Read the full transcript of Mark Levy’s talk titled “Using The Obvious To Stand Out In Life And Business” at TEDxCapeMay 2024 conference.
Listen to the audio version here:
TRANSCRIPT:
The Importance of Standing Out
MARK LEVY: Maybe you run a business, maybe you’re the leader of a movement, you could be an influencer, or maybe you’re an artist, or maybe you’re a writer. Whatever it is that you’re doing, the work is important to you, and you’d like that work to be important to other people, maybe lots of other people.
But then the question becomes, how do you make that happen? How do you get other people interested and caring in what it is that you do? How would you even get them to notice you and your work in the first place? What could you put at the fore of what you were doing that would get people excited about what you were doing and even stop them in their tracks to take a look?
I have a secret to tell you about that. The thing that’s going to make you great, the thing that’s going to make you and your work beautiful to other people, the thing that’s going to get people excited about what it is you’re doing and make them perhaps want to join you in what it is you’re doing, that thing, that thing is probably pretty obvious. It’s obvious. It’s not buried. It’s more like gold that’s sitting right on top of the soil. That thing that’s going to make you great is obvious to absolutely everyone except to you. To you, it’s not so obvious. To you, it’s a little obscured.
The Curse of Knowledge
And that’s because of something that the sociologists and the psychologists call the curse of knowledge or the curse of expertise. It’s the idea that you’re too close to the work you do. You know your work too well. You may even be an expert in what it is that you’re doing. And that knowledge and that expertise is keeping you stuck. You can’t get a good conceptual distance away from your work so that you could see it in an open, honest, clear way and see what was so great about you. You can’t do it. It’s hard.
Other people outside your realm can see your greatness easier than you can because they’re not burdened by the kinds of knowledge that you have. But for you, it’s hard.
It reminds me of that old adage, “You can’t read the label inside the jar.” Right? So let me tell you, in order to find what makes you great and what’s going to make you stand out in the best possible way in this world, it is essential that you escape that jar so you can read that label because your greatness is one of the ingredients on that label. You’re going to have to become a stranger in your own business so that you could see your own business more clearly.
The Need to Stand Out in Today’s World
So I’m talking here a lot about the need to stand out. And why is standing out so important today, more important than any other time in human history? It’s because there’s so many of us on earth and we’re producing so much content. So right now there are over 8 billion people on earth. And because of social media, that means there are potentially 8 billion personal brands in the world. Potentially 8 billion. There are tens of millions of corporate brands in the world. You and I see hundreds of marketing messages each and every day. And over the course of months, we see tens of thousands of marketing messages.
So unfortunately, your good work alone just won’t cut it. You’re going to have to show the world something that it doesn’t normally see. Let me tell you a story about that. And I love to tell this story for two reasons. One is, it’s the story about a difference that’s centuries old. And the other reason is, it’s the story of a difference that came about accidentally. No one intended this to happen.
The Leaning Tower of Pisa: A Story of Accidental Distinction
850 years ago, in Italy, they built a tower. And the name of that tower in Italy was? Right. I heard lots of answers. And so some of you, I think, said the Tower of Pisa, which is right. And some of you said the Leaning Tower of Pisa, which is also right. But know that when they built it 850 plus years ago, they weren’t trying to build the Leaning Tower of Pisa. The blueprint did not say “Leaning Tower of Pisa” on the top. But you’re both right. It was the Tower of Pisa.
And so the Tower of Pisa is about 18 stories tall. And because of a flaw in its foundation, it started to lean almost immediately. They hadn’t even finished it. And over the centuries, it’s leaned anywhere from roughly 4 degrees to roughly 10 degrees. Now, you’d think a structure that tall, leaning over that far, that that would be a disaster. But it wasn’t a disaster. That lean made the Tower into a sensation for 850 years.
And think about how long that is in human terms. That’s about 37 generations of people have come from around the four corners of the earth to watch that Tower lean. I had read last year that the Tower, just last year, it drew about 5 million visitors. This is after 850 years. It drew 5 million visitors. And the plaza it was in made about 23 million dollars. And I’m sure there’s lots of reasons why people came to that area of Italy. But the dominant reason has got to be to see that Tower lean. That if you take away the lean, you take away a lot of those visitors, you take away the money, you take away the excitement, you take away the Tower’s very identity.
Finding Your Unique Angle
So whatever it is that you’re doing, whether you run a multinational organization, or you started a business at your kitchen table, or you’re an influencer, or you’re the leader of a cause or a movement, you need a lean.
You need a tilt. You need some kind of angle. So what are the things that businesses and personal brands use today in order to create their lean to attract attention to them in a big, big way? There are dozens and dozens of different ways to do this.
So for instance, a lot of corporations and a lot of people use their origin story. It’s the story of how they started in the work they’re doing and why it’s so important to them. And they use it in all their social media marketing. And people who fall in love with that origin story seek them out so they can be a part of someone who’s living that origin story.
Or businesses will take a piece of philosophy that’s important to the work they do. And they lead with that piece of philosophy in everything they do. And people who fall in love with that piece of philosophy and want it in their lives seek the company out.
But companies do other things like they create services for underserved parts of the population. Or they’ll create a product with a rare ingredient in it. And again, all these things, there are dozens of these things that are there to be unique to attract attention.
