[Opinion] Marketing for the Peace Builder V

Focus group feedback is useful to the peace builder.

Here’s how you run one:

The peace builder, working with another party (typically the focus group moderator), puts together some questions in regards to a future product, a current problem, and the solution to both that is offered by the peace builder.

Then, the peace builder gets a room somewhere and invites some people—maybe five to ten—who are in the demographic that the peace builder wants to offer their services to.

Then, the peace builder orders some pizza, the moderator sits down with the focus group participants and asks them the series of questions that have been cobbled together. In addition, the moderator may coax information from focus group attendees through the use of open-ended questions.

The peace builder sits in the room, saying nothing, but taking notes and watching the attendees’ non-verbal reactions, listening to the moderator, and recording responses to the questions.

At the end of an hour, the attendees are thanked for their time, offered the opportunity to take advantage of the product, service, or process that they have been questioned about, and are sent home.

Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

The purpose of a focus group is three-fold:

To determine the reactions and responses of members of your target audience in a low-risk environment where they are rewarded for their participation.
To get feedback about the product, service, or process that the peace builder is developing through a process similar to an interview.
To collect the opinions from the focus group about the motivations of people who might actually use the peace builder’s product and to better understand how they perceive the utility of the product offering.

The savvy peace builder should be using focus groups before they launch workshops, seminars, training opportunities, books, curriculum, or any other product or process designed to appeal to a niche group of people. The savvy peace builder should avoid focus groups entirely when they are developing workshops, seminars, training opportunities, books, curriculum, or any other products or processes that have never been developed before, or which have been developed so long ago, that they have been forgotten almost entirely.

A warning though: Sometimes attendees fall into groupthink, peace builders and moderators, may fall prey to experimenter bias, issues of confidentiality around sensitive information in a group setting, and the fact that peace builders may cherry pick feedback to support a foregone conclusion.

-Peace Be With You All-

Jesan Sorrells, MA
Principal Conflict Engagement Consultant
Human Services Consulting and Training (HSCT)
Email HSCT: jsorrells@hsconsultingandtraining.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HSConsultingandTraining
Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/Sorrells79
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jesansorrells/

[Strategy] Creations of Commerce

By now, you already know that “Black Friday” and “Cyber Monday” are recent marketing creations, designed to get you to buy more, spend more, have more stress, engage in more consumption and to confuse “tradition” with moving money out of your possession and onto the bottom line revenues of brands.

We didn’t get here by accident though.

The human need to persuade, convince and to sell—and idea, a process, a service, a product—is so strongly embedded in human biology, psychology and even our spiritual DNA, that we have welcomed this change, from over 50,000 years of “not enough” to the last 100 years of “too much.”

We want to be sold and persuaded; but, we want to be persuaded and sold on the things that have meaning and mattering. This is why, even before commercial brands and corporations, there were empires, governments, and tribes. And, at a level even deeper than that, there are religions and belief systems that have toppled powerfully persuasive empires.

Which brings us to the reason for the season.

Meaning and mattering doesn’t come from buying one more item, no matter what the commercials tell you. Meaning and mattering doesn’t come from consuming one more meal, though the commercials will tell you this as well (it’s no surprise that gluttony and Thanksgiving have become closer commercial bedfellows in the last 20 years). Meaning and mattering doesn’t come from throwing away abandon and forgetting the old year and old mistakes and making resolutions that won’t be kept, because they’re too hard, too overwhelming, and too meaningless.

Meaning and mattering comes from remembering (and acting on) three core principles this holiday season:

Thanksgiving is a time for being grateful and seeking silence from the noise that doesn’t matter more so than for being gluttonous.
Christmas is a time for seeking redemption, giving the gift of forgiveness and seeking reconciliation with those who have harmed us, more than it is a Saturnalian bacchanal of commercialized shopping, glorious getting and begrudging giving.
New Years is a time for seeking resolution and closing the circle on gratefulness, remembering what we have gained in the previous year and looking forward with excitement to a new set of experiences, rather than a drunken brawl and a hangover riddled future.

Meaning and mattering.

