Ideas for profitable
communication
by Baruch ter Wal

Show, don’t tell

A whole generation is graduating from our universities with a new mindset: they can be themselves and still be successful.

That’s the impression I got, anyway, running workshops at Survive & Thrive today. I don’t mean to say that the rest of us don’t have that mindset, but typically the importance of being ourselves is something we’ve learned. It involved us breaking some colonial programming.

The talks I gave were about the importance of aligning your business conduct with every claim you make. Indeed, backing up your claims with action should be the most natural thing in the world – because the claims are true.

So if your claim to fame is that you’re passionate about a topic you’ll naturally blog about it, or hold meet-ups about it, or carry out novel research into the area. If you claim to be a “true partner” you’ll naturally put your fees at risk in case of failure, or take equity in some of your clients’ businesses, or think about their issues in the shower. If you’re all about service you will die before you require people who click on the “contact” tab on your website to fill out a form before you’ll talk to them.

Most advisors will say that if your behaviour is not aligned with your marketing claims you need to adjust your behaviour. I think you’ll have more success if you adjust the claims.