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If you want to drive your organization to a higher level of success, here’s a word of advice: set some ambitious goals. No one ever unlocked the leadership capabilities, creativity and passion of their employees by asking for modest gains. Unfortunately in our “prove-it-before-you-do-it” ROI world, some organizations limit risk-taking and inadvertently penalize those who consistently think outside the box. The result is an organization as demoralized as it is bored.

In advertising, this propensity can be deadly. The best advertising people thrive on risk-taking because that’s where the big breakthroughs live. And breakthrough advertising helps build brands and profits. When the pressure to limit risk and drive down costs is overwhelming, it shows in safe, lackluster work.

Lou Tice, personal coach extraordinaire, reminded Seattle’s downtown Rotary last month that setting unrealistic, audacious goals actually increases the likelihood that the goal will be achieved. This may sound counterintuitive, but it’s actually good common sense. Those who set small goals never stretch and grow. So sacred cows thrive, people stay in their comfort zones, the quality of their work suffers, and they influence others to underachieve. Conversely, when people set outlandish goals, the only way they can achieve them is by changing the way things are done, moving into a new zone where innovation can flourish, and turning sacred cows into hamburger.

One of the most dramatic examples of the benefits of setting big goals can be found right here in Seattle. Several years ago, City Librarian Deborah Jacobs and Executive Director of the Seattle Public Library Foundation Terry Collings decided to dream big. In what became the “Libraries for All” initiative, her team set about rebuilding the entire public library system here in Seattle. Not content with providing a much-needed facelift to the facilities, they wanted to show the world that Seattle was serious about opening our doors to anyone who was hungry for information. Reaching this goal required better facilities, more resources for books and programs, and innovative thinking about the role of the library in the digital age.

An amazing thing happened. Their goal was so breathtaking, and the leadership so resolute about achieving it, that momentum started to build. In 1998 Seattle voters approved a $196.4 million bond measure, the largest library bond measure in American history. This funded construction of the new library buildings. Private support flowed into the foundation as momentum built and this provided much needed support to buy books and expand programs. As an icon of this bold, new initiative, the foundation hired the controversial Dutch architect, Rem Kulhaus, to design what has since become the new Central Library, a building universally lauded for both its architectural merit and for bringing the library into the 21st century.

When the Central Library opened, The New York Times architectural critic wrote: “At a dark hour, Seattle’s new Central Library is a blazing chandelier to swing your dreams upon. If an American city can erect a civic project as brave as this one, the sun hasn’t set on the West. In more than 30 years of writing about architecture, this is the most exciting new building it has been my honor to review. I could go on piling up superlatives like cars in a multiple collision, but take my word: there’s going to be a whole lot of rubbernecking going on.”

Today, every single community library in the Seattle system is being renovated or rebuilt.
And I’m sure it’s no coincidence that in 2005 we were named the “most literate city in America” by an annual Central Connecticut State University study.

Most people involved in this monumental accomplishment consider it a career-crowning achievement. It started as a goal that seemed too big to achieve, but teamwork, tenacity and out-of-the-box thinking brought this bold idea to its unabashed triumph.

With its unrelenting focus on ROI, corporate America may be crushing the kind of innovation that built our new Central Library. And what is particularly ironic is that bold action often provides a better ROI in the long term than a so-called safer approach. That’s why it’s incumbent upon those of us in advertising and marketing to make the case for risk-taking. We need to push back on the money people and request budgets that allow for innovation, and even the occasional failure. The more conservative, risk-averse philosophy may look sensible, but an approach that guarantees conventional thinking, bland solutions, and modest returns is far from it.

Bill Fritsch is president of Hydrogen Advertising, an award-winning, Seattle-based advertising agency emphasizing superb ideas efficiently produced. Reach him at 206-389-9500, ext. 224 or email bill@hydrogenadvertising.com. For more information, visit http://www.hydrogenadvertising.com.

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If you spend even a dime of your budget on “image” advertising, then this article will show you why you’re throwing your money away, and what you can do instead to double — even triple — your sales in the next 30 days or less.

I want you to imagine two door-to-door sales reps starting their first day on the job. They both work for the same company, sell the exact same product and are in virtually identical neighborhoods selling their widgets. The only difference between the two is the way they go about selling their product.

The first sales rep (we’ll call him Sales Rep #1) goes around the neighborhood he is working wearing a fancy suit and driving around in a flashy car with his company’s logo, slogan and website address written all over it. He just drives around the neighborhood all day. Never stopping at any houses and never talking to anyone on a personal level.

The other sales rep (we’ll call him Sales Rep #2), on the other hand, does the exact opposite. He has neither a nice looking suit or flashy car. In fact, his suit is 30 years old, his pants are too short and his car is so old and beaten up, it has a coat hanger as an antenna.

And so he has no choice but to “slug it out” door-to-door and face-to-face, knocking on every door, wedging his foot inside every time the door opens, giving his pitch, telling his story and making his case one house at a time. Eventually stopping at each house in the neighborhood.

Now, really, if your life was on the line, and you HAD to pick which of the two sales reps will make the most money — who would you stake your life on?

Sales Rep #1 in the fancy car driving around randomly and not knowing if anyone is even noticing or listening to him? Or Sales Rep #2, who may not be the best-kempt fellow in the world, but who goes door-to-door making his full pitch (and actually asking for the sale) one house at a time?

Here’s the point: Image advertising, slogans, fancy logos and relying on technology to make the sale for you is no different than what Sales Rep #1 does. It’s expensive, useless and even obnoxious in some cases.

On the other hand, using the tried and true methods of direct response advertising, finding your prospects, getting their attention, telling your story and asking for the sale — while not sexy — has much bigger “teeth.” It will also make you a lot more money, and will put you head and shoulders above your richer, fancier and more technlogically savvy competitors every single time.

Ben Settle is an expert copywriter and direct marketer. If you liked this article then check out Ben’s website at http://bensettle.com — where you’ll find over 500 pages of advertising ideas, strategies and tactics just like this one — as well as rare swipe file ads and hot marketing information not easily found anywhere else.

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