If that’s not enough Firesphere awesome-ness for you, we’ve got another piece of exciting news: Brains on Fire is moving the creative spaces our Pirates work at to the lower deck! You read that right. Things have been getting bigger and better around here, so we’re bringing the whole crew together, re-designing our office arrangement and buckling down for an amazing second-half of 2010.

To celebrate the twenty-five-foot vertical adjustment, I thought it would be fun to invite you into our little moving adventure - follow my feet through the office as I transport a box downstairs and encounter a few obstacles along the way.

(PS - No employees, footballs, dolls, chairs, or metal pipes were harmed in the making of this video.)

If you’ve been following the Firephere over the last few months you might have heard that Brains on Fire has been furiously thinking, typing, editing, sketching and publishing a love story. And that story happens to be inked on the pages of a book we’ve named after the state of mind we seek for ourselves, our clients and our kindred spirits: Brains on Fire.

You can learn plenty about the read (and where to get your hands on one) over at the Brains on Fire book website (1), but today I want to talk about how the love story is going to live beyond words and letters on a page.

When Robbin talks about writing the book, she is adamant about saying that ‘we’ wrote it - not her and the other people with last names printed on the binding - but all of us:

When I say “we,” I don’t just mean the four authors you see listed on the cover. “We” represents an army of believers. It’s the people who comment on our blog. It’s the courageous clients we serve. It’s their customers. It’s everyone who sends us a resume or a love note. It’s our employees and extended tribe. It’s people who catch a vision and inquire about our services. It is all of us who are learning and changing the way we think about the work we do in the world. (Phillips, Cordell, Church, Jones ix)

- Robbin Phillips, Courageous President

And because so many people inspired the book, we want to continue to re-write the way we do marketing, together. From page 169:

Igniting movements is hard work. It’s building with people, not tools. Our belief is simple…we’re all in marketing grad school. We’re not experts. Frankly, there are no experts yet. And that’s why we’re all in this together. There are more lessons to learn, more stories to share and more movements to ignite…So join the Brains on Fire movement at www.brainsonfire.com/lessoneleven. Let’s write the next chapters together. This is the beginning, not the end. (Phillips, Cordell, Church, Jones 169)

So what is Lesson Eleven? It is a collection of real life stories - a movement-maker’s journal. Real stories from you, real stories from other marketing do-ers, real stories that we discover, share and hope will change the way we think about marketing.

So here it is - the first story of Lesson Eleven. And it is based on the opening line of our love story:

It’s about people, stupid.

——————–

While the medical issues that define our age are many, leading physicians say that childhood obesity poses a gigantic threat. (2) This isn’t the place to discuss the many causes or many proposed solutions, but I ran across a story the other day that serves as a wonderful example of why people are so important. (3)

Dr. Maureen Black and her associates at the University of Maryland School of Medicine have studied childhood obesity and the ways that people are targeting the problem. They discovered that group health education for inner city Baltimore kids is easily found in school and church settings, but noticed that learning in the place where a majority of health knowledge should come from, the home, is rare.

Their solution? Pretty simple. Build one-on-one relationships between healthy college students and overweight children, facilitating life learning and mentorship that takes place in the child’s own home. Says Dr. Black,

These were very active sessions. The mentors were not just talking to them. In every session they had food, and they often made the food together in the child’s home. The mentors took the children to the corner store or to a nearby fast-food restaurant to learn about healthy choices. They visited the skating rink or went hiking in a state park to learn the importance of being physically active. (3)

The results are pretty remarkable. After only 12 mentorship sessions, the children in the study who were paired with a mentor (there was a control group) experienced a 5% decline in rate of obesity, while those who weren’t experienced an 11% increase. After two years. That’s right - the lessons that the children learned in a personal relationship of only 12 meetings produced changes that lasted two years.

People are so important, so central, because they are the main ingredient of what makes a movement long-lasting. How?

It comes down to trust. And people don’t trust your company; people trust people. People they know. People who’s recommendations they seek out and have faith in. People don’t buy your company, product, or service first, they buy people first. (Phillips, Cordell, Church, Jones xiv)

The childhood obesity example shows that while lots of factors can help (group education, removing soft-drinks from schools, etc.), the hard work of actually getting involved in someone’s life can produce extremely compelling results. Relationships are the lifeblood of any marketing effort that is going to last. And they make the work you do in the world truly meaningful.

