Hey friends,
Welcome to Episode XXVIII of Market Curve - a bi-weekly newsletter exploring the intersection of marketing, writing and persuasion.
A man must do to be something
This title is inspired from two places: Shakespeare’s Hamlet and a letter.
In one of the most famous lines in literature, Hamlet delivers with utmost eloquence these words:
“ To be, or not to be, that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles “
This paragraph was also quoted by one of my favorite authors of all time, Hunter S. Thompson in his seminal letter to his friend about what it means to live a good life.
These powerful words can be extended to our businesses too. It makes perfect sense there. Almost too perfect.
When we first start our business, we are joyous with excitement yet nervous as the little boy who’s going up on the roller coaster for the very first time.
He knows the ride’s going to be so much fun he’s going to be screaming with joy yet he’s afraid of the fall.
He’s not wrong to. I wouldn’t expect anything else from little David.
Yet in that moment, when he decides to strap himself up to the seat and gets ready to be launched 30 feet in the air, he has decided to “be”.
Much like ourselves when we strap ourselves and shoot off in the night sky screaming our lungs out - sometimes with ecstasy, sometimes with despair.
And when we do that, we “be”.
We are no longer standing at the ground looking at other kids laughing and crying.
We are there - relishing and enjoying this wonderful ride of “being”.
By Shounak.
To be a vendor or not to be.
As you can see, I’ve subtly changed the wording from the poem above to make another point that.
I’m going to give myself brownie points for that - it’s an important topic to talk about.
I remember first coming across the word “vendor” when I was 6 years old. I was reading a story about a train vendor who was selling peanuts on the train to a wealthy man.
Yes, we have those here in India. It’s what we’re used to.
Since then, whenever I hear the word “vendor”, the image of this mustached vendor in his red turban always enters my mind.
Now I wear no red turban nor do I have a mustache (I do sport a marvelous beard though) but I still associate this image with that of a vendor.
This happened with a client of mine who asked me to sign a vendor agreement.
After we discussed the problems he was looking to solve, he told me that he didn’t need my expertise. All he wanted from me was someone to execute. No thinking, just plain execution.
This is a classic vendor arrangement.
Much like the train vendor selling peanuts, I was selling my work. Not my thinking or strategy. Just the end product. It’s a transaction based in price that puts the customer in the driving seat.
I give what he asks me to give - this is the mantra of the modern vendor.
Now compare this to someone who walks in and starts telling his customers - “This is wrong, XYZ sucks and don’t even get me started on ABC”.
The moment he does this, he’s seen as an expert practitioner. The train vendor has now transformed into a medical health nutritionist. After asking them all kinds of questions, he finally chooses to give his customers the peanuts.
The ball is in his court now. It’s no longer a vendor-buyer relationship. It’s an expert practitioner-client relationship.
And that’s where you want to be.
By Shounak.
Learning that would make Feynman proud?
I’ve been trying out a nifty little reading hack these past few months now. Basically, my ADHD riddled brain needs constant stimulus so I find myself jumping between books with equal degrees of excitement yet nervous frenzy.
And while the jumping around was fun, I didn’t really remember anything wholeheartedly.
So I devised something that would allow me to jump around while learning more about a subject than I ever could.
Let’s say I’m studying marketing. What I’ll do first is make a list of 5 perspectives I want to learn marketing from.
For me, that meant:
- marketing from a consumer psychology lens
- marketing from an economics lens
- marketing from a persuasion lens
- marketing from a copywriting lens
- marketing from an ad agency lens
Now that I’ve done that, I can jump around between these 5 books while still being confined within the broader scope of “marketing”.
And not to forget, learning marketing from 5 different lenses.
Now that’s something Richard Feynman would be bloody proud of, wouldn’t you say?
One of the few good things that happened this year was that I made tons of online friends. Now I’m no Newton but if my calculations are right, I’ve made roughly 50 friends across 10+ countries. Now that’s something really cool!
But you know there’s no such thing as free lunches - it takes time to write this newsletter and certainly a lot of energy. But I find it extremely liberating and pleasing to write it - so I’ll continue for the foreseeable future.
However, if you have some change lying around and want to support an indie business owner, you can say thank you by doing one of the following:
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