Ross Macdonald Redux

Both sides of the tracks are the wrong side,
if you live close enough to them.

— Ross Macdonald

That the Coen Brothers plan to turn Ross Macdonald's Black Money into a film is reason to go on. 

Although only one of Macdonald's 18 "California noir" mystery novels, it's a ripper—as are nearly all the books forming the Lew Archer saga, the adventures of an LA detective who's more poet than policeman, more psychoanalyst than private eye.

I rarely let a year pass without rereading one or two of Macdonald's masterpieces. His observations of people trapped by undeserved wealth and poverty are ceaselessly humane—and as accurate as any you'll find in genre fiction.

As in life, no one in a Lew Archer mystery is without sin—neither the oligarchs nor the outcasts; the matriarchs nor the mobsters; the cops nor the con men; the hippies nor the hucksters; the surfers nor the starlets. And the prose is delicious—the key reason Library of America this year enshrined 11 Lew Archer novels in its collection.

"Macdonald matters because he’s one of the finest fiction writers in American literature, not just detective fiction," says biographer Tom Nolan.

Macdonald learned to write in graduate school from teachers like W.H. Auden and Cleanth Brooks, who taught him that not only every word, "but every line, every sentence, every little block is integrated into the whole, and everything should have equal weight to create a unified work of art and beauty," Nolan says.

"The things that are most interesting and appealing about him, and valuable to people still, are the beauty of the expression, of the language, the beauty of the prose, which has poetic qualities and is informed by a great lyric talent."

Banking on Brevity

The secret of a good sermon is to have a good beginning and
a good ending; and to have the two as close together as possible.

― George Burns

New-media company Axios, launched in January by former Politico staffers, intends to distinguish itself among the legions of online newsletters by "writing short."

There's a lesson in this for business bloggers, egged on by experts to blather for SEO's sake.

“Journalists are writing for journalists. That’s the biggest problem in media right now,” says Axios co-founder Jim VandeHei. “People don’t want the pieces we’re writing. They’re too damn long.”

Ad-free for now, Axios will generate revenue eventually through $10,000 subscriptions, the founders hope.

"Smart brevity" is the key to attracting those subscribers. The newsletter's website describes the idea:

If you think about your evolving habits for consuming news and information, you realize you have less time, and a shorter attention span. Our content, our ads and our platforms are designed specifically to adjust to these new habits and demands. We aim to make the experience more substantive and meaningful—and therefore more valuable. When we pull this off, it will free people up to spend time on content truly WORTHY of their time, on our platform or elsewhere.

Axios, you might guess, is Greek for "worthy." By writing short, VandeHei plans to steer clear of the "crap trap"―the dead end publishers turn onto when they forget readers come first.

Know the Best Sources of Product Info?

IBM asked 700 B2B buyers wielding $10,000 or more to name their preferred sources of product information, and sorted the answers by buyers' ages. The results are astonishing—or maybe not:

• Boomers named tradeshows 
• Gen Xers named online, third-party reviews 
• Millennials named vendors' sales reps

What's up with that?

 
Boomers will never give up on shows. They haven't forgotten "the good old days," when companies timed their product launches around the industry-leading shows. Big events were vibrant and newsworthy and "must attend." Shows were the worldwide web.

Gen Xers are inexorable skeptics. Forget about face-to-face, content, direct, social media, or other forms of marketing with this cohort. All marketing is BS. Gen Xers only trust disinterested parties' informed evaluations.

Millennials prize speed and ease. "I want to know and I want to know now." What's the easiest route? A sales spiel. As IBM puts it, Millennials want a "hassle-free, personalized channel." Enter the sales rep.

Sure, generalizations about the generations have grown tiresome; but they explain IBM's findings.

Source of chart: Better Business Bureau

Defaulting to Lies

I'm not upset that you lied to me,
I'm upset that from now on I can't believe you.

― Friedrich Nietzsche

Why do some salespeople default to lies, no matter the stakes? When there are no stakes? When nobody's erred. When all that's requested is a straightforward reply.

Do they need that much to be loved?

I think so. I think, as well, they believe everyone else just fell off a turnip truck.

If your default mode is to lie, ask yourself: 

• Am I playing to the stereotype of the salesperson as huckster?
• Do my customers tell other customers I'm an inveterate liar? 
• Is my default mode―lying―the reason my income is meager?

No Thanks

Why does a publication subscriber quit? Why does an association member?

Lapse research always shows she quits for one or more of these five reasons:

• Your product is irrelevant
• Your price is too high
• She's too busy to take advantage of your product
• She gets what she needs on line
• She had trouble renewing

Drunk on their own "look at all we offer" Kool-Aid, however, marketers forget a customer subscribes or joins for a specific reason―and quits for a specific reason. She does the former to fill a need; and the latter when that need is filled; is no longer filled; went unfulfilled; or no longer matters.

It's convenient to marketers just to shove a quitter into some segment like "medical device sales rep"―as if that had a whit to do with the reason she became a customer―and conclude, "Well, some medical device sales reps are quitters."

But that facile conclusion sheds little light on the difference between the quitter and the loyal customer, and none on the specific reason the quitter quit. To do that, you need to contact her on the phone and have a "frank and open" discussion with the goal of listening.

When you do, you'll discover, indeed, she quit for one of the above five reasons; but you'll also unearth a lot more―real-world intelligence you can use to improve your product:

• How―specifically―did your product become irrelevant?
• Why is your price objectionable?
• Why can't she "make time" for you in her day?
• What unique value do competitors provide her?
• Why is renewal a source of friction?

You'd be amazed at what in-depth lapse research will tell you.

One large national association I assisted discovered, in fact, it wasn't bleeding thousands of members every year, as it believed. Members were mailing their renewal payments to the local chapters, because no reply envelope was included with the renewal invoice. The chapters were banking the dues income―without reporting its source.