He noticed things... Mark Manson wrote thousands of blogs. Most didn’t become The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck. That idea travelled around the world. But the title didn’t arrive during some heroic brainstorming session. He remembered a song title. He liked the phrase. So he wrote it down. Later... It became the seed of the book title. That sounds almost too simple. Which is exactly why it matters. Great comedians do the same thing. Jerry Seinfeld notices the stupid little sentence everyone says when a phone call drops. “I don’t know what happened.” Obviously you don’t. None of us know how the bloody phone works. That tiny observation becomes material. 𝘞𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘯𝘰𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘦. 𝘊𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘢𝘯𝘴 𝘯𝘰𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘦. 𝘍𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘯𝘰𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘦. 𝘎𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘵 𝘴𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘴𝘱𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦 𝘯𝘰𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘦 𝘵𝘰𝘰. The hesitation before somebody answers. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗲𝘅𝗮𝗰𝘁 𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗱 𝗮 𝗹𝗲𝗮𝗱 𝗸𝗲𝗲𝗽𝘀 𝗿𝗲𝗽𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴. The complaint they laugh off. The sentence three customers say independently. Most people hear it. Then move on. The killer operator thinks: “𝘏𝘢𝘯𝘨 𝘰𝘯. 𝘐𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨?” And writes it down. That is where offers come from. Hooks come from there. Sales angles come from there. Content comes from there. The mad part? Almost nobody deliberately practises it. Which means the competitive field is tiny. Everybody wants better ideas. Very few people are willing to become better observers. 𝗕𝘂𝘀𝗶𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀 𝗶𝘀 𝗹𝗶𝗸𝗲 𝗪𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲’𝘀 𝗪𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆. The opportunity is already on the page. You don’t add anything. You train your eyes until you can see what everybody else keeps missing. > The best do this with language. > The best do it with behaviour. > The best do it with problems. > The best do it with moments. Then use the Mark Manson story as the proof. That phrase already existed. He was simply awake enough to catch it.

I haven't seen this approach mentioned and would love some feedback, especially if you see a flaw I'm missing. If you sell to local businesses , web design, social media, SEO, etc. , one of the biggest challenges is simply getting the business owner's attention. They're buried with people trying to sell them the same things. I'm going to try a provide-value-first approach this week: 1. Buy a $100 gift card from a local business you'd like to work with. 2. Auction it on your business Facebook page or personal page, starting at $1, and tag the business so they can watch the auction happening. 3. Let's say it's a $100 gift card from a massage therapist. You get 29 bidders and the winning bid is $79. 4. The winner pays you $79 and gets the $100 gift card. Your cost to get the attention of that business owner was $21. ($100-$79) Let's say you now have 28 other people who have demonstrated that they're interested in buying what that business sells. So you approach the massage therapist: "29 people bid on the $100 gift card I auctioned. It sold for $79. Would you be willing to let the other bidders buy a $100 gift card from you for the same $79 winning price?" If she says yes, you send the losing bidders a link to purchase directly from the massage therapist for $79, with a deadline. The money goes directly to the massage therapist. You're out of the transaction. So instead of just cold calling the owner saying: "Can I help you get more customers?" You've spent $21, bought something from their business, created some social media attention for them, and potentially brought them several new customers before you've tried to sell them anything. Then you can ask: "Would you like me to do more of this?" That's the experiment I'm going to try. What am I missing? Where does this break? And how would you improve it? Thanks!