Let’s focus on that this holiday season, rather than on the latest deal from the largest corporation.

-Peace Be With You All-

[Opinion] Marketing for the Peace Builder IV

There are three questions that the savvy peace builder should focus on when developing a marketing plan:

Whom do we serve?

This question can be answered with surveys and other formal and informal means. The question is not focused on the peace builder’s skill sets and where they’re comfortable. Instead the question focuses on the target audience for products, services, processes and philosophies. The question seems simple, but when the answer in the peace builder’s mind comes back as “everybody” there needs to be a deeper, more disciplined dive into the question from the target’s perspective.

Why do we serve them?

This question focuses on the four areas that many peace builders (and many entrepreneurs, business owners, and other self-starters) forget, because it is a question that delves into the culture of the marketing, the branding and the project that a peace builder wants to develop. The four areas are mission, vision, and goals. The mission describes what you want the project to accomplish, vision describes where you want the project to wind up, and goals describe the ways you will get there. The last area is the trickiest, because values—if only written down and not lived—can act as a boundary or act as rocket fuel. Either way, if they aren’t articulated, the peace builder may forget them and grab at whatever revenue generating idea comes along, in effect diluting their brand promise, distracting themselves, and ultimately going out of business.

How do we delight them?

This question really is the one that focuses on the savvy peace builder as a person who can delight, rather than as a widget (or a cog) in an industrialized, productized process. This is the question where the peace builder’s strengths, interests and passions can freely reign, to create a product, process, service or philosophy that the target market wants and that they can deliver successfully and generate revenues at the same time. Asking this question (and answering it well) can make all the difference between a peace builder who “burns out” after sustained people work, and the peace builder who stays engaged with learning and developing year-on-year.

Developing a marketing plan can seem like a waste of time, but answering these three questions places the core of the plan under the peace builder’s control and make the development process smoother. In addition, commitment, consistency and persistence become reinforced through an engaging plan for marketing peaceful solutions to conflicts.

-Peace Be With You All-

[Opinion] The Other 95%

The people who start a project and eventually have the ability to finish a project—whether it’s a project to build peace in their lives, their neighborhoods, their families or their organizations—are in the low numbers.

This is because starting is easy (we celebrate starting school, starting a new job, starting a marriage) and comes with great fanfare, but finishing is hard and comes with…somewhat less fanfare.

The numbers of people who start and then finish are staggeringly low:

95% of people never start anything. They are your traditional organizational followers, employees, managers and supervisors. They are useful for scaling the project, managing the tasks, keeping the project in a static place, and creating just enough friction to keep everything interesting.

5% of people are starters. They are the traditional entrepreneurs, founders, visionaries and they exist in all realms, from academia all the way to religion. They are the “ruckus makers,” the risk takers, the adventurers, the explorers and they are the ones that the 95% laud, but are also secretly envious of.

However, of the 5% who start a project, 99% of that 5% fail, and their definition of failure will vary along a continuum, extending from “The idea was too early” to “The idea was too late” and every gray area in between.

1% of the people who start a project, succeed to the end. Again, definitions of success will vary greatly along a wide continuum, but the people who built, explored, started and finished, have created the opportunities and spaces for the other 95% to succeed to their own level.

There’s a lot of talk about the gap between the “wealthiest 1%” and “the 99%” in America (and worldwide) these days. There’s a lot of concern that the gap will grow and millions of bytes of data are being created to cobble together arguments, theses, and proposals about what to do to “fix” this gap.

But the fact of the matter is, the gap that no one wants to address is the motivation gap—the gap that exists between the 95% who never start and the 5% who do. A gap in motivation, discipline, courage, acknowledgement, support, belief, discipline and drive.

And addressing the presence of that gap requires 100% of us to answer the question: “What motivates me to start, or not to start, the project I’ve been dreaming about?”

Only individuals can answer that question, person by person, quietly, deep in their own hearts.

-Peace Be With You All-

[Strategy] The Temptation at Mass

When you build a product, create a service or develop a process, the temptation (whether at scale or not) is to pursue the acceptance of the masses and be for everybody.

