Toolbox Studios Blog

Generating Buzz the Old-Fashioned Way – Shock and Awe!

I am attending O’Reilly’s Tools of Change conference in New York City from February 22-24 to keep up with the latest innovations in the publishing industry. Also, I’m here supporting one of our clients, LibreDigital. As a sponsor and innovator in the industry, LibreDigital is scheduled to give a presentation on Wednesday about a pilot program completed by LibreDigital, Harlequin, Toolbox Studios and LivingSocial’s Visual Bookshelf community. 

The pilot eGalley program was for a book named Proof by Seduction by debut author Courtney Milan. Part of our assignment in supporting LibreDigital at the trade show was to create buzz about the event. Here’s what the creative minds at Toolbox came up with…

THE PROBLEM: First, we knew that one of the channels we had to use to promote the presentation was the classic “goodie” bag that every attendee receives. But so often, those bags are filled with boring sales sheets, flyers and tchotchkes. The creative team was determined to create something that stood out and delivered results for our client. 

THE SOLUTION: We analyzed the data from the pilot program and realized that many reviewers of the Proof by Seduction eGalley – a Historical Romance book – commented about the book’s racy cover. So we decided to leverage that brand equity and replicate the book cover of Proof by Seduction. We also included a handwritten, entertaining and mildly titillating message on the back, “Digital Handselling gets steamy. Meet me. Zeigfield Room. 10:35 Wed. A.M. Sharp! XXOO –L.D.” 

THE RESULTS: The insert was placed as the first item on the pile of materials in the conference “goodie” bag. It could be a coincidence, but more than likely the staff at Tools of Change found the flyer entertaining and clever, too. If it had been another boring sales sheet or corporate flyer, I think it would have been relegated to the bottom of the bag with the Tic-Tac’s.

Check back later in the week and I’ll share the attendance at the LibreDigital presentation. You can follow the Toolbox Studios' staff at Tools of Change via our Twitter posts at @toolboxstudios.com

XXOO

Rob Simons

President, Toolbox Studios, Inc.

What do you get when you ask 120 entrepreneurs their opinion? Just the facts.

Since 2003 I have been a member of the Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO), a group dedicated to helping entrepreneurs grow professionally and personally through learning events, once-in-a-lifetime opportunities and a peer-based network of fellow entrepreneurs. One of the interesting elements of EO is that it is a member-led organization—entrepreneurs leading other entrepreneurs. As you can imagine, this makes for some very intriguing situations. 

As the incoming Area Director for Texas/Oklahoma Area, I had the opportunity to attend the U.S. Presidents Meeting in Dallas, Texas, a gathering of the current and incoming EO presidents of the 52 chapters in the United States. These presidents lead chapters with over 3,278 entrepreneur members that collectively represent over $56.7 billion in revenue and over 600,000 employees. It’s an impressive group of Type A business owners that fit the stereotypical entrepreneur model of impatient, competitive and aggressive. 

So how effectively do these entrepreneurs work together to lead an international organization?

Over the course of two days of back-to-back meetings, I had the opportunity to observe how some of the brightest minds in business think and operate. I noticed one primary characteristic of these leaders that everyone should aspire to adopt – entrepreneurs only focus on facts and metrics. As part of this fact-based approach, they only express viewpoints based on past personal experience not opinion. The key lesson is that facts, metrics and past experience are irrefutable. As opposed to opinions that are open to debate. To stay on task in any meeting, it’s always best to avoid opinion and focus on facts.

The outcome of this approach is that a large group of Type A personalities can quickly and effectively concept, plan and execute multiple strategies for an organization. The following are a few examples of how this approach was applied in Dallas:

• Before making an important decision on improving member retention, EO leadership provided numerous quantitative reports that included demographics, membership trends and qualitative surveys from members (experience).
• A requirement of members that hold leadership positions to support the chapter Presidents is that they themselves are past Presidents. The theory is that you can only provide help if you have relevant experience in the position you are trying to help.
• When any chapter asked for help on a specific issue, the other chapter leaders responded with specific experiences from their chapter, including specifically what they did and results. What these leaders didn’t do was offer specific advice (opinion) on how the requesting chapter should handle their situation. 

In a short time frame, I witnessed a group of highly competitive and impatient entrepreneurs develop numerous plans and strategies to improve their organization. Over the course of two days, I never observed a defensive exchange between individuals. It was a highly effective meeting and I’m sure it will result in a positive impact on the organization.