Purple Cow
February 27, 2009
I’m on a plane today on the way to Columbus for the National Youth Ministry Conference. As I was packing books for the plane, I came across a book I read a few weeks ago en route to Texas by Seth Godin.
I’ve become a fan of Seth Godin. I first heard about him from friends in marketing at Youth Specialties and I now read his books and blog posts periodically.
The essence of one of my favorite books, Purple Cow, is wrapped up in the title. Seeing a cow these days is not all that unusual (granted, more unusual for city dwellers but go with me on the analogy a bit). But seeing a purple cow – now that’s remarkable.
The point is that getting folks’ – including teenagers’ – attention is getting harder and harder. Marketers can’t use the same old’ approaches to get attention; they have to do something remarkable. Remarkable doesn’t necessarily have to be flashy but it does have to meet students’ needs.
Think about the next talk you are giving. Are you showing clearly and creatively (and hopefully in the first 2 minutes of your talk) how the Kingdom ideas you’ll be talking about meet their needs? I don’t mean a selfish “I want to feel better” kind of need; I mean the need we all have to know that God loves us from our head to our toes, and God invites us to be involved in Kingdom work.
Make your next talk remarkable. Make it a purple cow.
©2009 Fuller Youth Institute