Try making yourself more interesting

There are no cheat codes for com­mu­nity. No Charles Atlas short­cuts to make your pet project the one to rule them all. Want peo­ple to think you’re awe­some? Be awe­some. This panel promises a bullshit-free look at how you might tune out the jib­ber jab­ber, tune in to those who mat­ter, put your head down and make your online ser­vice a lit­tle bit more epic each day. We’ll dis­sect Bike Hug­ger, Pho­to­jojo, Metafil­ter, and other exam­ples of Web charm for what *you* can do. Today, and tomor­row. And the day after. Which is how you will become what you want to be.

Accord­ing to Oberkirch:

Mar­keters get into this mind­frame, this thing, of look­ing for the lat­est “tac­tic”. As we know, this doesn’t work. Instead, “Do Epic Shit”. One of the com­pa­nies that “Does Epic Shit” really well is Threadless.

Here are some tips on how to be more awesome:

• Appren­tice your­self to great work. Draw inspi­ra­tion and learn from what oth­ers are doing.
• Give side projects some front & cen­ter time. This will become your future, after all.
• Focus on deli­cious details. Growth is about doing small things right. There are huge pay­offs from tweak­ing small things.
• Go long. We have no atten­tion spans. But things take time. This is one to one … get into a long time horizon.
• Share. Gen­er­ate more value than you capture.
• Iron­i­cally, it takes courage to do the things you love.

In short, don’t treat peo­ple like you’re just inter­ested in sell­ing some­thing to them. Talk to them like they’re human beings. Mar­keters are using to talk­ing AT peo­ple; now, learn to engage them in a conversation.

Finally, model the behav­ior in your orga­ni­za­tion. Show peo­ple what works. Show them new things.

SX09-574, sxsw, sxswi, sxsw09, sxswi09, roux, brian oberkirch, panel