The Story of Schlitz Brewery: Revealing the Extraordinary in the Ordinary
But what I want to talk to you about right now, I want to tell you one final story. And this story, I think it’s about you. So this is the story about how you are going to find your greatness. The thing that you’re going to be standing out for in this world. And so this story is another historic story. We’re not going back 850 years like in the last one, only 120 years. And I will dramatize this story a little bit.
So in the early 20th century, there was a famous advertising man named Claude Hopkins. And Claude Hopkins got a call from the head of the Schlitz Brewery. And the head of the Schlitz Brewery said, “Mr. Hopkins, there are five big breweries in the United States. And on that list of five big breweries, we’re number five. We’re in last place. We need your help.”
And Claude Hopkins, the famous advertising man said, “I’m positive I can help you. I’m certain of it. But in order to help you, I’m going to have to take a tour of your brewery.” And the head of Schlitz said, “Mr. Hopkins, I don’t think you’re going to find much of anything if you take a tour of our brewery. But if that’s a condition of working with you, it’s a very easy one to grant. You’re in Michigan. We’re in Milwaukee. Just hop on a train and we’ll give you a tour.”
And Hopkins did just that. And what he saw at the Schlitz Brewery astonished him. The first thing they showed him was an artesian well 4,000 feet deep. The reason why Schlitz went that deep, they said, was they wanted to make the purest beer on earth, so they needed to start with the purest water on earth. By the way, artesian well means that that pure water was shooting out of the earth under tremendous force like a geyser. And Hopkins was very impressed seeing this.
And then they showed him a machine that cleaned every bottle four times before they poured the Schlitz beer into it. Again, if the water was pure and the beer was pure, they didn’t want to introduce impurities in the bottling. So they cleaned each bottle four times separately. And then they showed him in a laboratory what they called the original mother yeast cell. It was the original cell it had taken Schlitz brewers 1,200 experiments to create. This was essentially the great-great-grandmother of every bottle of Schlitz beer all time ever made.
So every bottle of Schlitz that ever had been made tasted like or was influenced by this original mother yeast cell. And every bottle of Schlitz beer that ever would be made according to the Schlitz hierarchy was going to taste like this original mother yeast cell or be influenced by it.
And Hopkins was freaking out. And Hopkins said, “Oh my God, this place, this place, this place is a wonderland. Why aren’t you telling everyone about all these wonders?” And the head of Schlitz said, “Mr. Hopkins, I told you you wouldn’t understand. And you don’t understand. This place, not a wonderland. And these things, not wonders. This is how you brew beer. This is how we brew beer. And this is how every one of our other competitors brews beer. We all do everything identically. We’re exactly alike. So what we’re doing here at Schlitz is nothing special at all. What we’re doing here is very, very ordinary.”
And Claude Hopkins, the famous advertising man, said, “Well, that well may be. But the public doesn’t know about any of this.” And so Hopkins proceeded to write a series of advertisements detailing every single thing he saw, detailing the 4,000 foot artesian well, the machine that cleaned the bottles four times, the lab, the original mother yeast cell, the brewers, the 1,200 experiments and more. And he put these in the ads and they published them in the newspapers. And in a matter of months, Schlitz went from being last place, number five, to being neck and neck, is how Hopkins wrote about it, neck and neck for number one.
Finding Your Greatness: The Extraordinary in the Ordinary
So to me, the lesson to that story is, and this is important to anyone here trying to affect change in the world, or anyone listening, this is important in order to affect big change. The lesson here is this, what is ordinary to you may be extraordinary to the world if they only knew about it. That you think certain things don’t count, whereas a lot of other people think these things that you’re ignoring do count, and they count a lot.
So coming up with your distinction, coming up with your greatness, it doesn’t have to be some long, quixotic journey. You just need to ask yourself the right series of questions. Questions such as the following:
What is it about my work that is painfully obvious to me, but may not be so obvious to other people?
What is it about my work that’s surprising? Because surprise is where the action is. Surprise means people’s expectations were defeated. They expected you to go one way and you went another way. And wherever there’s surprise, people are paying very close attention. So when you think about your work, think about surprise, anomalies, the unexpected. Because your greatness may be in one of those, and people want to see those things.
What stories reveal who I truly am? Or what stories reveal what my work is truly about? Because stories are these little packages of meaning that we create. And stories don’t just happen to us. We have to create stories. We have to find meaning in them. We have to hold on to them. So if you’re remembering a story, you’re remembering it for a good reason. It means something to you. So when your linear logical mind runs out of problem-solving ability, when you’re trying to solve a problem and you’re going in a linear ABC direction, and you can’t go any further, always ask yourself, what about this situation? What stories do I know about this situation? Because if you take one of your stories and you crack it open, you’re going to find your own ready-made wisdom in there. And your greatness may be inside the wisdom.
And the fourth and final question I’d like you to think about is, what is it about my work that other people just cannot forget? What is it about my work that people talk about even when I’m not around? Because that’s the perspective of others.
Questions like these are more than a mere exercise. Questions like these are a doorway into what makes you irreplaceable in this world. So when you leave here today, what I’d like you to remember is this, that as you try to find the thing that’s going to make you special, as you try to find your lean, don’t aim to be impressive. This is not about impressing others. Aim to be real. Because real is where your greatness lies. And real is where your beauty lies. And real is what the world will remember.
