Learn something - read a book!
We are in the middle of one of our Marketing Mindset Group Coaching programmes at the moment. Following this week's session Sharon and I were talking and came to an important realisation. The internet is making us stupid!
OK that's not fair. It isn't making us stupid but what it is doing is making us superficially knowledgeable.
There is a huge amount of information on the internet. You can find out just about anything with a few clicks of a mouse. For any subject that piques your interest you will find that someone has written something about it. This is true for any subject but for us business people it's especially the case.
Does this availability of information really help us to understand better? I don't think it necessarily does and here's why:
- Credentials - we really have no way of knowing who is providing us the information. Anyone can create a website and call themselves a guru. They can easily talk about all the successes they've had and the people they've helped. They can even produce lots of glowing testimonials. But can we really be sure that they really know their stuff?
- Bite sized chunks - most content for the web is written to be punchy and short. This is because the reader is a) bombarded with lots of information and b) has a short attention span. Writers therefore have to capture attention really quickly and give people short answers. They can't hope to convey detailed information and analysis, explore the subtleties and truly educate the reader - there just isn't time!
- Hyperbole - part of capturing the attention means ratcheting up the hype. "Five killer marketing strategies to turbocharge your small business" is more likely to get hits than "Five marketing strategies that you might find fit your market and you are skilled enough to implement successfully." We end up reading something which makes big promises that it can never hope to deliver.
- Bait and hook - much of the business content on the web is there to help sell something be it product or service. The writer typically will discuss the "why" and the "what" but not the "how". If you want the "how" you need to buy the report or hire the consultant. The reader is left therefore knowing he should do something, maybe even knowing what he should do, but not knowing how to do it well!
The result of all this is that we learn loads of factoids, we can bluff our way around lots of subjects, but often we don't really understand them.
In our coaching sessions Sharon and I talk about theories, tools and techniques that we first learned by reading about them in books written by experts in their field. Detailed books that go through these subjects from soup to nuts. Through years of applying this knowledge we have refined our own skills to the point where, we like to think, we understand them really well.
This is a call then to close the browser, switch off the computer and curl up with a good book. As I've said in previous blogs there are no shortcuts, there is no secret sauce and there is no magic wand. If you want to get good at something you have to start with a good knowledge of the subject and you're unlikely to gain all of that knowledge from the internet.
Where do you start? Well, following our discussion the other day Sharon and I have pulled together a new page on our website where we have listed some of the books that we have really learned from. They are all books we have read, and we have given our own little review. They are not all for everyone but if you are interested in the subject then we think you will find them valuable and a good read. Here's a link and happy reading.
