Friday Field Notes: 1/10/2025
The first full week of the year is done!
If my calculations are correct, about 62% of people have given up on their resolutions.
Another 10% are hanging on by a thread.
I went a bit different this year and asked myself, “If I were going to take the smallest steps towards my goals every day, what would I do?”
That gave me a list of 8 items. Most of them take less than 5 minutes.
And while they’re not going to get me to my goals on their own, they keep my goals top of mind, increasing the chances of actually achieving them.
It’s super simple and might be all you need to get an edge on those targets.
Anyway, here are the highlights for the week.
Lessons Learned This Week:
1. Your employees have an ultimate goal: to find a better job. Give them a way to achieve that with you.
I just finished Reframe Your Brain by Scott Adams. In it, he brings up a great reframe for employees.
If you’re unhappy in your role, you don’t need to justify being miserable. You need to think, “My work goal is to find a better job.”
Whether that’s in a different business or in a different role with the same one, employees should be constantly seeking to make their lives better. It’s not unreasonable.
It gives a great opportunity for employers, though.
Do the work to keep your team happy, so that they’re already in the best position for them.
Agencies have crazy high turnover. You can put a stop to it in your own agency.
2. “Do your best” is terrible advice. Focus on key outcomes and what needs to happen.
“Do your best” actually says nothing about what needs to happen. It doesn’t calm the mind. It just sends it wildly trying to remember everything that needs to happen.
I like the 80/20 rule in this instance.
What’s the smallest thing I can think about that will lead to the largest impact?
“Remember to breathe.”
“Just make sure the copy resonates.”
“Smile and be present.”
Things get easier when you have a more specific step to hone in on.
So yes. Do your best. But also focus.
3. The power of social media lies in the social, not the media.
My social posts do ok. They’re mostly in double-digits for engagement and I can get a good dopamine hit with the notifications.
The real value I’ve found is in the people that I meet and talk to.
I’ve got multiple relationships that spawned through social media and they’ve led to deals, opportunities, and greater value for my audience.
I’m bullish on the social side, especially as humanity seems to become less personally connected.
Content I Enjoyed:
📃 Leading By Doing is a great paper on a powerful leadership tactic. I wrote a post about it too.
🔎 Eric Siu and Niel Patel talked how “SEO as we know it is dead.”
While I’m over the “X is dead” craze, they brought up some great points.
SEO as the market has gotten used to referencing it revolves around Google. In reality, it’s SEARCH Engine Optimization. Anywhere people are searching, optimize for that.
Got me thinking differently about the way ahead for agencies.
🍞 Toast created some content that’s a great example of how to show you understand your audience. Don’t just promote features. Prove you get what they’re going through.
Quote That Slaps:
“One of the disadvantages of doing everything mathematically, by research and by mandate, is that after a while, everybody does it the same way." - Ad Genius Bill Bernbach
We see it constantly in the market. Someone sees success and can map out the path, so everyone does it, and everything looks the same.
Then the algorithm gods throw in a change and that path doesn’t work anymore. So people wait for someone to be successful then copy it.
Instead, don’t think mathematically about everything. Get creative.
It may not be the clearest path to success, but it may set you up as the creator of the next path.
Content Roll Up:
Have a great weekend!
Comment and share any of your learnings this week!
