Wizard of Ads Monday Morning Memo

I chose the title “Water Creatures” because it elicits the flexibility of symbolic thought, which is the subject of today’s message.

“Elicits from where?” you ask.

From within you.

“Water” followed by “Creatures” causes you to imagine living things in a liquid world where slippery creatures wiggle through water more elegantly than birds through the air, occasionally bursting through the barrier that separates their world from our own. We see them briefly above the waterline.

Symbolic language allows your listener to personalize your story and participate in it by supplying details that you did not include.

Symbolic language gives you access to the thoughts and beliefs and hopes and dreams and suspicions that lie deep in the hearts of your listeners.

This is what people are talking about when they speak of “listener engagement.”

John Steinbeck describes this process in his preface to “East of Eden.”

“The reader will take from my book what he brings to it. The dull witted will get dullness and the brilliant may find things in my book I didn’t know were there.”

Symbolic language causes the subconscious to become active.

We did this together last week when we alternated a series of non-rhyming lines from unrelated works of literature and then layered those lines like a lasagna to see what they would say to the subconscious mind.

After each line is read, I will inject my own reaction.

Something there is that doesn’t love a wall.

(a desire to cross a barrier)

Darkness settles on the city

(the world grows dark)

of man’s first disobedience, and the fruit.

(disobedience and fruit)

Children playing in the garden.

(innocence in a garden)

To be, or not to be, that is the question.

(Life? Or Death? A choice.)

Winter brings a bit of sadness.

(Loss of light and warmth)

Silence covers hidden places.

(Silence and hiding)

When those random lines are considered collectively, I am reminded of an ancient story in the third chapter of Genesis.

(And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.

Then the Lord God called to Adam and said to him, “Where are you?

Adam said, “I heard Your voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid myself.”

God said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you that you should not eat?”)

Those random lines triggered the third chapter of Genesis in my mind. Your reaction may have been been entirely different.

We take from the story what we bring to it. This is the nature and the wonder of symbolic language.

Bob Dylan won a Nobel Prize for it.

Do you doubt me?

Let’s look at the lyrics of Dylan’s greatest hits. I believe that you will quickly recognize their flavor to be a reduction sauce of symbolic thoughts created by a master chef, a concentrated liquid as dark as the deepest waters.

How does it feel, how does it feel?

To be on your own, with no direction home

A complete unknown, like a rolling stone

Ah you never turned around to see the frowns

On the jugglers and the clowns when they all did tricks for you

You never understood that it ain’t no good

You shouldn’t let other people get your kicks for you

You used to ride on a chrome horse with your diplomat

Who carried on his shoulder a Siamese cat

Ain’t it hard when you discovered that

He really wasn’t where it’s at.

– Bob Dylan, Like A Rolling Stone © Universal Music Publishing Group

How many roads must a man walk down

Before you call him a man?

Yes, ’n’ how many seas must a white dove sail

Before she sleeps in the sand?

– Bob Dylan, Blowin’ in the Wind © 1962 by Warner Bros.

Hey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me

I’m not sleepy and there is no place I’m going to

Hey! Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me

In the jingle jangle morning I’ll come followin’ you

Then take me disappearin’ through the smoke rings of my mind

Down the foggy ruins of time, far past the frozen leaves

The haunted, frightened trees, out to the windy beach

Far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow

Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free

Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands

With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves

Let me forget about today until tomorrow

– Bob Dylan, Mr. Tambourine Man, © 1964, 1965 by Warner Bros.

Take a deep breath, friend, because we are going under again.