When building, (and planning to build) the discipline is to be targeted and to pursue the special and the narrow—the long tail in essence.

The primary drivers for pursuing the acceptance of the masses at scale are fear, desperation and greed:

For money
For prestige
For status
For power

The fact of the matter is, the myth of mass acceptance as being the “golden ticket” to profitability over the long-term has been exploded by the presence—and the influence—of the most dominate communication tool yes invented by man—the Internet. Sure, there will be blips of products, services, and process, that will appear to catch the masses attention, but in reality, the mass effect is dying a hard death. As audience attention becomes harder and harder to contain and obtain at mass, the benefits of a product, service or process being for “everybody” erodes under the weight of mediocrity, ineffectiveness and banality.

For the peace builder, if the processes, services, products, and philosophies that you provide are not for “everybody” in conflict, the real discipline is in developing your own emotional and psychological responses to what that means, and then methodically acting on them.

-Peace Be With You All-

[Opinion] Google for Podcasting

The rumblings have started through the podcast world, and the big players haven’t said (or written) anything about anything yet, but I’m sure there’s been all kinds of back end, off line chatter for months now. And, two days ago, Google announced that content creators of podcasts can get their shows listed in the Google Play Store.

There are several significant issues with podcasting, which have been addressed by writers here, here and here. The Google announcement (you can check out the link to the announcement page here and the interview they did with Libsyn (a podcast distribution company) here) while great in the light of Google discontinuing Google Listen in 2012, doesn’t answer how this new venture is going to significantly impact podcast content creators positively in two areas where they struggle:

Getting accurate audience analytics

and

Developing a strong marketing and branding process.

Let’s all be clear for those of you who consume, but don’t create, audio content:

Itunes and Apple doesn’t care about audio content (i.e. podcasters don’t get accurate download information and analytics on listeners (i.e. who’s listening when and through what device)) because Itunes and Apple don’t make any money off of downloads of podcasts.

Yet, Itunes is where most podcasts (even The Earbud_U Podcast) are located. Apple has ruled the roost for 10 years during this era of podcast creators struggling with inaccurate distribution metrics and having podcasters beg listeners to give review of podcasts in Itunes to demonstrate they are listening. And all this was happening while Google was busy developing life sciences projects and tanking Google+. This phenomenon of inaccurate analytic data also haunts how podcasters monetize what is still an expensive process for many content creators to start, while showing little traction (even less than starting a blog in some cases) early on in the production process. This combination of inaccurate analytics, the struggle to get traction and the lack of support from the larget distribution platform on the planet, leads many podcasts to be abandoned by frustrated creators.

Thus, the question: Is having a podcast in the Google Play Store going to improve the tracking and analysis of downloads and listeners for the benefit of podcast creators, in a way that Apple has caved on providing or developing?

In other words, by submitting to Google Play Store and Google Play Music, are podcast producers going to have access to the entire suite of Google products to track and monetize their downloads, i.e. have access to Analytics, Search, Google Ads (which Google promises not to put on top of creator owned content, or insert into content mid-show) and even Google My Business?

This leads to the second concern that wasn’t addressed in the interview that Google did with Libsyn: Branding for podcasting is all about getting the right audio content, at the right moment in front of the right listeners. This leads directly into the vagaries and complications of getting discovered through Google search, which to Apple’s credit, they have largely left up to the content creator to manage and struggle with. Most branding and marketing for podcast content is a shot in the dark, leaving many podcasters thinking that the best way to market is as an “always on, always downloadable” piece of content; and then, to go off and make content in other areas, bringing those audiences over to the podcast from platforms that have nothing to do with podcasting. A lot of these decisions are based on how Google manipulates its search algorithm in relation to podcast content in particular and audio content in general. There’s no “You Tube” for audio content.

The question then is: If a large podcast creator whose content already generates 10 million downloads a month (i.e. Serial, This American Life, The Adam Carolla Podcast, The Jay Mohr Podcast, The Marc Maron Podcast and on and on) is going to be ranked at the top of a Google search in Google Play Music (where they dominate without being listed in Google Play Music currently) how does that impact who gets listed highly in the Google Play Music library for listeners?

