branding

Why Nothing is Important

Pessimistic as that might sound, the post’s title is actually a nod towards being optimistic. To having faith. To being willing to try - and fail or succeed.

The reason this is preying on my mind is that I’m in the midst of getting an idea of the ground.

For the past 18 months, I’ve been fortunate enough to be in the company of people who aren’t afraid to try new things.

To look at a need and then try and fill it. Kind of like the guys who invented the light bulb, automobile, airplanes, great consumer brands like Sony and Apple, Internet leaders like Google and yes, even software giants like SAP and Microsoft.

Granted, I’m not saying that we’re saving the planet here - but we are doing something that we think will matter to some people. People like you and me. Consumers.

So we’ve identified a need. We’re working on filling it. With a little luck - and a whole lot of help - we’ll even launch it for our friends, associates and acquaintances to play with it a little in about a month … give or take a couple of weeks for the gremlins to be worked out of the system.

And yet, we’re surrounded by people who are telling us we should be afraid.

That this isn’t the time to try something new. That there are “oh so many websites and services out there so why bother launching something new.” That we would be better off waiting and watching and continuing to do nothing instead of risking our time, money and hope on something.

This irritates me. It makes me mad. And it should make you even angrier.

If I - or anyone for that matter - believed in such “reasoning” then where would we be? We should just give up on innovation and settle for mediocrity.

I mean - why bother inventing new gizmos, gadgets, machines, software or anything else for that matter?

After all - what if it fails? Why not do nothing instead!

Don’t do nothing. Nothing is important as a means towards something. Do something and Nothing will instead be important as a footnote to your success.

This rings true whether its the development of a new service, product, level of customer satisfaction, innovative and relevant public relations campaign or something as simple as the sharing of an idea.

So why is nothing important - because being aware of the danger of it, you’ll do something. The only thing that you could do that would be worst than trying and failing - is to do nothing.

What challenges have you overcome in your fight to do something rather than nothing?

© 2009 Journeys Through The Line.