Let's talk about usefulness
Do you own a Roomba? It's a robot and it moves around your floors and cleans them for you. Honestly, I have never heard anyone tell me they wanted to clean the floors more than doing something else. The usefulness of the Roomba is off the charts – specifically because you can do something different. Something you enjoy.
Today, after weeks of wondering where they were, I found my prescription sunglasses. Sunglasses, in and of themselves, are awesome. But prescription sunglasses – their usefulness might inspire you to write songs about them.
14 million folks, every year, can't be wrong when they purchase drip coffee makers. The fancy ones that get the coffee started before you wake up are likely your favorite, and I can understand why. If we're talking usefulness here, I know people that would put this at the top of the list.
I have a friend who loves coffee and he also loves Burt Reynolds. And you can't think of Burt Reynolds without thinking about CB Radios. Long before smart phones and even dumb phones, there were CB Radios. In 1977, the year of Smokey and the Bandit, over 20 million folks had CB licenses. That's some serious usefulness.
I could go on listing some of the 101 gadgets that changed the world. But we all know noise-canceling headphones would win – right? At least if I was the judge.
But my point isn't to review the items there or to pick a winner…
Instead, I'm sharing a strategy with you
Here's what I know. When stuff is truly useful, when it's incredibly awesome and I can't help myself, I talk about it. My reaction when I'm blown away by an object's usefulness is to:
- Tell as many people as I can about it
- Convince my friends they have to check it out
- Gift it to my closest friends so they can experience it too
Are you like me?
When you're blown away by something, what do you do?
And if you know this about yourself, and if I know this about myself, shouldn't we be putting this into practice across other parts of our lives – like our writing and blogs?
Instead of worrying about Promotion…
The internet is filled with articles that list the 7 ways to grow your email list. I had been thinking of writing mine.
And then I realized that most of what I'd share with you wasn't about promotion. It was simply about this one idea.
To blow people away with your usefulness.
So create incredibly useful content. Create guides, advice, and warnings that protect people and help people. Create the stuff people would gladly pay tons for. And share it. And as you do, as you blow people away, you'll notice they'll all react the same way:
- They'll tell as many people as they can about you
- They'll convince their friends they have to check you out
- They'll buy the things you are selling and gift it to close friends
Because that's what people do with stuff that's amazingly useful!