And then, what is going to happen to the searchability of the content of the mid-range folks (people like Arel Moody and The Art of the Charm Podcast–among others) who already are struggling to market themselves and rank as highly as the big players?

And then, where do smaller podcasters (like The Earbud_U Podcast, The Launch to Greatness podcast, Grammar Girls, and others) whose content doesn’t rank highly in their own niches (or who are having to partner with other podcasters to form networks (like The Rainmaker Platform, Relay.FM and others), because audio content consumption hasn’t happened yet at mass in their niches?

Google moving into the space of promoting podcasts in their store is interesting to me as a podcast creator, in the same way that IHeart Radio partnering with podcasters and Spotify also partnering is interesting to me. None of these moves take away the core responsibilities of the content creators, which is to create an engaging, interesting and motivating platform and then to create audio content on top of it.

In the future, as more and more marketers, organizations and brands discover the power of the spoken word, I predict a time when all of the branded, walled garden, distribution players (don’t be surprised if in three years Facebook announces it will launch a search service for podcasts) will seek to bend the arc of engaging content creation (and content creators) in their direction. This might be good for the field of podcasting (which is still niche at around 200,000 podcasts compared to 1.5 million blogs) but the audiences are growing, slowly, niche by niche.

And don’t worry. I already got Earbud_U approved to be in the Google Play Store, and I’ll let you know when it goes live.

-Peace Be With You All-

[Opinion] Leadership Through Doing “Things That Don’t Scale”

There are “things that don’t scale” many organizations avoid doing (or abandon outright), when they reach a certain size.

Leaders in those organizations (who may have begun bravely desiring to commit to doing those things) abandon the “things that don’t scale” as other interests begin to attract their attention (see Google’s recent troubles here) and as other constituencies demand attention (see Twitter’s recent issues with investors here). Then there’s the issue of organizational gravity and 747’s.

The human touch is always one-to-one RT @sorrells79: Leadership Through Doing “Things That Don’t Scale” https://t.co/0OehLo17i5

— Liz Kislik (@LizKislik) October 29, 2015

There are three areas organizational leaders begin with enthusiasm and personalization, but then abandon later when the organization scales:

Customer service: Many organizations say that the end user, the customer, the audience member, the fan, the follower, the client, is the one that they serve, and when they are small enough and scrappy enough, they do exactly that. But at scale (and as they transition into being an incumbent in the market), the customer gets lost in the shuffle and it becomes harder and harder for an organizational leader to make the decision about whom they serve, and then to serve them in the same way they used to.

Conflict management: At scale, conflict management becomes a rote, human resource department driven process, separated from the people who are impacted by the conflicts, disputes and disagreements, and the leaders who can successfully resolve them. This is why human resource departments don’t exist in small businesses, start-ups and other organizations smaller than 50 or so individuals. There, the leader does the resolution, as a chieftain of old would, but above that, the effects of Dunbar’s Number kick in and the organizational leader doesn’t have the attention, time or energy (read “bandwidth”) to address or manage all conflict scenarios all the time.

Marketing efforts: At scale, marketing falls into the same trap as conflict management does. More for less becomes the credo, and what used to be innovative, connecting marketing efforts, becomes bogged down in micromanaging, preening and office egos. What used to be sounding boards become echo chambers and marketing efforts are viewed increasingly as a “nice-to-have” rather than as an integral part of the organizational message.

The way to resolve issues in all of these areas is not to ask the question “Well, do we grow or not?” and then try to either stifle growth or to just let growth happen.

The way to resolve issues in these three areas is to have a steady, continuously reinforced sense of organizational culture, organizational focus, and organizational energy.

Then, the leader has only one question to answer in each area every single day, and the question has “yes” or a “no” answer: Does the action I am about to lead on for this organization match up with our culture, focus and energies?

Acting on “things that don’t scale” by answering that question with either a “yes” or a “no”, opens the door to delight organizational customers, end users, clients, advocates, fans, followers and so many others. Make no mistake: it requires leadership courage to stick to performing in the areas that don’t scale, to keep doing them well, and to keep the employees and others performing them, reigned in.

