Getting There

So, instead of arriving in San Jose at 9:30 PM, we touch down in San Francisco at 11:00 PM, collect our bags and find ourselves, compliments of Delta, boarding the “Super” Shuttle, along with a small party of felow travelers. Arriving at our hotel as the last of the drop-offs, we have had a fatigue-hazed nighttime tour of the Stanford campus, the Villages at Cupertino aka Appleland, a swish apartment complex casually at home in all that Silicon Valley wealth and a quick tour of the streets of downtown San Jose pretty much deserted except for an occasional vehicle of suspicious appearances from which one would not be surprised to see gunshots emerging. Or maybe that was just what it felt like at 2:00 AM west coast time, or 5:00 AM east coast time, about when I am usually getting up.

I think we came to SMX West to learn something about the latest and greatest in search marketing and not to provide fodder for travel writing. Only time will tell.

Didn't see that one coming

(from last night's travels)

Flying west tonight with Pete on US Air instead of on our scheduled flight on Delta. Got to the airport in Myrtle Beach planning to fly to Atlanta and then to San Jose with a scheduled arrival time of 9:00 pm. Instead we are flying US Air through Charlotte to San Francisco with an ETA of 11:00 pm. And then a late night taxi to San Jose for the start of tomorrow's conference. As the helpful Delta agent in Myrtle Beach was rebooking us due to blown Delta connections, she asked us if we were "from here?" "Yes," we told her. "Oh," she said, a bit surprised, "I never fly out of Myrtle Beach. I always drive to Charleston." Who knew?

On our first flight of the day, Pete and I went through the outstanding three day agenda deciding which of us would go to which sessions. We've got a game plan mapped out. Looking forward to sharing what we learn with everyone when we get back.

In Honor of Steve Wilson

What follows is my tribute to Steve Wilson, spoken at his service on Friday, Nov. 26th...

Steve has been my partner at work for almost 25 years.

He's been a great partner. More than I can possibly express.

Coming to work without him present, without his wry humor, his understated brilliance and his enormous heart, is hard to imagine. There is a loss there that will go on for a long, long time.

Steve was an incredible person. In that regard, I can tell you that I am grateful to have known him, to have spent so much time with him and to have had him so smack in the middle of my life for so long.

Grateful is a big concept to me.

Over the years, the words “cultivate gratitude” have come to signify a way to look at life. A way to strip away any sense of entitlement. A way to access reasons to be thankful for our lives.

For gratitude to become a habit, one must practice it. And that doesn't mean practice it only when it's easy. It means under any circumstance. Even this one.

So, today, the day after Thanksgiving, I want to tell you why I am so grateful to have had Steve as a partner for so many years.

It's actually hard to know where to begin.

I think I want to start by calling out his humility. Steve was a person of huge creative talent and at the same time, one of the least self-promotional individuals I have ever known. I'm not sure I can remember a single thing he ever said or did whose motive was to make himself look better. This is a quiet and beautiful and under the radar quality that few people have. I remember many years ago at a particular juncture in our workload mentioning to Steve that I was aware of the fact that he had given all the really juicy, high profile creative assignments to other people in the agency rather than holding on to them himself and he said, “Thank you for noticing.” Over the years I'm sure there were countless gestures like this, most of which probably did go unnoticed. Steve knew who he was and didn't need the recognition of others to shore up his sense of self.

Steve was a great listener, one of the best I have ever known. He would take in everything and you knew he was really taking it in. And where creative work was concerned, that capacity of his to listen well and then tap into his own deeply original creative mind was a constant source of real pleasure. Day after day, year after year, Steve's creative work connected with, delighted and excited client after client.

In that same light, Steve could always be trusted to come through. You knew you could count on him. You knew he had your back. You knew that he was so deeply engaged and committed to delivering excellence that he was never going to let you down. Under fire, under stress, under duress, Steve would always come through. And always with an extraordinary attention to the most minute detail.

As everyone at our company knows, Steve shouldered huge amounts of responsibility. Always. Without complaint. In ways that were designed to lighten the load of others.

Steve was a person of exceptional integrity. In all the highs and lows of our business life together, there was never the slightest concern or question about the fact that he could be trusted completely with anything no matter what it might be. I thank him for that gift and I know I will miss it.

Steve was a person of kindness. His core of kindness was always present. I cannot think of a single mean-spirited thing he ever did.

