Lucky vs. Repeatable

It’s so important to know the difference between the two when attempting to learn from someone. You want to try to emulate skills that are repeatable. Attempting to copy the parts of someone’s success that aren’t repeatable is equivalent to a 56-year-old dressing like a teenager and expecting to be cool.

via Collab Fund

A common practice in marketing is to look at competitors and inspirational/aspirational brands to benchmark—harvest ideas, uncover keywords, see what’s working. But it’s hard to figure out what we can repeat-like trying to reverse engineer virality.

We’re only seeing the finished product. We don’t know the process. This is the “overnight success” myth. The success is only overnight to those that weren’t doing all the work to make it happen.

you have 20 years to write your first album and you have six months to write your second one.

-Elvis Costello

The returns diminish with each additional mover.

The first movers do it, then everyone does it. When everyone does it, it doesn’t work as well.

via Marketing Against the Grain podcast (📼 / ~15:24)

Timing is luck. Virality is luck. Catching a person in the perfect moment for your message to resonate is luck.

Delivering value is repeatable. One core, consistent, coherent brand message is repeatable (that’s kind of the point). Being where your customers are is repeatable (and also kind of luck).

Coming up with the slogan “Red Bull gives you wings” is lucky. Sticking with it for decades is repeatable.

When benchmarking, spend less time focusing on what your gaps and more on theirs. What channels are underused? What tones of voice are avoided? What value adds or selling points are missing?

It’s easier to build a repeatable practice in a place with low competition than it is to get lucky in a place with high competition.

Or, trying zigging when others zag once in a while.