I was burned out from exhaustion, buried in the hail

Poisoned in the bushes and blown out on the trail

Hunted like a crocodile, ravaged in the corn

“Come in,” she said, “I’ll give you shelter from the storm”

Suddenly I turned around and she was standin’ there

With silver bracelets on her wrists and flowers in her hair

She walked up to me so gracefully and took my crown of thorns

“Come in,” she said, “I’ll give you shelter from the storm”

Now there’s a wall between us, somethin’ there’s been lost

I took too much for granted, got my signals crossed

Just to think that it all began on a long-forgotten morn

“Come in,” she said, “I’ll give you shelter from the storm”

Well, the deputy walks on hard nails and the preacher rides a mount

But nothing really matters much, it’s doom alone that counts

And the one-eyed undertaker, he blows a futile horn

“Come in,” she said, “I’ll give you shelter from the storm”

– Bob Dylan, Shelter from the Storm, © 1974 by Ram’s Horn Music

Chef, can you make a reduction sauce?

Do you know how to create a bubbling brew of symbolic thoughts that will become a crossword puzzle in our minds?

Do not think it is randomness, for it most certainly is not. Randomness is quickly recognized as the handiwork of a fool.

The mystery and magic of symbolic language is that we know for certain that it means something. And it is up to each of us to figure out, for ourselves, what it is.

Robert Frost knew this better than any man.

When people would ask him, “What were you trying to say when you wrote such-and-such?” Frost would always answer, “What did it say to you?”

Regardless of the answer they gave him, Robert Frost would smile and reply, “That is exactly what I was trying to say.”

Learn to use symbolic language.

Your heart already knows how.

Now you must teach your mind.

Readers will take from today’s Monday Morning Memo what they bring to it. The dull witted will find dullness, and the brilliant will find things I didn’t know were there.

Roy H. Williams

“If a story is not about the hearer he will not listen. And here I make a rule – a great and interesting story is about everyone or it will not last.” – John Steinbeck

The wizard says this is also true of ads that bond the hearts of customers to a brand. – Indy Beagle

Doug Noll is a well-known consultant to executives and entrepreneurs. He gives them essentially the same advice that the Wizard of Ads has been giving you for the past 32 years: “Win the heart, and the mind will follow.”

Doug says that strong leadership begins with the understanding of a simple truth: People are emotional beings, and their nervous systems shape how they respond at work. “Employers,” he tells roving reporter Rotbart, “should stop thinking of their staff as rational, and recognize instead how strongly their emotions drive their actions and decisions on the job.”

Doug says that leaders who understand this fundamental truth reduce workplace conflict and get more productive results from their people. Would you like to lead a happier, more productive team? Listen to this week’s episode at MondayMorningRadio.com

At the center of every cliché is a point that deserves to be made.

We need to learn to make these points in new and different ways.

Overuse make clichés predictable. Familiarity makes them sound “correct”, even though clichés are always a mistake.

A cliché is a phrase that is overused.

It is overused because it is familiar.

It is familar because it is overused.

Are you beginning to see the swirling pattern that accelerates and perpetuates the sucking of our language down the drain of imbecility?

Your goal as a writer should be to delight your listeners. You want them to be engaged in what you are saying.

There can be no delight without an element of surprise.

Predictability is the killer of surprise and delight. Clichés are the tombstones that mark the graves where their corpses lie.

Allow me to summarize: Clichés are bad. Do not use them.

NOTE: Every Large Language Model (LLM-AI) received its education by being immersed in an ocean of clichés.

May I teach you a new way to write that is new, surprising, and different?

Will you allow me to introduce you to meter?

Meter is music that is heard in the subconscious mind.

I will give you the names of a few different meters, but you do not need to remember them. The names of the meters are irrelevant. Your ability to create sentences that have rhythm is all that matters.

The most common meter in the English language is iambic pentameter, a rhythmic pattern created by an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable.

(da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM)

Robert Frost used iambic pentameter in Mending Wall

John Milton used iambic pentameter in Paradise Lost

Shakespeare used iambic pentameter in Hamlet

“Something there is that doesn’t love a wall.”

“Of man’s first disobedience, and the fruit…”

“To be, or not to be, that is the question.”

to BE, or NOT to BE, that IS the QUEStion.

