One of my favorite "features" of Rohit's new book, Personality Not Included, is a related Web site he created, The Personality Project. I, along with lots of more luminous luminaries are featured there talking about the importance of personality in marketing. each does it with perosnal stories and examples from their business or their lives. The great thing in most is that there is not a huge division between their POVs as business leaders and their own personaloutlooks on life.
My story is very personal and includes Air Canada. You will find many other stories from the likes of Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos.com. I had the chance to see Tony speak at Community 2.0 this past week. He told the story behind Zappos. At times, it sounded like he aspired to be Amazon (the epitome of customer service, selling everything not just shoes), but he revealed that personality is a big part of their story. You can read his Personality Project post here. I love that his staff will check three competeing web sites to find something for a customer if they, themselves, do not have it and then will drive that customer to a competitor.
Tony, a serial entrepeneur at a disgustingly young age, is serious about the Zappos culture. 'Culture' is the whole point of my post. Culture is real and organic. It is a value system that lets people be themselves (yes, they must share some of teh values to fit in, but unlike our families, we "choose" our job, and can move to one that aligns with enough of our values). Culture promotes someone at Zappos to go the extra 10 miles for a customer not just because it feelsl good but because customer retention is key to profits and to outbound word of mouth.
So, I love The Personality Project because of all of the original stories from a collection of not-the-usual personalities. And I also love it as a great example of what I will now call "transmedia" - a term that first noticed last week in an article (where was that article?) about the new generation of Hollywood science fiction geeks - the creators of Lost, Heroes, Battlestar Gallactica. These followers of Joss Whedon are super sharp about extending the experience of their stories and characters into different mediums without resorting to indiscriminate license deals. No lunchboxes. They only do what will extend the story. That is what Rohit has done with the Personality Project. It complements the book but takes it further in a new direction (not to mention that it's a great way to invite people in to whitewash the fence with you a la Tom Sawyer).
There are a hundred slots. Let's see who shows up next.
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