“This book is for people who see life for what it can be rather than what it can’t,” writes Guy Kawasaki in the introduction to his 2011 title, “Enchantment: The Art of Changing Hearts, Minds, and Actions.”
“They are bringing to market a cause—that is, a product, service, organization, or idea—that can make the world a better place,” he explains. “They realize that in a world of mass media, social media, and advertising media, it takes more than instant, shallow, and temporary relationships to get the job done.”
Kawasaki says, only slightly joking, that 90 percent of the battle of being enchanting is showing up, and the other 90 percent is persevering after you show up.
Here are his four rules for being enchanting:
1. You have to be able to explain what you do in the first 30 seconds of meeting someone.
2. When delivering a PowerPoint presentation, think 10-20-30: 10 slides, 20 minutes, and use letters that are a point-size of 30.
3. The most important thing to do when starting a company is to stop planning and thinking—just build a prototype.
4. Always hire people better than you in areas where you are not strong. If you have two marketing guys rubbing sticks together, the company is not going to fly.
Launching an Enchantment Campaign
When it comes to embarking on your enchantment journey, Kawasaki provides the following itinerary:
Chapter 1: Why Enchantment?
The greater your goals, the more you’ll need to change people’s hearts, minds, and actions. This is especially true if you have few resources and big competitors. If you need to enchant people, you’re doing something meaningful. If you are doing something meaningful, you need enchantment.
Chapter 2: How to Achieve Likeability
Has someone you disliked ever enchanted you? I doubt it. If he or she did, I doubt the feeling lasted long. This is why the first step of enchantment is to get people to like you. To accomplish this, you’ll need to accept others and find something to like in them.
Chapter 3: How to Achieve Trustworthiness
Has anyone you distrusted ever enchanted you? I doubt this, too. Achieving trustworthiness is the second step. People trust you when you are knowledgeable, competent, make bigger pies, and create win-win situations—in short, when you do the right things the right way.
Chapter 4: How to Prepare
Great products, services, organizations, and ideas are enchanting. Crap is not. Preparing to enchant people requires creating something great, communicating it in short, simple, and swallowable terms, and working your butt off to get it to market before your competition.
Chapter 5: How to Launch
Great enchanters ship. This is what Richard Branson and Steve Jobs do better than anyone else. Ever. Launching your cause involves immersing people in your cause, getting them at least to try it, and recruiting your first followers to help you spread the word.
Chapter 6: How to Overcome Resistance
People often accept “good enough” products and services because they are busy or don’t know better. You will encounter resistance to change in these situations. The way to overcome resistance is to produce social proof, find a way to agree, and enchant all the influencers.
Chapter 7: How to Make Enchantment Endure
Enchantment is a process, not an event. You want your efforts to endure, and this requires that people internalize your cause, reciprocate, and fulfill their commitments. It also helps to build an ecosystem of resellers, consultants, developers, and user groups around your cause.
Chapter 8: How to Use Push Technology
Have you wondered how to use PowerPoint, Twitter, and email to push your information? These products can enable you to bring your story to the people you want to enchant. This chapter explains how to do this using the latest technology.
Chapter 9: How to Use Pull Technology
In addition to push technology, there’s pull technology. In this case, you bring people to your story instead of bringing your story to people. This chapter focuses on using websites, blogs, Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube to enchant people and encourage them to come to you.
Chapter 10: How to Enchant Your Employees
Enchantment is not only an outbound activity, but one that you should direct at your employees, too. If you provide them with the opportunity to master skills, the autonomy to work independently, and the chance to realize a positive purpose, you can enchant employees.
Chapter 11: How to Enchant Your Boss
Imagine working for someone you’ve enchanted. The benefits include freedom, flexibility, money, and mentoring. Enchanting your boss requires re-prioritizing your efforts to make her or him successful—but the outcome is worth it.
Chapter 12: How to Resist Enchantment
Not every enchanting person has your best interests at heart. Resisting enchantment, therefore, is a valuable skill that requires avoiding tempting situations, looking far into the future, and finding a devil’s advocate. After reading this chapter, you may even be able to resist Apple’s products.
Get started! Click here to buy Kawasaki’s Enchantment.