(da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM)

If you reverse the order to create

(DUM-da DUM-da DUM-da DUM-da DUM-da

you are now using trochaic meter.

“Darkness settles on the city.”

“Children playing in the garden…”

“Winter brings a bit of sadness.”

“Silence covers hidden places.”

We will now playfully alternate those random phrases written in opposing meters.

Listen to the “call and response” that happens:

“Something there is that doesn’t love a wall.”

“Darkness settles on the city”

“Of man’s first disobedience, and the fruit…”

“Children playing in the garden…”

“To be, or not to be, that is the question.”

“Winter brings a bit of sadness.”

“Silence covers hidden places.”

When you have mastered meter, you will be tempted to add rhyme. Do not do this.

Rhyme draws attention to your meter and makes it predictable. Need I remind you that predictability is the killer of surprise and delight?

Blank verse is the name for words written in meter that do not rhyme.

Blank verse creates magical music in the mind.

Do you want your words to be remembered?

Learn to write blank verse.

Roy H. Williams

PS – There are a multitude of meters. You do not need to know them all. But if you are curious to know a little more, visit Indy Beagle’s rabbit hole.

Your best ideas always come to you when you stop trying so hard to find them. Sara Connell has studied why moments of clarity often surface while walking, showering, or just letting the brain wander. Sara teaches her readers and clients how to generate breakthrough ideas intentionally.

Do you have more ideas than time to pursue them?

Sara can solve that for you, as well. Do you want to listen in as Sara Connell shares her methods with roving reporter Rotbart?

Do you want to learn how to:

1. slow the mental noise,

2. identify which ideas are worth exploring, and

3. turn flashes of inspiration into concrete next steps for business and life?

The place to go is MondayMorningRadio.com

Unexpected events happen to us all.

This is why it is never completely within our power to determine the acceleration and elevation of our lives. We can, however, influence our futures to a meaningful degree through the intensity of our energies and the direction of our activities.

Your energy and your activities, your decisions and their consequences are the gas pedal, the gearbox, the steering wheel and the roulette wheel of your life.

Energy is the fuel that determines how fast your motor is spinning.How much energy are you expending each day?Activities determine your acceleration.What are you doing each day with your time?The amount of time you spend doing a thing – let’s call it “practicing” – determines whether you are in first, second, third, fourth, or fifth gear.Decisions spin the roulette wheel of Probability.Consequences follow decisions.Some of these consequences will be the ones that you were hoping for when you made your decision. Others will not.

Unintended consequences happen to us all.

Serendipity is an unintended consequence that works in your favor. Catastrophe is an unintended consequence that works against you.

Never assume that the roulette wheel of Probability will always land on a winning number. Even when you have a 90 percent probability of winning, one out of every ten spins of the roulette wheel will punish you for no reason.

It isn’t fair.

It isn’t right.

You didn’t plan for this.

You didn’t choose it.

But it happened.

Get over it. Get past it.

Deal with it. Move on.

Do not allow your ears to hear your mouth tell the story of your bad luck. Do not let your eyes read the words of it; for every time you revisit your dark story, you empower that one, bad spin of the roulette wheel to determine the acceleration and elevation of your life.

Quit whining and start winning.

What will you do with your energy and activities, your decisions and their consequences?

Will you choose a journey that is structured and predictable, or will you choose an exciting adventure?

Predictable, structured journeys are often tedious and soul-sucking.

Adventures are exciting because they bubble with trouble and danger. If there lurks no Wicked Witch, no dragon, no lions or tigers or bears, you are not having an adventure.

Paul Tournier wrote a marvelous book called “The Adventure of Living”.

Here are a few bits of its wisdom:

“The excitement of adventure rescues us from the Sea of Introspection that drowns many of those who hesitate.”

“The adventurous life is not one exempt from fear, but on the contrary, one that is lived in full knowledge of fears of all kinds, one in which we go forward in spite of our fears.”

“The law of adventure is that it dies as it achieves its object.”

