Dec 03 2008
Learning by Doing: Jeff Widman interviews Charlie Hoehn & Aidan Nulman about interning with Seth Godin
This is the first, last, and only episode of the Gen Y Marketing Podcast.
In this twenty minute segment, I interview Charlie Hoehn & Aidan Nulman about:
- Interning for Seth Godin
- Listening to your audience versus doing what you think works
- Generation Y–what’s hype, what’s legit
- How they define marketing
- A bunch of other interesting stuff I can’t remember.
(Hat tip to Brian Russell for the great editing job!)
The Gen Y Podcast saga was an adventure in learning by doing. I learned the importance of action–don’t sit and wait. Inevitably you’ll fail. You’ll learn. Then you’ll either kill the project or change it. And do it again. You can’t shortcut this process. At best, you can only pre-think 40% of the process.
I had the proper recipe–recording equipment, smart people, and a little bit of free time. But I was missing the critical ingredient–a problem worth solving. My intuitive side knew this. It hemmed & hawed. So I killed the idea.
Perhaps you’ll enjoy my original thesis:
There are over 100 million websites.
Unfortunately, an abundance of resources does not constitute a solution.
After a point, the proliferation of blogs, tweets, pages, and images actually inhibits problem-solving. Too much noise.
Thus Google rose to prominence. Soon the web hit 2.0, and search diversified into Technorati, YouTube favorites, and SimplyHired. A lot of hype.
But it was all a pull-model. And my on-demand searches still contain noise.
What if the next step is a push-model?
It only works if search is perfect. Search results delivering exactly what I want, when I want it. Nothing else. Otherwise the noise overwhelms me.
You see, wall-able content doesn’t happen everyday. And when it does, we want to know. But technology is limited. That’s why the SEO industry exists.
I wonder. If the next step in search isn’t about technology, but about refining our ability to sift through information. (My brain consistently generates better search terms than my parents.)
I wonder. If the next step hasn’t already happened.
If my generation searches information differently. Sees the world differently.
Generation Y.
Hype. Or truth? Join the conversation.
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