He did, however, have a wicked sense of humor. A witty, understated, wry and often deadpan way of totally cracking us up. I came across an email he sent out a few years ago. He was forwarding to a few of us an email he had received with the subject line: Hi from Kristina. Above the complete text of Kristina's email, Steve's email began: “I'm sorry to tell you that Monday will be my last day at the agency. I've fallen in love and am moving to Russia. When you read Kristina's email to me, I'm sure you'll understand why I am so totally smitten. She has such a refreshing way with words--my favorite being: “I shall wait much.” Well, I can't make her wait much, so I must go. I'm now writing to her my story life but am sure things will work out regardless.”

******

Now I want to tell you a little about the events of this past week.

As you all must know, many of us at LHWH have been coming to work with Steve as a central person in our lives for ten, 15, 20 years and more.

So, after this past weekend's sudden and shocking turn of events, Vern and I talked and agreed that we wanted everyone at LHWH to know what had happened with Steve after he was admitted to the hospital on Friday, including that he was not going to make it. I spent Monday sharing that news with everyone in our company, not knowing by the end of the day he would already no longer be with us.

You can only imagine the shock and heartbreak of this news.

The lack of warning, the lack of closure, the suddenness, the helplessness and impending finality of losing Steve just like that was devastating and almost surrealistic for all of us. In having to share this news, I was witness to the depth of feeling for Steve in so many people: the tears, the disbelief, the sense of loss, the visceral impact this news had on everyone.

I also reached out on Monday to close friends who used to work at LHWH that I knew would want to hear what was happening with Steve in a more personal and immediate way.

I hope no one here ever has to be the bearer of news like this to those close to you but I want to tell you that across the spectrum of all the past and present LHWH relationships that Steve had there was one common thread that was expressed over and over again: “I really, really loved him.”

The cumulative effect of hearing this over and over again was very powerful. It gave me pause to want to dwell a bit on that depth of feeling Steve inspired around him.

Given that Steve's workplace persona was often overwhelmed, stressed out, unknowingly frowning, intense, serious and rushed, it was amazing and revealing to be exposed to how deeply that inner beauty of his had connected with so many people at such a heart level.

It made me think of my favorite definition of work, something Kahlil Gibran wrote, something that I first read long ago when I was still in college.

Gibran said:

“Work is love made visible.”

Based on this definition, Steve deserves to be honored for the quality of work that he did.

*******

A few years ago the American writer Joan Didion wrote a book called The Year of Magical Thinking. It's the story of the year that followed her sitting down to dinner with her husband one night only to have him drop dead in front of her in the middle of a sentence. “You sit down to dinner and life as you know it ends,” she wrote at the time. The book is a memoir of the year that followed that sudden death. The reason that the book is titled The Year of Magical Thinking is that at some point well into that first year after her husband's death, Joan realizes that somewhere in her, she still expects to come home one night and find her husband alive, sitting at the table, life as she knew it returning to normal. She recognizes that deep down, she is still attached to the expectation of a magical reversal of the unreality of his death. This comes to mind because this week I have heard over and over that this all seems unreal, like a bad dream, like it can't really have happened. And I expect that we will all have our own experience with not really believing that Steve is gone, that we will come to work one day and he will be in his office as usual. I know, myself, this week, when I walked by his office, I still felt that he was there or would be there shortly and could not really fathom that the hole of Steve's absence wouldn't somehow be filled by him magically reappearing and all of us waking from this as if it was just a bad dream. I expect we will have our own year of Magical Thinking at LHWH while we all try to process a loss that leaves such a big hole in the heart.

But, on a deeper level, suffering is an inevitable part of life. We are all mortal, none of us know the moment we are destined to go and all of us have to experience the death of people we love. This is often a test of faith. But, it can also serve as a catalyst for deepening one's understanding of what really does matter in life, for reshaping one's priorities, for remembering what has intrinsic, ongoing value and what does not.

It is said that:

"God brings men into deep waters

not to drown them,

but to cleanse them."

And for myself, I believe, in the end, everything comes back to love.

And while it hurts to lose Steve so abruptly, there is some solace in seeing how deeply loved he was by so many.

This is the legacy of his life that I will hold on to. It ties back to the final thought I want to share today, another quote about love:

“Love is the reflection of God’s unity in the world of duality. It constitutes the entire significance of creation.”

Heard It Through the Grapevine

If there's one thing I've recently noticed, it's this: people love to gossip. Circulate. Pass on. Repeat. And often without a second thought. Gossip is, after all, always about tearing down.

