Facilitating Connection

The days have come and gone when four or five channels drive trends and influence opinions. These are the days of, quite literally, infinite channels.

Nobody says anymore, "If you can land a commercial spot, you win”. (Okay, maybe the Superbowl. Then again, you’re going to pay through the nose using that logic to reach a whole lot—millions upon millions!—of people that are trained to ignore your witty phrase or funny joke. I’m not sure if that is worth it.)

If you earn the permission of a few, and you devote yourself (or your company or your church) to them, then your resources can be invested in ways that are not meaningless.

How do I know that?
Because you know them.
And that’s the holy grail of marketing.
You really know the people for whom your thing makes a difference.

Now that you’ve bowed out of the race to annoy, you can get to the business of building connections* between the people for whom you are giving your attention.

This is when the appeal of interruption fades and the potential of community begins to emerge.

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*Remember, there are at least five alternative ways to engage your community, church, neighborhood, workplace, company. Please, stop the information-dumping.

1. 1. 1. Getting attention (in the midst of mind-numbing information overload).
      2. Earning permission (to share, to be heard, and ultimately to be trusted).
      3. Delivering on expectations (of the people that gave you permission to share through the noise).
      4. Facilitating connection (in the form of a genuine community).
      5. Inspiring creation (of solutions in partnership with the community).