A conversation with Simon Sinek
I've mentioned Simon Sinek's name several times in previous blog entries - his talk I heard him give at a recent conference I attended made a definite impact on how I look at marketing, business, and just relationships in general. I was both surprised and impressed that he took the time to give me a call after I had sent him an e-mail about a month back. He called me this morning and we had nice half-hour chat about branding, his Golden Circles, why companies fail, among other things.
One of the topics that struck me this morning was one of "discipline" - the discipline to keep your company focused on the "why" of what they do. We talked about how a lack of this discipline can cause many companies to eventually fail. He brought up an interesting example of a man with tremendous discipline - Craig Newmark, the founder of Craig's List. Craig is a huge advocate of making the internet free to use for all. I did some research and Craig's List does between $10-20 million dollars worth of business a year with 19 employees. Using a formula used to value eBay, it has been estimated that Craig's list is worth between $1 and $2.4 billion dollars. I saw another article that had it valued at about $5 billion dollars. Yet, Craig Newmark refuses to sell the site as he wants to ensure that the majority of the site remains free (apparently there is a small charge for job postings in some of the larger markets). Simon also mentioned that he met Craig Newmark at one point. He was most impressed by the fact that Craig's cards said "Customer Service Representative AND founder" - yes, founder was second. He also said that many customer service issues are handled by Craig himself.
Talk about discipline - TURN DOWN A COUPLE OF BILLION DOLLARS BECAUSE OF WHAT YOU BELIEVE IN!!!!!! That is deep - I'm pretty disciplined and I have some pretty firm beliefs, but I'm not sure I could have done something like turn down a billion dollars. It probably is not a coincidence that Craig's List popularity continues to grow at a rate that far exceeds many of its competitors. It's difficult to stick to your beliefs instead of chasing the almighty dollar.
One of the topics that struck me this morning was one of "discipline" - the discipline to keep your company focused on the "why" of what they do. We talked about how a lack of this discipline can cause many companies to eventually fail. He brought up an interesting example of a man with tremendous discipline - Craig Newmark, the founder of Craig's List. Craig is a huge advocate of making the internet free to use for all. I did some research and Craig's List does between $10-20 million dollars worth of business a year with 19 employees. Using a formula used to value eBay, it has been estimated that Craig's list is worth between $1 and $2.4 billion dollars. I saw another article that had it valued at about $5 billion dollars. Yet, Craig Newmark refuses to sell the site as he wants to ensure that the majority of the site remains free (apparently there is a small charge for job postings in some of the larger markets). Simon also mentioned that he met Craig Newmark at one point. He was most impressed by the fact that Craig's cards said "Customer Service Representative AND founder" - yes, founder was second. He also said that many customer service issues are handled by Craig himself.
Talk about discipline - TURN DOWN A COUPLE OF BILLION DOLLARS BECAUSE OF WHAT YOU BELIEVE IN!!!!!! That is deep - I'm pretty disciplined and I have some pretty firm beliefs, but I'm not sure I could have done something like turn down a billion dollars. It probably is not a coincidence that Craig's List popularity continues to grow at a rate that far exceeds many of its competitors. It's difficult to stick to your beliefs instead of chasing the almighty dollar.
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