——————–

Stay tuned - we’ll have another edition of Lesson Eleven next Tuesday and some great stuff coming up on the blog.

• (1) You can learn more about the Brains on Fire book and where to get your hands on one at www.brainsonfirebook.com.
• Phillips, Robbin, Greg Cordell, Geno Church and Spike Jones. Brains on Fire: Igniting Powerful, Sustainable, Word of Mouth Movements. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2010. Print.
• (2) You can read CDC coverage of stats and consequences of childhood obesity here.
• (3) You can read about Dr. Black and the mentorship study here.

So guess what? TODAY August 30, 2010 is the official release date of Brains on Fire; Igniting Powerful Sustainable Word of Mouth Movements.

We’re so excited and I am frankly a little bit nervous for some reason. It reminds me of my college days in art school. When we’d put our finished art work up for critic.

Makes me feel like I’m standing naked in room of fully dressed people.

Anyway, it’s Sunday, and I am at a book store right this minute. Sitting and writing this blog post at one of the Barnes and Nobles in Greenvegas. The one on Haywood Road to be exact. It’s a relatively cool, sunshiny day in our neck of the woods. I walked in — got some chips, one of those IZZE sparkling grapefruit drinks and I am forcing myself to hold off going back to the business section to see the book on it’s shelf until later. Some of us from Brains Fire are meeting here at 4pm to do it together. Along with some of our friends who live close by.

So here’s a couple of things I want to share with you:

Lots of you have been talking and tweeting about the book and sharing photos. We LOVE that. We are going to aggregate and capture them all on brainsonfirebook.com. So keep going. We REALLY do want to hear from you.

Connect with us anytime.

On email. On Facebook @ facebook.com/BrainsOnFireBook and on twitter @brainsonfire. With questions and comments. Good and bad. We want to hear it all.

We’re big believers in practicing what we preach. When we wrote this book we made a solid commitment to share everything we’ve learned in an open, honest and meaningful way. (Lesson #5: Movements Empower People with Knowledge). We hope in doing so that you will find a desire to join our cause in finding meaningful ways to connect organizations and their advocates through shared passions.

Let’s do this together.

I saw one recent comment that made my heart sing — I think it was you @hughweber that said, “I am taking notes while I read this one.” We seriously hope you will SHARE your takeaways and ideas with all of us, Hugh. And that brings me to…

Lesson Eleven Tuesdays.

One way we want to make sharing easier is every Tuesday we will post a blog that will in a way, continue the book.

We would like Tuesday’s posts to come from you – our courageous clients, readers and friends and advocates. Maybe you can share other examples of movements you’ve seen in action. Or just your key takeaways. (I shared the Bare Escentuals story with John Moore from Brand Autopsy. He asks good questions. We’d love to see other examples beyond the work we have done from you guys.)

Send a relevant post and photos if you like to me and we’ll start collecting and sharing them on Tuesdays.

Do you like that idea? I hope so.

Okay. Here we go.

Stay close.

This should be fun. And remember, if you are reading this blog. If you get that “same tribe feeling” with Brains on Fire…remember…this is OUR book.

Be proud.

It took an army of true believers. Please know it is hard for me to write that line without tearing up. It’s been quite a year.

Okay. Sappy as it sounds. I hope you know. I love you all very, very much.

OX,
Robbin

I love breaking rules. I do it all the time. Some of them small, some slightly more adventurous. It just makes me feel a little more alive and in control at the same time.

And it’s funny. One of the reasons I think Brains on Fire is Brains on Fire is this: we challenge the rules of marketing. A lot. It’s a mindset I hope we always maintain.

Hmmmm….

So this Friday’s chat pack question is one I love. Ready?

If, with your safety guaranteed, you could experience something considered very dangerous, what would you want to experience most of all?

Me. I’d drive a car or a motorcycle or something over 200 mph. What can I say?

Speed calms me.

Now you go… come on. I need some “social media” interaction this morning.

BTW, this will be the last chat pack Friday for while. Starting next week, we’ll have something cool planned for Friday. Stay tuned.

The other day I heard Dodds talking on the phone with a client. He walks and talks so I overheard tiny bits of the conversation.

I asked him after he hung the phone up. “Happy client?’