Dorothy, go, adventure beyond the Wicked Witch, the flying monkeys and the sleep of the poppies, all the way to Oz.

Bilbo, go, adventure beyond William the troll and the spiders of Mirkwood into the lair of the dragon. Ride through the skies on the backs of giant eagles and return home as an altogether different Hobbit.

Frodo, go, adventure to Mordor with elves, dwarves, and men, destroy the ring, save Middle earth, then sail away on the White Ship to the Undying Lands.

Go, reader, find your adventure and feel alive again.

Roy H. Williams

The Wall Street Journal published a Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper on September 12, 2001, the day after 9/11. Their offices had been destroyed. The boss could not be reached. The Journal was published, nonetheless.

Listen as deputy rover Maxwell Rotbart interviews roving reporter Dean Rotbart, his father and co-host. They are talking about Dean’s newly expanded September Twelfth: An American Comeback Story. What we can learn from the Journal’s extraordinary response to a crisis that no contingency plan would ever have anticipated?

You are unreachable and your offices have been destroyed. Do your people know what matters? Do they feel empowered to act?

Can you believe that 9/11 happened 25 years ago? You will find it all at MondayMorningRadio.com

NOTE: First published in 2021, September Twelfth received a Gold Medal from the Nonfiction Authors Association.

Linda Pastam wrote a marvelous poem called “Driving West” in which these lines appear:

We are the pioneers

of our own histories, drawn

to the horizon as if it waited just for us

the way the young are drawn

to the future, the old to the past.

“…the way the young are drawn to the future, the old to the past.”

I need you to hold those words tightly in your hands, even though they wriggle and thrash like slippery fishes anxious to escape your unfamiliar fingers and return to the quiet darkness where they can breathe water and feel entirely at home.

Hold on to those words.

Dr. Roger Sperry was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1981 for his documentation of the differences between the two hemispheres of our brains.

One half of your brain puts you in touch with this Present Moment in this Real World.

The other half puts you in touch with the Past and the Future in that mystical – magical – hallucinatory unreliable World of Imagination.

Dr. Sperry discovered that what appears to a brain divided into two halves could more accurately be described as two separate, competing brains.

In his Nobel Prize acceptance speech, Sperry said,

“Each brain half appeared to have its own, largely separate, cognitive domain with its own private perceptual, learning and memory experiences, all of which were seemingly oblivious of corresponding events in the other hemisphere.”

Dr. Sperry later said,

“Each hemisphere of the brain is indeed a conscious system in its own right, perceiving, thinking, remembering, reasoning, willing, and emoting, all at a characteristically human level, and both the left and the right hemisphere may be conscious simultaneously in different, even in mutually conflicting,mental experiences that run along in parallel.”

Regardless of which half you prefer, both halves are equally important.

One half of your brain puts you in touch with This world.

The other half puts you in touch with Possible worlds.

One half puts you in touch with the sciences.

The other half puts you in touch with the arts.

Now let’s get back to those wriggling fish that I asked you to hold.

The Future to which the young are drawn, and the Past to which the old are attracted, are different time zones in the world of imagination.

The young live in the brightness of the noonday sun. The old live in the twilight and remember the light of day.

Most Americans attempt to persuade each other with facts. We do this because we trust Science and we worship Mathematics, and that is why we write such terrible ads.

Most of us, most of the time, trust our instincts.

We trust our intuitive hearts.

This is what Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman described as System 1 or “Thinking Fast” in his book, “Thinking Fast and Slow.”

Behavioral scientists estimate that roughly 90% to 95% of our daily decisions are made automatically and unconsciously using System 1 thinking.

Most people don’t want to admit it.

In fact, most people refuse to accept it.

But the scientific truth is that we make at least nine-tenths our decisions in that half of the brain where the darkwater fish glimmer effortlessly and thoughtlessly, silver and gold in the moonlight.

Study the arts. Learn to win the heart.

If you win the heart, the mind will follow. The mind will always create logic to justify what the heart has already decided.

