When I first started blogging, I reached out to Chris Brogan, asking him for advice and suggestions on how to improve my blog. He not only replied and gave me good advice, he even made a post about my blog, giving me my first boost of subscribers. Since then, he’s continued to be really helpful in everything.

Just last week, I finally got a hold of Trey Lockerbie‘s EP. How did I get it? I emailed him asking him for it, basically saying that I wanted his EP, but it’s only available on the iTunes music store which is inaccessible from Singapore. Long story short, he left a copy of the CD at the hotel’s front desk last week when he stopped by Singapore for a show. I’ve always really loved Trey’s music since I first heard him a couple of years ago, but this brought my appreciation  (and fanhood) of him to a whole new level.

What am I getting at? Firstly, from an individual’s perspective. Don’t be afraid to ask for what you want. Your heroes are not always really that out of reach. More often than not, they’re happy to hear from you. Even business owners have said that what matters most to them is “customers who appreciate what we do.” Reach out, ask for what you need, and you never know, you might just get it.

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, for brands (both personal and corporate). How open are you to your customers? How approachable are you? Do you communicate with your customers, are you willing to help them when they reach out to you? Because you should. That little bit of approachability goes a long way.

Why? A number of reasons, but mainly because I feel I can relate to it. The story of the 4 kids, graduating from high school and going to college – and having to deal with all that comes with that transition, saying goodbye to friends, the uncertainty of the future, etc. That’s something I can relate to. Sure, it’s probably a lot more dramatized than anything I’ll ever live through in my personal life, but in general, it’s something that’s personally relevant to me.

Yes, objectively, it might not be the best show, nor the best season. It may not have the best visuals, or the best acting (as my friend puts it, the characters seem flat, etc). But it holds relevance to me, it’s something I feel I can relate to, and as such I like it a lot.

And the importance of that cannot be overemphasized, in my opinion. Personal relevance. No matter what your product is, personal relevance trumps general quality, in my opinion. That’s not to say that you create a crappy product. But once you’re past a certain treshold, once your product is “pretty good”, any increase in quality can be trumped by an increase in relevance.

The challenge is figuring out who you want to reach, and tailoring the story you’re telling – and no matter what you’re doing, you are always telling a story – to that audience. Not always easy to do, but there are great rewards in doing that.

How are you crafting your story so that your target audience can relate to it more?

Mitch Joel wrote about how “Results speak louder than words“. Valeria Maltoni says that “Actions speak louder than words“, and encourages us to “Teach. Lead. Learn. Love.”. Chris Brogan shared his goals for 2009, “to equip and build armies”, and “moving needles”.

Seeing a trend? I certainly am. I think this is the year where these things -social media, etc – are really going to start maturing. We (myself included, for sure) need to really start executing, and not just talking about all of these ideas. And not just executing, but executing with concrete, measurable results.

We need to start leading, and making things happen.

What can you make happen in 2009?

What’s my point in saying this? I’m not just trying to rant or defame her. But the point is this. At the risk of sounding harsh, people don’t care about what you want.

No matter who you are, that’s a fact. Most people aren’t going to care about what you want, as an individual, personal brand. It’s worse if you’re a company. People will care what you want only if you’ve built a reputation with them, such that they trust you and like you enough to care. But even then, the extent is limited, and you can’t push it too far.

It’s a relatively obvious lesson, I guess. But one that we often forget. In whatever we’re doing, whatever message we’re trying to spread, it’s not about what we want.

If you want people to listen, you can’t just be talking about what you want. You’ve got to give them what they want.

But anyway, back to this post. There’s a piano in the lounge here, at the dorm. And there a few people who play.

When the piano is being played, it’s very easy for the people around to just ignore it, and go on with their own activities and conversations. In fact, more often than not, that’s exactly what happens. People don’t notice the music from the piano.

When do people take notice? When it’s a song they know and like. It’s not how good the pianist is. No matter how good the song is, or how well the pianist is playing, people won’t take notice (not for long anyway), unless they can relate to it.

It’s a pretty obvious lesson. People will only bother about what they know and like – something that is personal to them and they can relate to. Everything else just fades into the background, as background music.

And the thing about background music is that, even if it’s good, most people just ignore it.

How do you prevent yourself and your message from fading into the background?

clipped from www.stoweboyd.com

So, my New Social App, open the door, invite me in, and tell me up front what you can do for me. But don’t forget to serve drinks and give me a friendly tour. If all you want is registered guests at your party, I’ll be there like every other edgling that gets an invite. But if you want more than zombies standing in the corner dribbling ice cream, make sure I know why your ice cream’s the best, show me the ropes, and make sure I’ve got a personal reason to stay and love you.

It’s a very important point that we often miss. And again, it’s a lesson that stretches beyond just social applications.

It’s not just about getting new people in – new customers for your product, new readers for your blog, etc. What you do after they’ve entered the door is just as – if not more – important.

When I first bought the case, the store owner demonstrated the case to me. How? He used one of his own store guitars, put it in the case and tossed it on the floor. Literally. Practically like how the airline people tend to toss luggages. And the guitar was perfectly fine.

That one demonstration went really far in my decision to buy that case. The fact that the store owner was willing to risk one of his own guitars to demonstrate the case (which was cheaper than the guitar, definitely) showed how much he believed in it. And it made me believe too.

Would you be willing to take that kind of risk for your product? How much do you believe in your product? How much would you risk for it? (For those thinking about your personal brands, substitute “product” with “beliefs”.)

Because if you don’t believe in it enough to take the risk, and believe in your product, your customers are much less likely to either.

Here’s the part of the post that really struck me, though.

clipped from sethgodin.typepad.com

Word processing didn’t work because it was typing but a little
cheaper. It worked because it was better than typing. Email didn’t work
because it was mail but a little faster. It worked because it was
fundamentally better than snail mail…

It’s not about improving performance. Just an improved performance will not be enough to make people want to use your product.

It’s about making something that’s fundamentally different. Something that’s better, that redefines what the task is. As Guy Kawasaki puts it, it’s about jumping to the next curve.

Merely providing better performance isn’t enough.

More than the customer service aspect of it, one thing that really struck me is this. With all the focus on online tools and Web 2.0 and all, it’s really easy to forget the basics – the offline things. Basic things like the sign on a door.

There’s so much talk about how companies should join the online conversation, create more engagement online, make their online tools more personal, etc. It’s easy to forget that for most companies, a large part of the customer experience is still the offline aspect.

It’s a simple thing. But one that we need to remember. As companies, or as individuals building our personal brands, even. We need to remember that there’s still an offline component. It’s easy to forget, especially when we make changes, because online is so much easier to change. It’s easier to change a website than to change the sign on a door. But they’re both just as important.

You’ve got to make sure that what you say and do offline matches what your behavior online. Not everyone’s going to check your website all the time.

Yes, the web allows you to spread your message further and establish your brand more. But your brand still exists offline. You’ve got to pay just as much attention to the offline experience.

There’s still an outside world that exists offline.

The beauty of Bug Labs, in my opinion, is this. It’s a tool that is inherently personal. It gives the user freedom to choose how they want to use it. By its very nature, it is customized, tailored to their own needs and wants.

When you provide a personal, customized solution – like Bug Labs has – you’re really likely to succeed.

It’s no longer about generic tools and services. It’s not about the mass anymore. It’s about the individual. It’s about being personal.

How can you make your product – or whatever you’re selling – more personal?