Otherwise, the “things that don’t scale,” but do delight, are the very things that, when abandoned, will surely lead to organizational death.

-Peace Be With You All-

[Opinion] Ok…So Ad Blocking is Here…

Ok…so ad blocking is here….

From browsers to mobile hardware, the drive is on (whether from the creators of ad blocking software or just from us all talking about it now) to empower consumers of content to block advertising they don’t want to see via software based means. This advertising, small and large web publishers argue, is part of a fundamental principle of mass media, going back at least a century. The principle comes down to a deal, which—like many deals—can be renegotiated and changed to reflect shifting values and principles:

We (web publishers) create content without charging you for the creation of that content, and in exchange you (the content consumer) give us attention and we charge a third party, the advertiser, to put ads in front of, and around, our content.

This same deal drove the development and growth of platforms, such as television, radio and newspapers, and the development and growth of content on those platforms, for the last 100 years.

But, the Internet was supposed to be a different content delivery platform.

Right?

Apparently not.

Now, consumers—instead of just choosing to ignore interruptive ads like they always have (and because measuring audience engagement is difficult (but not impossible) there are more intrusive, interruptive ads, not less)—content consumers are choosing to block everything.

Seth Godin wrote with hope fifteen years ago about permission marketing. Cory Doctorow writes with abandon about the anarchy of the web. But both of those writers and thinkers assume a fundamental point about most content, whether it’s on the internet, on the radio, on television, or in a magazine or newspaper, that must be written down and repeated out loud:

Most content on any platform isn’t good enough, interesting enough, relevant enough or entertaining enough, to act as the glue binding the audience of content consumers to the content creators in a “revenue for value” exchange based relationship.

This is why there are millions and millions of cat and baby videos on Youtube, but only a few breakout “stars.” This is why Vogue magazine (or Burberry on Instagram) will be fine with ¾ of their magazine content (or their social distribution feed) being ad space, but Mother Jones or The National Review might just wither and die with ad blockers. This is the reason there are 152 million blogs on the Internet, publishing 1.3 million pieces of content a day, but no blogger has risen to dominance on the web in 15 years.

Thus advertising.

There are a few ways out of this bind, but before we get to that, the question of “What kind of internet do we want to have?” must be answered. We (and we are including ourselves in this group as a content consumers) have not answered this question in any kind of meaningful way. Content consumers have to be a part of the conversation before the endpoint of plopping and advertisement in front of our eyes is reached. Content consumers (to build trust and get their permission) have to be engaged in the building, creating and disseminating of a product from start to finish—or not at all.

The first way out of this bind is by crowdsourcing content development. There are some sites on the web that do this well; there are many more that do it badly, or not at all. Crowdsourcing journalism, entertainment, and other forms of content may lead to less ad blocking—and higher revenue—rather than more by content consumers who feel emotionally invested in the product.

The second way out of this of this bind is by creating more subscription-based platforms. For subscriptions to work, there must be a consideration (and a careful one at that) by the web publisher about what kind of content is being created. Long tail philosophy should be ruling with brand-based content, but many are still stuck in the 1950’s. By the way, this is the only way that data gathering, analytics and implementation based on the data is useful as a tool for content creators and publishers, as well as the incorporation of micropayments via cryptocurrencies. Don’t believe me? Ok. What’s in your Netflix queue right now? And have you paid for a reSnap recently?

The third way out of this of this bind is by rethinking distribution systems. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and even Google and Apple are going to war with each other to decide who controls the ad space of the mobile phone screen and the app walled garden. This war has to be fought (I guess) but thinking of these platforms less as content delivery systems, and more as content broadcast systems, would free many creators from the false choice of “Do I or don’t I put an ad in front of my content?” Email and RSS feeds circumvent broadcast systems and go directly to the audience content creators want. This is also the reason that creators on Meerkat and Periscope who are live streaming events (and their lives) are going to have trouble monetizing their content if the platform ever has to respond to the vicissitudes of Wall Street shareholders.