Roy H. Williams

Paul Kesig uses the acronym L.O.V.E. to encapsulate his approach to sales.

Lis for celebrating Little wins.

O is for asking Open-ended questions.

V is for creating and communicating Value.

E is for building an Emotional connection.

Paul says that pairing love with sales strikes many people as contradictory. This is usually because their experiences with bad salespeople have taught them to truly hate the sales process.

Listen in as Paul explains to roving reporter Rotbart that those who have adopted his approach have quickly discovered that L.O.V.E. really can spell success; MondayMorningRadio.com

The Island Magic of Being Invisible

(A Song for My Partners)

Six months later,

a thought occurred to me;

Writing for Youtube is like writing

for radio and TV.

Every writer has at their disposal

the same techniques and tools;

microphones, sound effects

and cameras of every kind.

But if you will succeed

you must limit yourself

to the microphone of your keystrokes;

the sound effects and cameras of your mind.

When we hear the words of Shakespeare

they become music in our ear,

and when we hear Robert Frost

we are no longer lost.

Those rhythms, mental music,

and refrains

remind me of the language

of the Bible of King James.

So what now,

shall we do?

I will try to imitate them

and you will, too.

We will write words

for television and radio.

We will tell stories and our clients

will get rich you know.

We will write essays

and teach everything we show.

People will remember

what we taught them

but forget who told them

that it was so.

We will write songs

that make singers

comprehensible.

But we ourselves

will always be invisible.

Why do we do this,

you and I?

We do it

because we have to,

we don’t need

to know why.

We do it because

we feel compelled.

Writing is the only time

we don’t feel

like we should be doing

something else.

Roy H. Williams

Pennie and I were in New York 40 years ago for ArtExpo in the Jacob K. Javits Center. We spent 3 days looking at more than 10,000 pieces of pieces of art and meeting many hundreds of artists as we walked those 500,000 square feet together. At the end of the show we went home with only 3 pieces, all of which were purchased from a relatively unknown Israeli artist named Reudor Gratch.

We invited Reudor and his wife, Effie, to dinner that night at “One if By Land, Two if By Sea” in Greenwich Village. We had an incredible evening with them.

The next day, I picked up a newspaper when I noticed that one of the serigraphs we had purchased from Reudor was one of only THREE pieces of art the newspaper had photographed for their review of that year’s ArtExpo.

You can see it at the top of this page.

August 17, 2026

“Trust” is a fuzzy word.

We know the meaning of the word, but it conjures no clear image in the mind.

“Razor blade” is a vivid word. Every time you hear it, you can see that razor blade clearly on the visuospatial sketchpad of working memory – also known as your imagination – in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex of your brain.

Trust is abstract.

Razor blade is concrete.

Trust is an artistic, emotional, relational word.

Razor blade is a scientific, logical, transactional word.

If you are thinking, “Razor blade is not a word; it is two words,” please be aware that I know this.

“Razor blade” is a 3-syllable construct that conjures a vivid, concrete image in the mind. But those 3 syllables* require the combination of two nouns, “razor” and “blade” to deliver clarity.

Were I to say only “blade,” you might think of a sword or a pocket knife or the knife with which you carve the turkey at Thanksgiving.

Were I to say only “razor,” you might think of that classic, metal shaving instrument that slowly opens to reveal a thin, double-edged blade when you twist the knob at the bottom of its handle.

Or you might think of that black, blue and chrome Norelco Aquatec that currently lies in a drawer below the mirror gaze into which you gaze as you run that buzzing little beast over the stubble on your bleary-eyed face each morning.

Yes, I know that “razor blade” is two words. But for the purpose of this essay, I am thinking of it only as a series of 3 syllables that deliver a concrete image.

“Trust” is a single syllable that does not deliver a concrete image, but it does deliver a meaningful impression.

Do you trust your husband?

Do you trust your wife?

Would you trust your dog

to protect your life?

