Speaker 1: 0:00

Hey there, my buzzworthy entrepreneurs. I hope you're having a wonderful day. If this is your first time tuning in, you're jumping in at the perfect moment. Welcome to season 10 of what is now called the Buzzworthy Marketing Podcast and to our loyal listeners who've helped us reach over 150,000 downloads across our first nine seasons. Thank you. Your commitment to growing your business and sharing your success stories continues to inspire me to bring you actionable marketing insights that actually move the revenue needle. Now, if you listen to the last episode of last season, I mentioned a huge rebrand and, as I just mentioned, it's not that big of a change Practically undetectable really Well to be mentioned. It's not that big of a change practically undetectable, really Well, to be honest, I jumped the gun. I got excited about a catchy addition to the name that nodded to our focus on B2B marketing and broke my own cardinal rule Always be testing. Let me give you a quick peek behind the scenes be testing. Let me give you a quick peek behind the scenes. Welcome to the Buzzworthy Marketing Podcast. Here's your host, michael Buzinski.

Speaker 1: 1:20

Earlier last year, my team and I at Buzzworthy Marketing decided to narrow our focus to working primarily on B2B service-based businesses. With that, I reworked my website and started shifting our messaging in all of our marketing to align with this new focus. One night I was laying in bed and what I thought was a brilliant idea popped into my head Boring to buzzworthy marketing. I was a genius in my own mind. Now I didn't have a place to use it right away. Well, not until we were wrapping up season nine of this show, when I had what I thought a second stroke of genius, renaming this show to boring to buzzworthy marketing show. I thought it cleverly nodded to our new focus while keeping the brand that you have grown to love. So I dove right in and I began adjusting the entire brand, starting with the logo and all of the graphical assets for the show.

Speaker 1: 2:18

I went as far as auditioning voiceover talent for the introduction before I realized that I had broken my own cardinal rule Always test new ideas before launching them. Rookie, move right. I mean. After 30 years of marketing, you would think I would never make that kind of mistake, but I did, which goes to show no matter how seasoned you are at your craft, you're still human and you make mistakes. For me, I just got excited about this quirky idea coming to fruition and I thought you, my buzzworthy entrepreneurs were going to love it.

Speaker 1: 2:55

But then, as I was listening to those voiceover auditions, I started to get an uneasy feeling. The title wasn't rolling off their tongue. The setup to mention the new name was. It was clunky, sometimes like just literally off it was. At that moment my heart sank a lot and I got a pit in my stomach. I asked myself I'm literally out loud is this a bad idea?

Speaker 1: 3:23

I immediately went back to my team, who sometimes doesn't push back as much as they should, and I asked them their opinions and it was 50-50 split between the original title and the new title, and I was still on the fence. I wasn't convinced that my new brilliant idea was the best choice for the show. So I sent out a survey on LinkedIn. The first response was Tom Schwab, who has written multiple books on podcasting. His vote Keep it simple and in the rest of the votes, the same. In the end, 100% of the votes were for the original name. And while that survey was running, I reached out to other people I respected, like Mike Michalowicz and Vern Harnish. Everyone in my network told me the same thing Simple is better. So it was time to undo my genius idea and revert back to what has worked for the first nine seasons, except for one slight change.

Speaker 1: 4:21

So while I was searching for some glimpse of support through confirmation bias, I dug into research on naming conventions for a content like podcasts versus TV shows and radio shows. I discovered there is a slight difference between calling something a show compared to a podcast. It turns out that a quote show is a generic term and doesn't give the onlooker a clear sense of what the content is. It's usually used in a TV and radio setting. I think I might have called this podcast a show in the beginning because of my background in TV and radio. So it all made sense and the difference is minimal in the long run. I mean, we've surpassed my wildest expectations and leadership already. Right, so it wasn't hurting us. But as I kept digging, I discovered that using the word podcast can help with searchability in podcast directories and even search engines, because, well, people use the word podcast when looking for podcasts. Duh, now I want to remind you my research showed that this would have minimal effect compared to other optimization strategies. But hey, every little bit counts. So after all the hubbub and anticipation, the big reveal has been boiled down to changing the show's name from Buzzworthy Marketing Show to Buzzworthy Marketing Podcast. Most people new to the show won't even notice the change as they listen back to older episodes.

Speaker 1: 5:48

But there is a lesson to be had here. As an owner or a marketer working at a company you've been with for some time, it's easy to get stuck in proximity bias. Your company, your brand, it's your baby. Your obsession with it can result in overlooking the basics and becoming too emotional and too emotionally attached, I should say, to the ideas around your brand. As you can plainly see with what I just went through over the last six weeks, even those with decades of experience are not immune. So the lesson? Well, it's what I'm going to call the reality check framework Three critical steps that can save you from your own brilliant ideas.

Speaker 1: 6:32

Step one the distance test. Think of your marketing like a painting. You need to step back to see the whole picture clearly. In my case, I was so close to my rebrand idea that I couldn't see the force through the trees. I was so close to my rebrand idea that I couldn't see the force through the trees. The solution Get objective opinions from people who aren't emotionally invested in your idea. Step two the simplicity check, ask yourself am I making this more complicated than it needs to be? I realized I was trying to fix something that wasn't broken. Sometimes, as the old adage says, if it ain't broke, don't fix it, just optimize it. And step three, the search test. This is crucial in today's digital world.

Speaker 1: 7:15

I discovered that small changes, like using podcasts instead of show in your branding, can have an impact in discoverability. For podcasts. It's not just about being creative, it's about being findable. But here's the real gold nugget I want you to take away from this experience. While valuable can sometimes be our worst enemy, why? Because it can make us overconfident. It can make us think we're immune to basic mistakes. Let me share something that really will drive this home.

Speaker 1: 7:46

When I finally did test my brilliant rebranding idea, you know, after almost implementing it, the feedback was eyeopening. People were confused. They didn't get it. The very thing I thought that would make us stand out would have actually made us harder to find and connect with. This brings me to what I call the triple T rule Test, track, then transform.

Speaker 1: 8:12

No matter how experienced you are, no matter how brilliant your idea seems. Always test it with your actual audience. Track the responses objectively, then and only then transform your brand. Remember, marketing isn't about what we think is clever or brilliant. It's about what resonates with our audience and drives results. You know what's funny? After all this, we made a small strategic optimization to our existing brand instead of a complete overhaul. And guess what? Our download numbers will most likely not improve all that much, but we didn't end up risking our existing brand equity. So here's your homework Next time you have a brilliant marketing idea and I know you will take a step back, run it through the reality check framework, get objective feedback. Test it on a small scale. Your future self will thank you Until next time I'm Buzz reminding you that being boring is a choice, so stay buzzworthy.