It’s easy to sit in a meeting room on a Friday afternoon and say, “I don’t think we need to reinvent the wheel here”.
It’s much harder to say, “It’s going to involve working through the weekend, but let’s step back and see if we can be genuinely creative, and come up with an idea that really is new and interesting.”
In other words, the decision not to reinvent the wheel is the easy way out. It’s the lazy way out. It means you can stop thinking, stop worrying about making a mistake, and grab a “proven process” off the shelf.
It’s also a first-class ticket to mediocrity.
Beware anyone who tempts you with a “proven process” or an easy “success formula”.
I’m not saying you should totally ignore what you see and learn. Not at all. Find out what has worked well for other people. Learn from their successes.
But if you simply sit back and copy what others have done, you’ll be very unlikely to achieve any real results for yourself.
OK, let me get off my soap box for a minute and invite you to watch this video. It’s not long, and I think you’ll enjoy it.
It’s a cover of Gotye’s song “Somebody That I Used To Know”, played by the band, Walk Off The Earth.
Walk Off The Earth is an unsigned band from Burlington, Ontario, Canada.
They are not famous. At least, they weren’t.
But this video has been seen over 40 million times. So I guess they are pretty famous now. They were even invited to repeat their performance on the Ellen show.
So how did they do so well with this video, which was recorded in one of their homes?
Sure, it’s a great song. Yes, they played and sang it well.
But that isn’t enough. Plenty of people and bands play and sing well.
What made this video go viral was a phrase that caught people’s attention.
Here it is: Five people play one guitar.
Just five words.
And no, I don’t think the band sat around thinking up a cool “sound bite”. Someone else did that.
But what the band did was have an original idea – an idea that enabled that sound bite.
Their idea was to perform a song with the entire band all playing on the same guitar at the same time.
Has anyone else done that? Not that I know of. It was an original idea. And it could have fallen flat. And I’m sure they had no idea that 40 million people would watch their video.
The point here is they didn’t just copy what other bands had done. They didn’t use a proven “success formula”. And I’m pretty sure they hadn’t just downloaded “Proven Marketing Tips for Indy Bands.”
In short, they reinvented the wheel.
As a freelancer or solopreneur, you can take the same road. Read less about what others have done to market their businesses, and spend more time thinking of something original, and hopefully a little crazy.
That’s what gets you noticed.
About the author: Nick Usborne is an online writer, copywriter, author and coach. Read more…
Love the band and the music – and your point is well taken!