The Clean and Green Club

Recently, I hit one web page that did something very right, and something else very wrong. I want to share these with you.

One of my big peeves when surfing the Net is the lack of clear instruction when you need to fill out a form. I especially can’t stand choosing a password with no guidance as to how the site requires that password to be structured, and then having my first two or three attempts rejected. And if I have to try three passwords, I will leave the site unless I absolutely have to register (for instance, if I am doing a website analysis for a client). So the first trap is failure to provide frustration-reducing instructions.

So I loved it when I hit a signup form on https://www.smartbizquiztribe.com/ and got this wonderful clear wording:

Security is important to us.
Password requirements: 8-20 characters long,
at least 1 uppercase, 1 lowercase character and 1 digit.

What I DIDN’T like: This was a link from a page of giveaways from various marketers. The page that got me to click was a page offering a free assessment tool. But when I clicked to the landing page, it was a 30-day free trial. I don’t see that as the same thing at all—and I lost enough trust that I refused to provide my information, walked away from the tool they were offering, and crossed them off the list of companies I might do business with.

1. Page failed to deliver what was promised
2. I don’t like giving my payment info when I’m not buying anything
3. I felt misled. I would never have clicked over if I’d known I had to subscribe to a paid service and then remember to cancel. My trust was gone and my time was wasted, and they lost any chance to make me a customer.

So even though I loved the way they did their password instructions, I was unhappy with the way this site took my time for granted and betrayed its promise. I lost trust and didn’t sign up. Betraying trust by delivering something different (and less than) you promised is Trap #2. Learn from their mistake!

Here’s the actual offer text that got me to click:

Free

Gift for Everyone

It’s a well-known truth that assessments and quizzes are SUPER-POWERFUL tools for growing your list and moving prospects to a YES! Smart Biz Quiz provides an automated assessment system that is revolutionizing the way coaches, trainers, speakers and consultants market their expertise online. From personalizing your communication, to increasing conversion from your one-on-one conversations, Smart Biz Quiz provides a new and innovative way to personalize your e-communication to double and even triple your conversion.
Value Each: $397 Quantity Available: UNLIMITED
Not a word about this being a one-month trial membership or about it not being a tool that the reader could use over and over.

Discover why Chicken Soup’s Jack Canfield, futurist Seth Godin, and many others recommend Shel’s 10th book, Guerrilla Marketing to Heal the World (and download a free sampler). Autographed and inscribed copies available.

Loonshots: How to Nurture the Crazy Ideas that Win Wars, Cure Diseases, and Transform Industries, by Safi Bahcall
What makes some “crazy” ideas take off and change the world, while others die a quiet, slow death? Bahcall, a physicist, biotechnologist, and former advisor on the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, spent years studying this phenomenon across disciplines, industries, and cultures—from ancient China, to the Islamic world of the Middle Ages, to the US military in WWII, to contemporary industries as diverse as pharmaceuticals, aviation, computing, and even entertainment. This fascinating and ambitious book is the result.
What he found (a small sampling; I took five pages of notes and even recommended it to Seth Godin, who had already read it):

• Successful “crazy” ventures nurture two very distinct, conflicting roles—and each requires a different structure and different governance. The “artists” are the dreamers and inventors who make the flying intellectual and intuitive leaps that turn 1+1 into much more than 2. But the “soldiers,” who bring the new discovery into the mainstream, are just as necessary.
• Famous loonshots are often product-focused. But strategic loonshots, like American Airlines’ early computerized reservation system or Walmart’s initial concentration on the small-town heartland, can be just as important.
• Artists and soldiers are in dynamic tension, rubbing up against each other with each side strengthening in some places while weakening in others—in a “phase shift” similar to the subtle changes in temperature and pressure that shift H2O molecules between solid (ice) and liquid (water) states, or between liquid and gas (steam). Change happens best when they’re both valued equally, separated, yet ideas can transfer back and forth (yes, the soldiers have plenty of ideas for the artists, because they test the concepts in the real world, where artists might not go). So, soldiers may respond better to a rigid chain of command, while artists need independence–but that independence is tempered by feedback from the soldiers.
• Forget looking at individual molecules in a phase shift; any molecule can shift frequently to either state. But in the aggregate, as the temperature cools, more molecules will “choose” the solid phase; as it warms, more will liquify. It doesn’t happen at once, which is why some parts of a pond or a puddle might be ice at temperatures above 32 degrees F (0 degrees C), while other parts (perhaps in direct sunlight) will be liquid even at 30 degrees F.
• It’s crucial to analyze WHY a system is generating successful loonshots—or why it’s failing.
• Differentiate between false and genuine fails (Friendster’s failure was not about social network unworkability, but about poor infrastructure; cholesterol-lowering statin drugs succeeded when the labs shifted their methodology).
• Organizations ossify from loonshot-incubators into franchise-maintainers (filming the next James Bond movie or releasing the next incremental software performance enhancement) because of multiple factors. But, potentially, we can prolong the loonshot phase. We humans can influence which actors are in which phase, by controlling factors such as the size of a working group (around 150 seems ideal) or whether political in-group maneuvering or pure innovation is rewarded.

Loonshots is well-written, well-researched, and quite provocative. With a release date of March 2019, you might be the first on your block to gain from Bahcall’s work (I read a prepublication copy). Oh, and read the endnotes, also fascinating.

About Shel
How can you profit by putting the VALUE in your VALUES? Shel Horowitz shows how to MONETIZE your organization’s commitment to fixing problems like hunger, poverty, war, and catastrophic climate change. Shel consults individually and in groups, gives presentations, and writes books and articles including Guerrilla Marketing to Heal the World (endorsed by Jack Canfield, Seth Godin and others).