Do you trust the government?

Do you the trust the police?

Do you trust your insurance company

or are you being fleeced?

In those nine seconds, I aimed the eyes of your imagination at 6 different subjects, but that single syllable – “trust” – delivered what I needed it to deliver each time.

Let me summarize what I have spoken.

Abstract versus Concrete

is essentially

Impression versus Clarity.

Reader, are you troubled that I said, “I have spoken,” when the technical truth is that I have written?

Here’s another little tidbit for you. The written word has no meaning until it has been translated into the spoken word it represents. Even when you are reading silently, you are hearing words in your mind. When you translate t-r-u-s-t into the single syllable that those 5 letters represent, the written word becomes the spoken word in your mind.

You have been told that one picture is worth a thousand words.

Maybe you even believe it.

Let’s put that to the test.

Draw, paint, photograph, or use AI to create a picture of “trust.”

The impression that we want to deliver to the viewer is the identical impression that is delivered by that glorious single syllable, “trust.”

The image you create can contain no words, no letters, no sounds, no numerals. We are looking for that mythical picture that is supposedly able to deliver what cannot be delivered in a thousand words.

When you have created your picture, show it to 100 people. Say only, “Tell me what you see.”

I do not believe that you can create a picture that will cause anyone to look up at you and say, “Trust.”

Let it be written it letters of fire across the skies: “One word is worth a thousand pictures.”

I wish for you a joyous and productive day.

Roy H. Williams

*ray-zur blayd or /ˈreɪ.zɚ ˌbleɪd/ in the International Phonetic Alphabet

“Working hard” is usually considered a virtue. But what happens when work becomes so central to your identity that you can’t switch it off? Do you continue working even when you are exhausted, on vacation, or spending time with the people who matter most?

Dr. Angelica Perez-Litwin has spent more than two decades observing high-achieving clients — and, as she candidly explains, she has experienced this problem herself.

As she explains to roving reporter Rotbart, “A person does not need to surrender their ambition. The solution is to build a healthier relationship with achievement. Professional and financial success can remain important without becoming the only measure of who you are.”

Listen and learn at MondayMorningRadio.com

Between the village of Anwick and the town of Sleaford in Lincolnshire, England, lies a farmhouse.

It is at this farmhouse that our journey begins.

Robert is a stockman on a farm. Daphne is his wife. Their little boy, Bernie, is born in that little farmhouse by lantern light because the house is much older than electricity.

When Bernie is five years old, his father is promoted to farm manager, and they are moved into a house with electric lights.

Bernie thinks, “Now we are living the good life.”

He leaves school at 15, but his mother has given him a love for literature and her father “Poppy” has injected him with a love for nature and narrative poetry.

Bernie sends a few of his poems to a music publisher in London who is looking for song lyrics.

That same publisher is talking to a young man named Reggie who is looking for a way to leave “Bluesology,” a mediocre local band that plays songs while the patrons of local restaurants eat fish and chips. Reggie says to the publisher, “I’m very good with music, but I can’t write lyrics. I’m hopeless.”

The publisher responds by handing Reggie an unopened envelope that he snatches from the top of the pile on his desk. He says to Reggie, “See what you can do with that and get back to me.”

Neither Bernie nor Reggie are accepted by the music publisher, but they are accepted by each other. Bernie mails poems to Reggie in London, and Reggie writes the music that turns Bernie’s poems into songs.

You have heard many of these songs, I’m sure.

According to Jordan Runtagh,

“‘Rocket Man,’ ‘Honky Cat,’ ‘Crocodile Rock’ and ‘Daniel’ all immediately shot into the Top 10 in rapid succession. By 1975, they were responsible for 2 percent of all records sold on the entire planet. That same year they released Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy, which became the first LP in history to debut at the top of the Billboard chart.”

Reggie is Captain Fantastic and his farmboy friend Bernie is the Brown Dirt Cowboy.