“Yes — we laugh at least once a day. “

That made my heart sing. Just sing. We work so hard, all of us. It has to be fun. Doesn’t it?

My motto.

Have fun and make money.

Not necessarily in that order.

So how do you make the work you do more fun? How do you make it fun for your clients? Is fun a part of the new ROI?

Anyway she was just super cool. You know we believe Brains on Fire is movement and so I love it when people tell me.

“I have found my people.”

That is the way you feel when you find others who share your same passions. That set of words is just so tribe like to me.

Same tribe is another word for this feeling.

Anyway, I asked the question, you know the one we are all taught to ask when interviewing someone. “Do you have any questions for me?’ BTW, the answer is never NO> Stupid people have no questions. Sorry to be so blunt but it’s true.. Anyway, without a doubt she asked the best question I’ve heard in a long, long time.

“What is your mecca?” (she had read the book, page 76)

I loved that surprisingly great question so much I had to stand up. And I think it’s helpful for everyone to answer it.

Here’s my answer. I have so many. Just knowing that it was hard to answer made me happy.

So… this sounds silly and self serving, but it is the truth. Brains on Fire is mecca for me. I love being here. Every. Single. Day. Surrounded by crazy smart people who share my passion for making positive change in the world. And then the clients who write me love letters on a Saturday morning. It’s just my personal mecca. We have good coffee too.

But I also love, love fast cars. So the BMW Performance Center is a little bit of Mecca for me. When you go there, they share all kinds of cool things. I have been three times thanks to my friend Natalie and my heart races every time. Just writing this post makes my heart race. You can burn the brand new rubber off the tires and they don’t care. They just get more tires. It’s amazing. I have a BMW – a fast one and since I believe in staying safe, I don’t go over 105 on the highway. (Smiling). At the Performance Center they let you go as fast as you want. Yup. Mecca. And the female race car driver makes me believe that one day, I just might do it. She is inspirational.

So I really want to hear your stories of mecca, will you share with me today?

The result? Lots of fun, lots of laughs, and one awesome David Bowie performance.

Enjoy a few scenes from the making-of:

Video lovingly cut but the intern, Suggs. Final Cut ain’t so bad, is it?

Need a mic, anyone?

Cramming isn’t just for college, and I think we had a few people who wished they’d studied more before the test.

Justin tickling the ivory.

This studio has the gear and the chops to use it.

We think Ramsey has a secret desire to be a honky-tonk country music star.

Mic’s, headphones, here we go…

Jack looks so confident, and Dodds and Ramsey are trying figure out how the man of steel does it.

Work hard, play hard, and sometimes both.

The magic happening.

“Victory in marketing doesn’t happen when you sell something, but when you cultivate advocates for your brand” – Steve Knox

Steve Knox made a huge, beautiful impact on me at the FIRE session. And set this thought rolling around in my heart and my head.

He said that the goal of a company should be to create Trusted Advocacy. And while he spent a lot of time talking about disrupting schemas (which was awesome cool), he said something else that got my wheels spinning and really validated a lesson we have learned.

Lesson number 9 in the Brains on Fire book to be exact.

“Movements make advocates feel like rock stars.” (Okay, I have said it before. Maybe rock star is not the best term, but you get the gist.)

Steve said one of the ways to create trust is to give without expecting anything in return. (Side note: what makes a remarkable company also seems to make a great person, have you noticed that?)

We call it lifting others up. So many companies these days want to start a community of fans. But think about it. Do we really admire those among us who are looking for fans to be their advocates or are we drawn to people who genuinely lift us up…without expecting anything in return.

I’ll be honest, I know who I’d rather have dinner with.

It’s a fine line.

Don’t go searching for people (fans) to lift your business up, lift them up first. Be famous for the people who love you, for the way you love them.

Love and recognition form a circular transaction. If you give it out, it’ll always come back to you. Trust it.

We all on some gut level know that first hand. It flat out works in relationships and it works in business. And finally, finally we as marketers and leaders are starting to embrace the fact that creating a remarkable business is all about relationships.

