Conscious Marketing Book Launch Speech
In 2010, my son Billy and I, ran away from home.
I sold our family home in Sydney, gave away most of our possessions and hung up the ‘closed’ sign on my marketing business. We ran away to live in Aix en Provence in the south of France.
There were many reasons for leaving and starting over. One big reason was that I’d totally and hopelessly fallen out of love with my profession. After 20 years as a marketer, I was sick and tired of being caught up in the mêlée of the increasingly toxic marketing and advertising world.
In any given day we’ll be exposed to more than 3000 marketing messages (that’s two per minute.)
In 2015, over 600 billion dollars will be spent on advertising. (The big four Australian banks spend more than $1billion dollars on advertising alone). Times that number by 10 to get a picture of the real cost of the marketing and ad world.
It feels like everyone is just shouting at each other in the mad race to grab a share of the consumers shrinking wallet.
I do believe in marketing. It’s an essential ingredient for any free economy. I just think it so very badly needs an overhaul. It needs to be completely reinvented. That’s why I wrote Conscious Marketing.
In 2011, we returned to live in Melbourne. I went to work for a not-for-profit (Fitted for Work) in an attempt to continue to feel good by doing good. It didn’t take me long to realise that I’m not the employable type.
Then in May 2012, I had an experience that would change my future work path forever. I was at the launch of Conscious Capitalism in Sydney. Raj Sisodia, author of Firms of Endearment and Conscious Capitalism was the keynote speaker. He declared…
‘The 21st Century Marketing Paradigm reflects a customer centric mindset that turns marketers into healers where our role is to cure, restore health, soundness and spiritual wholeness.’
I recall having a physical reaction to his declaration and my eyes filling with tears. I realised right then and there that I didn’t have to abandon my profession, that I could actually lead the charge to reinvent it.
If you’re seeking a renewed passion and purpose for your business, simply ask yourself ‘what’s broken in my industry?’ then use your business as a vehicle to fix it.
Over the course of that year I studied the conscious business movement, started the Conscious Capitalism Victoria chapter and wrote a white paper ‘The Conscious Marketing Revolution’. It was this paper that got the attention of Kristen Hammond at Wiley and that led me to the writing and publishing of Conscious Marketing.
So how would I love marketing to be reinvented?
I want marketing to stop being something that’s just slapped onto mediocre products as a bunch of clever ads designed to manipulate people into buying stuff they don’t need.
I want marketing to be an inside-out job. I want companies to build something so good and so compelling right into the heart of their business so that it attracts the best people and the product sells itself.
I want companies to build products and offer services that are essential, ethical, natural, beautiful and enduring.
I want to make marketing whole and meaningful so that it makes a positive contribution to the world.
Conscious Marketing is about building a business on PURPOSE and PEOPLE before PRODUCTS, PROMOTIONS and PROFITS.
It’s about shifting from interruption marketing to attraction marketing.
It’s about shifting from being price-driven to value-driven.
It’s about shifting from messages of fear to love.
It’s about shifting from competition to collaboration and from being company-centric to customer, community and planet centric.
And as Otto Scharmer discusses in his work – it’s about shifting from being ego-centric to eco-centric.
Conscious Marketing shows you how to make this shift following practical examples of companies that have done it.
Wayne Dyer taught me that there’s a difference between motivation and inspiration. Motivation is when you get a hold of an idea and you have to pull yourself towards it to reach your goal. It feels like a lot of hard work.
Inspiration on the other hand is when an idea gets a hold of you and you’re taken on a journey that you don’t have much say in. You just have to do it.
That’s what happened with Conscious Marketing and it’s how things are with Slow School too.
Conscious Marketing was written on pure inspiration. It wasn’t hard. It was an absolute joy to write because it was inspired by so many people.
It was inspired by hearing Raj Sisodia declare that marketing could be a force for good in the world.
It was inspired by the many fabulous people I’ve met through Conscious Capitalism.
It was inspired by the amazing people I’ve connected with at the coolest co-working space The Hub.
It was inspired by B Lab and all the other Certified B Corps from around the world.
It was inspired by the many beautiful connections and conversations I’ve had with people like you.
It was inspired by the very supportive and generous team at Slow School.
The reality is, it’s impossible for me to put my hand on my heart and claim myself to be a conscious capitalist, business owner or marketer if I’m not dedicated to being a conscious consumer first and foremost.
That for me is where it all begins – with conscious consumption – buying local organic produce, using a KeepCup every day instead of disposable coffee cups, not buying water in plastic bottles, boycotting products that contain palm oil or that are tested on animals, buying recycled clothing, actively buying from and recommending B Corps, embracing the exciting new share economy and so much more.
While I do slip back into my old unconscious ways both as a consumer and business owner, I try every day to be better than I was the day before and I guess that’s all any of us can do. To not try at all is the biggest tragedy.
We can all do better. And we can do it together. Let’s create and build organisations that change the way business is done, forever. Together we can create a ripple effect and make real change happen. If not you, who? If not now, when?