Reggie knows, of course, that he is unlikely to become famous as Reggie Dwight, so he creates a new name from the names of his former bandmates, Elton Dean and John Baldry.

As “Elton John,” Reggie writes the tunes that make Bernie’s poems famous around the world. Some of those tunes are “Your Song,” “Levon,” “Tiny Dancer,” “Candle in the Wind,” “Saturday Night’s Alright for Fighting,” “Bennie and the Jets,” “Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me,” “The Bitch is Back,” “I’m Still Standing,” and “I Guess That’s Why They Call It The Blues.”

In 1973, Bernie was traveling to concerts with always high, out-of-control Elton, doing the job each day of all the king’s horses and all the king’s men by “putting Humpty Dumpty back together again.”

When the Brown Dirt Cowboy decided that he didn’t want to do it anymore, he wrote his brother a letter of departure:

“When are you gonna come down? When are you going to land? I should have stayed on the farm. I should have listened to my old man. You know you can’t hold me forever. I didn’t sign up with you. I’m not a present for your friends to open. This boy’s too young to be singing the blues. So goodbye yellow brick road where the dogs of society howl. You can’t plant me in your penthouse. I’m going back to my plow. Back to the howling old owl in the woods hunting the horny back toad. I’ve finally decided my future lies beyond the yellow brick road.”

“What do you think you’ll do then? I bet they’ll shoot down the plane. It’ll take you a couple of vodka and tonics to set you on your feet again. Maybe you’ll get a replacement. There’s plenty like me to be found, mongrels who ain’t got a penny sniffing for tidbits like you on the ground.”

Reggie Dwight did what he always did. He wrote a tune and sang what Bernie had written.

In the days when an album that sold a million copies was a “Gold Record,” Reggie and Bernie’s album, “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road” sold 30 million copies.

A few years ago, Bernie Taupin spoke of the “inseverable bond” of brotherhood that he and Elton have shared for 60 years.

“In the insanity of our lives, there’s nothing better than the times when we get to sit down, just together. Like those moments in the dressing room, about a half an hour before he goes on, when I’ll go in and see him and there’s nobody else in there, and it’s just he and I. The calm before the storm. It all comes back. When we’re just alone with each other, it seems like a frozen capsule of time that everything we’ve ever done together inhabits. That’s magical to me.”

Bernie, I think I speak for a lot of other people when I say that your partnership is magical for us, as well.

Roy H. Williams

The Three Quivering Questions of Modern Society:

How can I achieve my goals with less effort?How can I achieve my goals in less time?How and where can I find pleasure?

These are the “How to…” questions.

(I call them the Quivering Questions because they contain an anxious energy similar to that of an addict looking for his or her next “fix.”)

Shortcuts, pro tips, life hacks, and insider secrets are snippets that exist to tell you “How to…”

Schools, seminars, master mind groups, and countless consultants exist to tell you “How to…”

Millions of books and Youtube videos have been written and produced to tell you “How to…”

The answers to the “How to” questions are always Informational.

The Three Ancient Questions That Echo Within Us:

Who Am I? (Identity)Why Am I Here? (Purpose)What Must I Overcome? (Adventure)

Those are the “Fascination” questions.

Fascination is the drive behind our search for God and our hunger for entertainment.

Faith and entertainment seem incongruent until you realize that both of them fascinate us because they change our mood and lift us higher.

The answers to the “Fascination” questions are always Relational.

When you understand these 6 questions, you understand the essence, attraction, and purpose of social media.

Youtube offers only “How to” videos and “Fascination” videos.

Likewise, every book is either a “How to” book or a “Fascination” book.

Television shows are either “How to” or “Fascination.” Movies and music lend themselves mostly to fascination.

I told you, “Fascination is the drive behind our search for God and our hunger for entertainment.”

When we contemplate our existence and the possibility of God, we ask,

Who Am I?Why Am I Here?What Must I Overcome?