We are so very jazzed that those of your reading the Brains on Fire book are reaching out to us by email and such. It’s really a dream come true for me personally. Another dream of mine is to return the concept of love back to the corporate world. Because love is a good thing. Here’s a comment to us by email from DeRay McKesson. Who by the way gave us a ton of constructive feedback we will address soon. But here is a comment from him I cherish:

+ Love. It’s an easy topic/word to avoid and difficult to engage meaningfully. I appreciate that you did not hide behind “passion” but instead let passion co-mingle with its partner “love” throughout the text. At each point, you acknowledged the feeling part of the work of spreading messages in a way that came across as authentic. Solid.

I woke up one morning recently to this email and it changed my life. It started like this: Dear Brains on Fire, This love is real. So yeah. Not naming names DOUGLAS, but you think we all work harder when you share that sort of thing? Well, guess what? WE all do. Whether we are abolishing sex slavery in the world, reforming high school education or selling diapers. Or scissors.

You toss bits of love out into the universe and they come back to you. Every. Single. Time. Stay close. WE are crazy mad in love with all of you who are taking your precious time to to read this blog today. Pass it on. Will ya?

Love and much, much gratitude,
Robbin

I had a girls-only lunch with my daughter yesterday.  As we sat there, dipping our fast food fries into the little paper cups of ketchup and talking about how I can’t believe she’ll be a 5th grader next week, I noticed an older gentleman alone at a table.  On his laptop.  Using the restaurant’s free wi-fi to connect with the world.  Not unusual, you say?  How about if I told you he was wearing dirty overalls, a grungy hat, and dirt-caked boots—a fashionable ensemble that made it look like he had just come in off the tractor (not such a unique outfit, though, in my neck of the suburbs)?  The sight got me thinking about how some people embrace technology and why some people step aside and let it roll right past them.  Up until a few months ago, I’m pretty sure I was the latter.

I might get called out on this, but I’ve only recently become the proud owner of my very first smart phone.   To be perfectly honest, as “jump-in-without-checking-to-see-how-deep-the-water-is” as I am in other areas of my life, new technology scares me a bit.  I like to watch how others engage with any new “gadget” first, make some assumptions based on my observations, then ease in after the tidal wave rush to purchase with a little dip of my big toe.  That’s probably why I held on to my old phone for all those years.  It did what I needed it to do, after all—make phone calls and take the occasional picture—but really nothing more.  It was simply comfortable for me to use.  When I finally handed it over to the sales clerk in exchange for my new (cough, cough) non-Apple smart phone, it truly was like I was saying goodbye to a friend.  Since I turned on my shiny new phone for the first time, though, I think I’ve rekindled an affair with technology.

I graduated from a small liberal arts college in ’94 (see, I’m not THAT old).  Back in those days, everyone wasn’t whipping out their iPads at a second’s notice or editing and producing high-def short films on their iPhones (http://www.cnn.com/2010/TECH/mobile/08/10/iphone.imovie.indie/index.html?hpt=T2).   I was one of those lucky graphic design majors who actually had to learn the “old ways” of design and advertising, like cutting amberlith (look it up, kids) and developing photo prints with real chemicals in a real darkroom.  I also got schooled in the “new way” of doing things—computerized graphic design.  Our college computer lab consisted of two Mac SEs with monochromatic screens, but the competition to outdo each other with Illustrator and QuarkXpress (again, look it up, kids) was still fierce.  I was some hot shit back then.  I was fearlessly grasping new technology by the balls and running really freaking fast with it.

So what happened to me and my wonder for the “new ways?”  Why was I comfortable with a basic cell phone for all those years and afraid to take a plunge into any new technology that came along?  Can’t really say for sure.  I think somewhere over the past 15+ years, it just got hard for me to keep up.  There was too much happening too fast.  I’m ashamed to say I decided to step aside instead of jumping in.

You’ll be happy to know, though, that I’m giving it another go.  I’ve decided to let my smart phone purchase serve as a springboard to connectivity, engagement, and enlightenment.  Heck, if Older Fast Food Farmer Guy can embrace technology without fear, why shouldn’t I?

Suggs’ new place on deck.

You’re child is going to be absolutely gorgeous, Megan!

Yours truly, probably coming back from the coffee pot with some fresh caffeine.

Our good friend Amy Taylor sent us a little package with some goodies.

Is she scared of a monster-ringed man? Is there a secret message written on his palm? And Justin, where in the heck do you find all these crazy monsters?

A packaged arrived in the mail…

What? Brains on Fire hardcover book copies?? Everyone’s in quiet awe.

And celebrate the love story of the Brains on Fire book.