The Virtuous Cycle of Attention and Trust
I like to think of myself as a student that not just learns by consuming content but applies that learning in some way. When I hear valuable ideas I incorporate them into my life and give them a chance to blossom.
Some of my best habits have come from doing just that, like the daily use of the Pomodoro Technique or the self improvement app chains.cc. More recent examples include reading an article about The Meditation Technique Hidden in Kung Fu Panda 3 and immediately applying it to my daily routine. I also took a snippet from this article about writing your goal in the present tense 15 times a day. It’s like kids who get in trouble and have to write on the chalk board repeatedly. It simulates auto-suggestion — the process of influencing the subconscious mind. Today I saw another valuable piece of content that I plan on adopting.
Enter Seth Godin and Gary Vaynerchuk.
This video brings so much value that if you stopped reading my article and watched this video instead, I wouldn’t mind. But for the sake of this article I’m concerned with the portion (starting at 6:45) that deals with this question:
Seth’s reply:
The currencies of anybody who wants to make change happen right now are attention and trust, and they are in a virtuous cycle. You don’t get attention unless you are trusted and you don’t get trusted unless you get attention… The question then is how do you get there? I think you get there by being generous. — Seth Godin
I agree 100%. Being generous up front matters in a world where everyone wants to take. But how can a laundry company be generous? What sort of gifts can I possibly give, and to whom?
My business is not such that I can hand out free samples. Each laundry service trip has a lot of expenses involved. I could give away something other than laundry service but what? And how would that translate into earning trust?
I prefer free samples of my actual service. I think the best way is to give out free samples to influencers in the marketplace. Since my business is local I think my best bet is to reach out to local celebrities, social blogs, and marketers. Some of them actively seek out partnerships. My goal is to reach out to several in the next few weeks and offer our services to them for free, expecting nothing in return. I’m going to set aside a budget to do this, and begin reaching out through email and social media.
This is not just a quest to get customers. It is a long term strategy of building relationships in this new city, one person at a time.
To Do List Update
- Document the back-end process from order to delivery including calendar.
- Create Welcome Packages for new customers.
- Report New Employee Hire (myself) to the Texas Workforce Commission.
- Write a template email for reaching out to influencers to offer free service.
- Send out emails to influencers.
- Obtain health insurance.
- Obtain workers comp insurance.
This story is part of a series documenting the journey of a 2016 Dallas startup called Feather. For your reference here is the Table of Contents for the series.
Previous Story: The Search for Customer #1
Next story: Customer Lifetime Value
Want to follow along? Feather is everywhere!
