Is Your Love Worth Finding?

June 06, 2011 4:03 PM

Everybody wants to be found.

People. Ideas. Brands. Organizations.

They want customers to stumble upon, obsess over, fall in love with, become addicted to and tell their friends about them.

But this isn’t just a business need – it’s a human need.

To be found is to be noticed.
To be found is to be heard.
To be found is to be seen.
To be seen is to matter.

THE QUESTION IS: Is your love worth finding?

Worth getting lost for?
Worth waiting in line for?
Worth crossing the street for?
Worth driving three hours for?
Worth being tired the next day for?

Is your love worth finding?

If not, consider these ideas for making yourself, your brand and your company more findable:1. Reward curiosity. About once a week, I get a glowing email from someone who finds my website for the first time. But instead of telling me how awesome I am – which is nice for my ego – they tell me how useful the website is – which is necessary for my bank account.

The cool part is, people say they spend hours at time reading articles, watching videos and perusing the site. And considering the average view time for most websites is about thirty seconds, I’ll take that as an indication of love worth finding.

You don’t need clever marketing tactics to get people to stay – you need to encourage and reward people who seek to know more. Does your website give curiosity free reign? I hope so. Because curiosity is the hallmark of genius, the mother of creativity, the beginning of wisdom, the ancestor of innovation and the quiet force of progress.

If you want to become love worth finding, don’t punish people who ask questions. Respond with a foundation of affirmation and thank them for confessing ignorance. Otherwise they’ll take their curiosity elsewhere. How do you pay people back for the time they spend with your brand?

2. Give them their daily bread. A few years ago, my friend Kirstin opened a restaurant in Scottsdale for people with restrictive diets. Her philosophy: No gluten? No dairy? No soy? No problem. The menu at Nourish color coats every item to accommodate people’s dietary needs. What’s more, they offer meal plans, nutritional consulting, lifestyle seminars, video podcasts and an engaging online community of customers and advocates.

“Nobody likes being the freak at the table. But when people find Nourish, they can finally relax and enjoy their meal without worry about their food allergies. And we’re the only place in town where someone can experience that.”

That’s love worth finding: A place of refuge people can patronize, but would agonize without. A place of belonging that’s more than just a helpful addition to their day, but a vital component to their lives. And a place of connection where people can remember that they’re not alone in their struggle. What pervasive, expensive, real and urgent problem does your brand solve?

3. Become an object of interest. Good brands are bought – great brands are joined. But they can’t join you if they can’t find you. And they can’t find you if you’re not interesting enough to cut through the clutter. A few questions you might consider:

*Is the bio page on your website worth showing to a friend?
*Are you the kind of person for whom onlookers demand an explanation?
*What have you done in the last thirty days to become more interesting?

Ultimately, becoming an object of interest isn’t something that happens overnight. It’s the result of a life lived fully, actively and creativity. Never underestimate the findability of interestingness.

Commit to making an investment in your future fascination, and the world will pay you back with its attention. Are you interesting enough that people would cross the street to greet, join and get behind you?

4. Create a unique way of interacting with the world. You become love worth finding when you talk to customers in a way that nobody else in your industry can touch. The question is: Can you create an act of artistry in a moment of boredom?

According Seth Godin’s bestselling book Linchpin, art is any nonanonymous interaction that leads to a human conclusion and changes someone for the better.

Your challenge is to make people feel essential – not just special. To help them feel a sense of belonging – not just buying. And to make sure they feel engaged – not just marketed to. That’s art. And it’s not only worth finding, it’s worth spreading.

Lately, I’ve seen this trend show up in my social media efforts. Almost daily, people skeptically respond to my emails, tweets and messages asking if it’s really me, or some robot autoresponder. To which I always reply:

“Robots are for amateurs. My brand comes from my hand.”

People are floored. Which they really shouldn’t be, but that’s the nature of modern technology: Impersonalness is the expectation. What are you doing to keep your brand human?

REMEMBER: If they can’t find you, they can’t join you.

And if they can’t join you, you can’t win.

Making your love worth finding.

LET ME ASK YA THIS…
How do people feel when they finally find you?

LET ME SUGGEST THIS…
For the list called, “18 Lessons from 18 People Smarter Than Me,” send an email to me, and you win the list for free!

* * * *
Scott Ginsberg
That Guy with the Nametag
Author, Speaker, Publisher, Artist, Mentor
[email protected]

Never the same speech twice.