The fourth way out of this bind is by rethinking all the assumptions underpinning the web. The Internet has moved over the last 25 to 30 years, from being a niche communication channel to a worldwide, glorified telecommunications delivery system. What if the Internet shifted from being a global mass bullhorn, to being an individualized, personalized content delivery system? Mobile phone, tablet and app development is pushing the Internet in the direction of this development, but frankly, not far enough. Which is where blockchain technology really comes to the forefront.

The fifth way out of this bind is for content creators to make conscious choices—and stick to them—about how and where to monetize their content with ads. We are not naïve enough to think that advertising will disappear; there were ads broadcasting the services of prostitutes painted on the walls of buildings in Pompeii and Ancient Rome. However, when everyone can publish (but not everyone will publish) everyone has the choice to run a Google ad (or not) in front of specific content, they produce. We run ads in front of The Earbud_U Podcast, but not on the HSCT #Communication Blog, for a reason.

Ad blocking will not be the end of Internet publishing, nor will it serve as the death knell for advertising on the Internet. By defaulting to the opposite of these five alternatives to advertising on the Internet, many content creators will wither away, and die, on the web.

-Peace Be With You All-

[Advice] Live Streaming for Peace Sakes!

Live streaming video apps such as Periscope, Meerkat, Blab.im and many others are hot right now.

As part of the long unwinding of television as a content delivery mechanism, they are a way for audiences to feel primacy at a live event as well as to feel as though they are a part of the event.

We quoted Woody Allen in a previous post, who said, “The audience has to know that they are the audience,” but with the advent of streaming and the rise of streaming personalities who blur the line between performer and engager this may no longer be true.

The real core of streaming is co-creation: Streaming video gives the audience the opportunity to create—along with the performer—a shared experience and produce shareable content for a micro audience. This is why sporting events have reflexively banned live streaming apps from their venues (MLB, NHL, US Open, etc.) and why concerts are thinking about it as well.

There are two things for the peacebuilder to consider when using mobile live streaming apps to build their marketing:

Conflict engagement is all about co-creating solutions to the issues, concerns and conflicts at hand with the parties. Many peacebuilders take this to mean that they fade into the background inside of the conflict process itself, allowing the parties the autonomy to do as they will to get to resolution. However, when the peacebuilder (with the participants consent) live streams the proceedings, then everybody involved attains a level of micro-celebrity.
Conflict engagement is also about being open with processes and procedures in order to educate and edify not only the participants, but also the public (the audience) at large. One of the reasons that many peacebuilder’s struggle with marketing and sales, is that both of these areas require openness and transparency around the product—peoples’ problems—in order to get more people into the room to solve their problems. This creates a level of vulnerability in the peacebuilder with which many professionals struggle. Live streaming used as a way to create “scheduled, must see viewing” opportunities (think of Oprah or Dr. Phil) creates more opportunities for vulnerability for the peacebuilder, not less.

Content co-creation with parties, audiences and peacebuilders is one of the many ways that live streaming video applications can advance the fields of peace, and bring more people into the engagement space around conflicts in their lives.

-Peace Be With You All-

Jesan Sorrells, MA
Principle Conflict Engagement Consultant
Human Services Consulting and Training (HSCT)
Email HSCT: jsorrells@hsconsultingandtraining.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HSConsultingandTraining
Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/Sorrells79
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jesansorrells/

[Strategy] Does Book Writing Still Matter?

Do books, and book writing, still matter?

In a world of free written content, indexed by Google and accessed by billions of people with Internet or mobile access, and a few keystrokes, what significance could writing a book possibly retain?

Let’s relate two stories that partially answer both questions:

I was at a conference earlier this summer at which I was the lunch keynote speaker. I had arrived early and was talking to the vendors who had lined up outside the hall to sell their products, services and processes to the attendees of the conference.

I stopped at several of the tables and eventually ended up engaging in a conversation with a sales representative from a company that specializes in engagement and recognition, two areas that I believe are critical to developing employees and keeping them at work.

