It’s true confession time. I’ve tried to be honest with you, Constant Listener, for the four years that I’ve been posting this podcast. Most of you know me fairly well by now, but there is one little secret that may not have been revealed. People my age should be spending time at the local funeral home selecting which casket they would like for their final resting spot or attending a tasting at the assisted living center down the street to learn the consistency of their tapioca pudding.
Instead, I was glued to my couch on Sunday night during the Kansas City Chiefs and New York Jets game. No, I didn’t have any money on the game. No, none of my fantasy players were in the lineup. I was watching to get just one good glimpse of Taylor Swift in the luxury box cheering for her new man, Travis Kelce.
Now you know. I’m a Swiftie. I’m a Swiftie! Criticize me all you want. Players gonna play, play, play. And Haters gonna hate, hate, hate. I’m just gonna shake, shake, shake, shake, shake. Shake it off.
But you may not know why I’m a Swiftie. Sure, Taylor’s an icon, she is really gorgeous, writes catchy pop music and has an infectious laugh. The real reason I’m a Swiftie? This woman knows how to influence businesses.
Welcome to Swimming in the Flood; a podcast where we develop the resilient leader’s mindset by navigating difficult currents in business. My name is Trent Theroux.
At the age of 11, Taylor went to Nashville, knocking door to door, asking record labels to listen to her karaoke records. She didn’t get any takers, so she picked up a guitar and learned that to improve her product. Taylor then started writing her own songs and two years later, her original music helped her secure a record deal.
Convincing people to listen and purchase your material is a whole different animal. During her first radio show tour, she was about to go on a California station called “K-Frog.” Taylor played a short riff from the single “Tim McGraw” she was promoting. The song lyric goes, “someday you’ll turn your radio on.” Instead, Taylor sang it, “someday you’ll turn K-Frog on.” And it worked! The radio station gave that song regular air play, and it gave Taylor a significant boost. Then, during a commercial break, Taylor alerted fans on Myspace (Myspace – wow). She alerted fans that she was on K-Frog. The station’s phone likes flooded with calls thanking them for playing Taylor’s music.
Taylor used her nascent, but growing, fan base to influence K-Frog into putting Taylor into the regular rotation.
I am now going to give you my unscientific, non-peer reviewed, resilient leader theory on finding your path. Are you ready? Got your pencils out? Here’s it is. Influence Your Market. You heard it. Influence Your Market. The theory is simple. Here it is.
A good friend named Paul opened a poke restaurant last year in Wilmington, North Carolina. Poke for those who have not tried is a Hawaiian culinary tradition that serves raw seafood with vegetables and a sauce. Now, the restaurant business is a tough business. 60% of restaurants fail in the first year.
Paul’s restaurant is named Pipeline Poke. Pipeline was recently coming up to its one-year anniversary. Sales were increasing at a moderate rate, but the restaurant still had plenty of capacity to serve more customers. That’s when they contacted Lauren’s Suitcase. They didn’t actually contact a suitcase. Lauren’s Suitcase is the handle for Lauren Jackson. She’s an influencer. Lauren’s Suitcase has the ability to influence potential buyers of a product or service by promoting or recommending the items on social media. Pipeline invited Lauren to come on down and sample some healthy, fresh authentic Hawaiian treats.
To be fair, Lauren does not come to restaurants out of the goodness of her heart. It’s a business. It’s a business to persuade other people to come try your business. Pipeline made a date with Lauren, and she surfed on over for a Big Kahuna bowl. Over the next hour, Lauren sampled several dishes and videotaped herself eating, along with her friend eating. That night she edited the video and promptly released it on Instagram.
The results were immediate. The 15-second video played at 1.25x speed, which gave it a real sense of urgency. Within minutes of its release, Pipeline’s social media outlets were receiving engagements. It’s no different than Taylor posting on MySpace (MySpace, c’mon). Taylor posting and fans calling into a radio station.
The power to influence a market is powerful and one that takes considerable effort to cultivate. Each influencer needs to make strong, powerful choices about how they want to move the market lest they alienate their followers. In the article “The Psychological Strategies of Influencers”, by Manfred Kets de Vries, he writes,
Establishing credibility becomes an indispensable requirement for being an effective influencer. Nathalie had developed a deep understanding of fashion, was authoritative in the matters she discussed and, as a result, her followers trusted her recommendations. This is because people are conditioned to follow individuals they view as authority figures, believing them to possess reliable and accurate information.
Influencers build personal connections with their audiences, almost bordering on a kind of “pseudo-intimacy”. Nathalie utilised every aspect of her personality to connect directly with her followers, inviting them in with strong eye contact, sharing personal photos and videos and promptly responding to their reactions and comments. By relating to her audience in this way, Nathalie presented herself as more relatable and approachable than celebrity influencers.
Folks, thank you for listening to Swimming in the Flood. Resilient leaders face challenging currents, and it is tough navigating, but with one tack or another we can get there together.