. And develop your rare and valuable skills. You’ll be surprised how many good things start coming your way.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+For more of the best life lessons I have learned check out my book, What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

Don’t be one of those people.

I pay close attention to the language that people use. I always have. I notice local nuances in word choice, phrasing and pronunciation. And I can tell the difference between the cursing of an educated and uneducated human.

I also quickly recognize when new words and phrases gain popularity.

A few years ago I noticed the increased popularity of the phrases, If I’m being honest…, and To tell you the truth… There is a time and place to use those phrases. But they shouldn’t be sprinkled before everything you say or you sound like your default setting is Big Fat Liar.

The latest phrase to ping my ears is One of those. Here are a few uses:

He’s one of those guys who….

She’s one of those bosses who….

They are one of those friends who…

I dislike the use of this phrase for 2 reasons.

  1. It is unnecessary. Whatever you say after this introduction could simply stand on its own. She’s one of those bosses who people love to work for could simply be: People love working for her. And, He’s one of those guys who never seems to have a bad day could simply be: He never seems to have a bad day. Or He’s always in a good mood. Or, I think he’s on drugs.

2. I don’t like to think of people as being common types. Humans are complicated, nuanced and unique. We are oversimplifying when we lump people into one of those categories. And I hate to be lumped.

As a champion of marketing, advertising and branding I am constantly looking for the unique, unoccupied spaces for brands to live. It’s important to own distinct real estate in customers’ minds. It is how brands become irreplaceable.

The same holds true when it comes to your personal brand. You don’t want to be one of those types. It decreases your value. It makes it sound as if there are a large number of you. As soon as you are one of those types, you are interchangeable with all the others. Like a commodity. Don’t be that kid.

Key Takeaway

Don’t allow yourself to simply be one of those. Lean into your uniqueness. Develop your own intriguing combination of strengths and style. Become uncategorizable. Be unlabelable. Own a unique place in the minds of those you interact with. It is the best way to maximize your value and memorability. It’s true of brands, products and services. And it’s true for humans too.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+ For more thinking like this check out my new book What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

The great un-equalizers in life and business.

There are nearly 8 billion people on Earth. Which, according to my quick math, equals a lot of competition.

Every time you apply for a job, promotion, or elected position, someone else will want it too. Just ask Napoleon and Pedro.

Want to woo an attractive mate? Join the crowd. Want to join a team, cast, club, or society? Get in line. Want a pound of that sandwich-sliced turkey breast? Take a number.

It’s important to have an impressive resume. Skillz are good. Experience is helpful. Knowledge is nice. References are respectable. Connections are cool, Jay. But your competitors will have all of those too. And perhaps theirs will be better than yours.

However, the great difference-makers in life don’t show up on your resume, your transcripts, or your personal win-loss ledger.

Online dating sites can’t capture the great difference-makers either. If they did we would have a lot fewer dating disaster stories to share.

Your Way

The secret ingredients that set you apart in life and business are your personality and style. Their importance can’t be overstated. If you have no personality or style you have no chance. If your personality and style are indistinguishable, so are you.

By developing a unique and interesting flavor you stand out. You get noticed. You become memorable. And interesting. And attractive. And sought after. That’s how you win in Nashville, Hollywood, Wall Street, Main Street, and at the Kollege Klub.

Key Takeaway

Embrace your own personality and style. Develop your own voice. Find your own flavor. It will become your unfair advantage in life. And in a crowd of 8 billion people, you could use every advantage you can get.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.

+For more life lessons I have learned on my adventure on Earth, check out my new book What Does Your Fortune Cookie Say? from Ripples Media.

May the Super Bowl remind you that the size of your audience matters.

Welcome to Super Bowl Sunday! For American advertisers, this is the biggest opportunity of the year. Because Super Bowl viewers make up the biggest American audience advertisers can reach at one time without a white Ford Bronco.

Messages need eyeballs and earballs to be received. More receptors and detectors mean that your message can have a bigger impact, more influence, generate more demand, create more persuasion and generate more revenue. It’s all you need to know to understand the popularity of the lip-sync platform Tik Tok.

The cost of running a Super Bowl commercial is super high. Because a commercial that airs during the Super Bowl has super potential to generate sales. Like an army of Mary Kay saleswomen in pink Cadillac’s invading the suburbs.

Remember, it’s not about who you know. It’s who knows you. Your idea, brand, product, service, movement, cause, or candidate’s success is limited by the number of people who are aware you even exist.

Key Takeaway

The shortcut to marking success is to get yourself in front of the biggest audience you can find. It’s ok to start small, but don’t think small. Keep ratcheting up your reach. Converting your audience will always be a percentage game. The greater the audience the greater the opportunity. Just ask the NFL. Or Kris Jenner.

*If you know someone who could benefit from this message, please share it with them.