In the course of the conversation, the person to whom I was talking mentioned that her organization had written a book about the core of their company’s focus and she wanted to give me a copy of the book.

Her assistant went to her car and 10 minutes later, I had the book (a hardcover) in my hands. I looked down at it and turned it over. Then I asked “How much do I owe you for this?” She looked at me and started laughing and said “Don’t worry, I’ve got an entire case of these books in the back of my car.”

The book—all that research, content, packaging, distributing, publishing and marketing—was $25.00.

In the second story, I was talking with a friend and colleague of mine in another industry. He and I were having lunch and discussing many topics, and in the course of our conversation, I brought up the fact that he recently had a book published. The topic of his book is on leadership and it represents his second book in several years.

He talked about how he was struggling to get attention for the book’s topic and how he had only sold one book at the time that we were talking (hopefully, by this point he’s sold a few more, but I haven’t followed up with him lately).

His book is around the same price point $25.00 as the hardcover book in the previous story, but he’s also offering workbooks, e-pamphlets and other “freebies” to sweeten the deal and make the price point more palatable. After all, there are hundreds of books on leadership published every year.

Do books, and book writing, still matter?

Some stats that show that it does. In the first half of 2014, books sales were up by 4.9% over 2013, accounting for $5,023,800 with adult nonfiction accounting for $3,310,600 of that total. [link here] In the business area, where leadership, engagement, employee motivation and entrepreneurship make their mark, there were 16, 604 [link here] books sold in 2014, up by 7% over the previous year.

In the year 1440, the printing press was invented and Johannes Gutenburg could barely monetize it, dying broke and forgotten until he was remembered almost 100 years later.

Why bring Gutenburg up?

History is littered with the bodies of failed inventors who were either too early with their innovations, too late with advocating for their work, or who got greedy, got in bed with the wrong people and died thinking of themselves as broken failures. That probably won’t happen to Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, or Sergey Brin and Larry Page, but books matter, because, after 600 years, we have finally gotten the format, the feel and look of book right. We have figured out how to monetize it and the technology to make it, sell it, market it and distribute it has experienced global, explosive exponential growth.

Authors (and many potential authors) hold the internet, content creation, free online content, and e-commerce responsible for the overall reduction in the number of book sales. Our new technology and delivery systems are blamed for the difficulty that many authors (in unpopular or “boring” genres) have in marketing and selling their books to niche audiences. Finally, the development of the social web and digital distractions on a platform initially dominated by the presence of the written word, is credited for the loss of concentration and focus that audiences appear to have in an age where the greatest product of the printing press seems to be being supplanted.

Do books, and book writing, still matter?

The savvy conflict engagement professional should write, because content matters. But the kind of writing that is done for a blog (like this one) does not have to differ entirely from the kind of writing that would be in a book, or even an e-book. The frustration comes with the fact that the categories in which peacebuilding has its roots (psychology, business, sociology, legal), have never been “bestseller” categories for the general, book buying public. The other frustration for peacebuilders comes in the fact that we are, at a human level, transitioning from one technology (printing press) to another technology (the Internet) and the rules are not set, as they will be 600 years from now.

Book writing still matters for the peacebuilder, but there are three suggestions for moving forward:

Write for a narrow niche and deepen it through working with your network that you have built offline and online. Selling a few hundred copies of a book through connections and networks is possible in a world of fractured attention spans. However, without writing for a narrow niche, all the giveaways and sweeteners won’t move units.
Use the disciplines that you’ve developed through writing blog posts, engaging with social content, creating marketing efforts and connecting with people, to sell your book. This is the most daunting piece of the process. It is like having a small start-up inside the business you’re already developing.
Set your expectations for what “success” or “failure” looks like for you. The savvy peacebuilder is savvy because they set their expectations around outcomes at a level that matches the length of their network reach. If you have worked for 4 years to build a network of 1300 people on Twitter, and you know that only 40 of those people are in the market for your book, Twitter may not be the tool to use to promote your book. However, if you only want to sell 40 books, those 40 followers may be your best customers.

Do books, and book writing, still matter?

Yes. Now more than ever.

-Peace Be With You All-