Filtering through the What and How to get to the Why

I just finished Simon Sinek's Start with Why. I have no idea why it took me so long to read it. It's an excellent book.

I started thinking about my company and my messages. Was I clear on my why?

I have always been a non-conformist. But, there I was, along with many companies, investing in marketing automation tools, hoping they would bring us new customers/prospects.

What it did was create anger and resentment as we captured personal information and started repeated automated messages. And without many visitors to your website, this is a waste of time and money. No Win-win that I could see.

After reading one of their white papers or ebooks, I have reached out to companies, asking them if I could share it on my site. The Only caveat? They wouldn't know who read their content, and they wouldn't get any information. Some companies were glad to get exposure and share their content. Others said they needed the personal data for their marketing and sales efforts.

So that is my Why. I have been fortunate to learn from many people who offered their expertise and knowledge freely over the years. I have created a tech-only environment for learning and sharing so that others can benefit from shared information.

Sure, it would be great to make a dollar every time someone clicks on a link to our site. But that is not the purpose. We are trying to help others learn, share, and not have to give up their personal information in the process.

Nothing feels better than helping someone else. If someone learns from our site, we are good.

Throughout the book, it is repeated - "Reminder, people don't buy WHAT you do, they buy WHY you do it."

In the technology industry the What we do and How we do it is on every website. And many companies say the same things, so it is hard to differentiate.

"If a company does not have a clear sense of WHY then it is impossible for the outside world to perceive anything more than WHAT the company does. And when this happens, manipulations that rely on pushing price, features, service or quality become the primary currency of differentiation."

I thought it would be interesting to check out the Why, What, and How of some technology sites.

I visited over 100 websites and kept a spreadsheet of what they said on their home page and what they said in their About Us, Values, and missions.

I found very few companies that had a Why. Plenty of Whats and Hows. And plenty of pop-ups asking for an email to get on a newsletter or whatnot.

Thank you, Simon Sinek, for the inspiration and learning.