EDITORIAL

TAKING A CHANCE ON IDEAS

Risk in Writing and Marketing

              Let me make two things perfectly clear. I haven’t read the book, and this article isn’t about the book.

              It’s about risk in writing – and marketing – and the risk that Edmund Morris took in the form he chose to write Ronald Reagan’s biography.

            Whether you like the book or not, whether you like Reagan or not, the point is that Morris, a respected and successful writer and biographer, chose a device that’s radical in a biography, and certainly in a biography of so visible a person as a former president of the United States.

              For those of you who are isolated from this sort of thing, what Morris did was make himself a fictional character in what he purports to be an accurate biography of Ronald Reagan.  This apparently allows Morris to comment, to invent, and to focus somewhat less objectively than one would expect in a serious biography. After all, biographies, of all kinds of writing, become the source of truth for all future generations. We know what we know of long-dead folk of consequence to their time only through what is written by them and about them. Morris, apparently, took a chance that his device would better tell the story of one of the most enigmatic men of our time than would traditional narrative. It was a risk.

              The consequences of that risk were that in the first instance, the book was judged not for the biography, but for the device. It beclouded the ultimate judgment of the veracity of the biography  and its role in helping us to understand the subject.  As it turns out, as the hue and cry about the technique decelerates, the objective view of critics seems to be that  seems to be that it’s an accurate biography, albeit not always flattering, and may well have been the best way to tell the story of a hidden and enigmatic man. No judgment from this corner. As I say, I haven’t read it yet.

              There is a crucial lesson to be learned from this exercise.

• Risk is inherent in all writing.
• The success or failure of a risk is not always immediately apparent
• Risk in writing – and marketing as well – is not only worth taking, but is essential to successful writing and marketing.

     Let’s look at it… 

Risk is inherent in all writing because if you’re going to be successful in communicating, especially in the competitive arena of ideas, then you’re going to have to be original. You never know, when you write something, if it will be read, if it will be understood, if it will be agreed with, if it will be enjoyed, and most significantly, if it will matter. And if you’re not prepared to take that risk, then you have two choices – don’t write, or be prepared to be dull, mundane, and unimportant – to have no impact or contribution.

This same rule applies to marketing as well. In today’s marketing arena, with new media on top of old media, how do you compete when everybody is doing and saying the same thing? Only by trying to be original, imaginative, and innovative. There are, after all, a finite number of marketing devices, and every competitor know what they are and how to use them. You can compete only be doing it better, which means with more originality, which means with more risk.

    The success or failure of a risk is not always immediately apparent, in both writing and marketing. The final judgment of Morris’ book has not yet been made, and is shifting from the original shocks. Now people begin to judge not the device, but the accuracy of the biography. And now the book is selling prodigiously.

 Certainly, in marketing professional services, valuing results takes time. The marketing program for a product gives you answers quickly; but until you can persuade somebody who is happily married to get a divorce, or a successful management to get an audit that hasn’t been required by law or a source of capital, there is no quick measurement of the efficacy of your marketing program. You’re out on a limb until some kind of results come in.

     Risk in writing – and marketing as well – is not only worth taking, but is essential to success. And the more competitive the environment, the greater the necessity to take risk. To seek new ideas, and fresh approaches.

 Can risk be diluted? Yes – by two things. Skill, and experience. It’s like getting into a car at the Indianapolis Speedway. The more skill and experience you have, the less risk that you’re going to get killed. And as they say on Wall Street, the greater the return, the greater the willingness to risk. But the greater the possibility that you’re going to win, too.

It’s the chance to win – whether it be writing or marketing or racing – that makes the risk worthwhile.

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