In college, I played volleyball. My weeks consisted of so many lifting sessions, early practices, and timed sprints (can't say I miss those one bit...) that I could barely keep track. And despite the fact that I was part of a hardworking team, I had a difficult coach whose actions--mouthing off at refs, making us run during timeouts, throwing things around on the bench--made him a hot topic of conversation within our conference. It was no surprise that this severely affected our reputation. The more people talked, the more we felt like we had something to prove (and we did). Our captains switched things up the very next season: we ran suicides until our legs turned to jello, we added ten pounds to our weights, we had frequent team meetings, and we upped our intensity (now there's a sports term if I've ever heard one). A team that usually placed at the very bottom of the conference became the regular season champs that year; one that everyone would spend their off-seasons preparing for.

It's no different in the business world. Domino's Pizza, for example, has battled quality perceptions over the years. The taste, price, ingredients, you name it, were dissatisfying. Point blank: you knew when you ordered that you were sacrificing quality for a lower price than Papa John's or Pizza Hut. In a smart business move, however, they listened, they interpreted, and they responded. They upgraded their ingredients and improved the taste, announcing their "new pizza" in a major TV campaign. They didn't just stop there: they encouraged their customers to "become the photographers" and send in photos of their pizzas. By listening to the public, they turned what was a negative situation into a positive one. Kudos, Dominos.

The next time you find yourself the target of gossip, consider your options. Listen. Interpret. Strategize. Your customers are what drive your business; show them that you care.

Jeff Small to Speak at TEDxMyrtleBeach

While some dread public speaking, others embrace it; LHWH Interactive Development Director, Jeff Small, is the latter. Having recently accepted an offer to speak at TEDxMyrtleBeach, he—among others—will have eighteen minutes to discuss what he is most passionate about. The answer: “Technology Ubiquity”. And just what is “Technology Ubiquity”? The discussion of how new technology is slowly becoming ingrained in our day to day activities and lives, and how this will affect all facets of our lives. “I'm going to talk about what kinds of radical technologies are rapidly becoming part of our everyday lives, and what effects this might have,” Jeff adds.

TEDxMyrtleBeach will take place on Thursday, October 21, from 9am-12pm in the boardroom of the Chamber of Commerce. In addition to Jeff, confirmed speakers include Jordan McDonald (discussing Women in Mixed Martial Arts), Brian Carter (incorporating social media with stand up comedy), Campbell Thames (addressing pop culture), and Gina Trimarco (discussing improv's ability to change one's life). Limited to forty attendees, event tickets are available for $25. To register, click here.

Why "going" viral often doesn't work.

You won't become viral by proclamation. In a recent episode of Donald Trump's The Apprentice, the men were pitted against the women in a battle to see who could create the best viral video for Popcorn Indiana brand popcorn. The women bested the men by creating a video that featured a young man gorging himself with popcorn while he worked out at the gym. Finding the winning video on Youtube, I was a little surprised to see that there were only 1,775 views. Interestingly, the "losing" video has 2,849 views. Both numbers are far from what many would call "viral," half a million views and up you're getting there, but it's a prime example that simply proclaiming that your work is viral doesn't make it so.

I'm truly surprised by the number of savvy marketers who still think that they can control the medium as well as the message. Both videos do a good job of showcasing the brand. But anyone watching either of these two videos see's quickly that they are what they are; a brand ad. And while they are mildly entertaining, they're certainly not likely to explode on the internet. So what's a marketer who wants to go viral to do? Well, start by living viral, not proclaiming that you are. Create truly interesting, entertaining, thoughtful, and compelling ideas that go beyond a video. If it's truly a great idea (Old Spice) it will become viral worthy. Old Spice launched their "look at me guy" campaign not as a viral campaign, it was an ad campaign that became viral. To date, the 30 second TV spot has been viewed on Youtube an astounding 21,858,024.

The Zappos Effect

Have you noticed that customer service reps are friendlier and a little more helpful these days?

I have. At first I thought it was just the economy that was forcing companies to re-think customer service. The I saw an interview with Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh. One of his examples of delivering a great customer experience hit home with me. Zappos makes it easy for a customer to call them. Their phone number isn't buried in their web site, in fact, not only do they welcome the phone call but they actually keep customers on the phone until they are certain that they have been genuinely helpful.

I recently had to call my cable provider to inquire about an issue with my home cable service. I was dreading the call. The last time I called them was a nightmare. On hold for what seemed like an eternity, customer service reps who sounded almost miserable, handed off to several people in the phone chain, not to mention actually being cut off only to have to call back and re-state my issue. Well I'm pleased to say that this latest call was perfectly painless. When I hung up having had my problem addressed by a friendly person who scheduled a service call at my convenience, I wondered, is it possible that other companies are taking their customer service cues from Zappos? If so, I applaud them for doing so. Let's hope it sticks.