I was around six the first time I played it. Two paddles. One dot. No story, except the one you created as you played. By twelve, I had my first Atari computer. At thirteen, I launched a BBS from my bedroom and dropped $400 on a 10MB hard drive (and I got a deal). It felt like I was holding the future in my hands. Looking back, Nolan Bushnell didn’t just build Pong. He planted the seed that would grow…
What happens when you blend 20 years of creative firepower, a haunted hotel, and a glass of red wine? You get Monica Ballard. She’s written jingles. Directed shows. Led ghost tours. Voiced ads you’ve definitely heard. And if you’ve called “A Place at Home – North Austin (512) 521-3010,” you’ve already met her without knowing it. So when my friend Marion, a jingle writer himself, nudged me to invite Monica onto the Rock Solid podcast, it wasn’t even a question.…
In 2014, Derek Sivers did something wild. He rewrote a confirmation email. That’s it. Not a campaign. Not a product launch. Just an email. Here’s what it said: “Your CD has been gently taken from our CD Baby shelves with sterilized gloves and placed onto a satin pillow…” It went viral. People laughed. They shared it. They remembered CD Baby. But why? Because it felt like something. Because it sounded like someone. Because it had what most brands are missing:…
In the middle of the Great Depression, when wallets were thin and hope was even thinner, a young copywriter named Elmer Wheeler said something that changed everything: “Don’t sell the steak. Sell the sizzle.” That line crackled its way into the halls of marketing history. Because Wheeler saw something others didn’t. While companies pushed facts, he pulled feelings. While they talked features, he told stories. He realized that people weren’t buying what was being sold. They were buying how it…
You ever walk into a room and just know you’re in the right place? That’s what talking to Adriana Nunez of the Round Rock Chamber on the Rock Solid podcast felt like. Now, if you’ve ever heard me speak or read Be Like Amazon or Waiting for Your Cat to Bark, you know I believe in systems. Repeatable processes. Measurable outcomes. But even more, I believe in people. And Adriana? She’s the kind of person who makes a community magnetic…
It’s the spark, not the system.The amplifier, not the engine.The bow, not the gift. A great story can capture attention.It can stir emotion.It can linger in the mind long after the words are gone. But if the beliefs behind the business are shaky,if the system is broken,if the strategy is vague or misaligned,then the story becomes a trap, not a tool. Because storytelling doesn’t fix misalignment.It amplifies it.It spreads the wrong message faster.It’s lipstick on a pretty pig.It’s narrative masking…
We don’t buy shoes.We buy the feeling of stepping into something that matters. We don’t buy books.We buy belief in who we could become. We don’t buy brands.We buy belonging. What do the logos or brands you wear stand for? And no one understood that better than Blake. He didn’t start with a product.He started with a moment that punched him in the chest.Kids in Argentina. Barefoot. No shoes. No safety. Most people would have donated and walked away.Blake didn’t.…
It was a product nobody wanted. Then one man touched it, and it became a $200 million phenomenon. No new features. No redesign. No big marketing budget. Only one thing changed and everything exploded. Here’s the story: In the 1990s, a small company created a fat-draining countertop grill. It worked. It solved a problem. But no one cared. Sales flatlined. The product sat on shelves, ignored and forgotten. They tried different strategies. Nothing moved the needle. Then came a breakthrough…