Your answers to those questions will determine your faith, whether it be Judeo-Christian, Hindu, Moslem, Buddhist, Atheist, Agnostic, or one of the many other belief systems with millions of followers.

When entertainment elevates our mood, our fascination comes from identity reinforcement.

The books, movies, and television shows that we love are the ones that show us a reflection of ourselves.

When we identify with a character, we vicariously experience the challenges they face. These challenges are known as the plot or the “narractive arc.”

We likewise experience the evolution of that character when they are changed by those challenges. This is known as the “character arc.”

The characters with whom we identify remind us of who we are.

Identity reinforcement is the essence of affinity groups.

An affinity group is any group of people who are attracted to the same thing.

Every religion is an affinity group.

The fans of a sports team are an affinity group.

People who follow fashion are an affinity group.

If you like jazz music, or hip-hop, or Jeeps or NASCAR or backpacking or sewing or science fiction or romance or current events or capitalism or gossip, you are in an affinity group.

Mass media and social media exist to attract and serve affinity groups.

The size of a business opportunity is largely determined by size of the affinity group it serves.

If you are an electrician, a plumber, or an HVAC technician, your affinity groups will be people who like and need electricity, running water, and comfortable temperatures. Your limiting factors will be

the population of your trade areathe strength of your competitors.how often the average person needs your servicesWhether or not your name is the one people think of first and feel the best about.

If you are a dentist, a jeweler, a lawyer, or a tree trimmer, your limiting factors will be

the population of your trade areathe strength of your competitorshow often the average person needs your servicesWhether or not your name is the one people think of first and feel the best about.

If you own a restaurant, a grocery store, or sell some other product that people need weekly, your limiting factors will be

the population of the neighborhood in which you are locatedthe quality of the customer’s experiencethe visibility of your location

Believe it or not, everything I have told you in these 727 words is extremely important when you are creating the messages that you will spend your advertising budget to deliver.

I understand if you are surprised by this, but it is true, nonetheless.

Roy H. Williams

Facebook has 3.07 billion monthly active users

YouTube has 2.5 billion monthly active users

Instagram has 2 billion monthly active users

TikTok has 1.58 billion monthly active users

LinkedIn has 930million monthly active users

NOTE:Monthly Active Users tells you only the Reach of these platforms. But to compare Effectiveness, you would need to know how much time each week a user spends on each platform. You would also need to know how many times each week the same user could be reached on that platform. I’m Indy Beagle

THIS WEEK on Monday Morning Radio: Steven Mercer speaks from personal experience when he tells entrepreneurs how to build a service practice without sacrificing their values, their time, or their financial stability.

Deputy rover Maxwell Rotbart asks brilliant questions and scribbles notes while Steven Mercer explains how to transition gradually from current employment to independent practice. He then explains how to attract clients through referrals and valuable content. He also explains how to decide when advertising makes sense.

Do you want to know the best ways to set fees, establish boundaries, and handle difficult clients?

Class will begin the moment you arrive at MondayMorningRadio.com.

Life is an adventure of choices and consequences.

Choices and consequences.

I believe that with all my heart.

But I do not believe that wise choices will always yield the outcome you desired.

The Book of Ecclesiastes is filled with the wisdom and insights of Solomon, who had this to say in chapter nine;

“I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favor to men of skill; but Time and Chance happens to them all.”

I agree with what Solomon wrote, so I dare not say that a wise choice will always produce the desired outcome. But I will say that in the absence of unlucky timing and plain old bad luck, good Choices usually lead to good Consequences.

Vi Wickam, one of my Wizard of Ads partners, wrote 140 words last week that knocked my socks off.

I am typing these words to you on a computer that sits on top of my desk. Below that desk are my bare feet.

My socks are nowhere to be found.

These are the 140 words that Vi Wickam wrote for American Business Secrets.

Make a Decision.

Many people talk about decisions, but few people understand what it really is

to make a decision.

Not every choice is a decision.

Decide comes from the Latin words “de” – meaning OFF – and “caedere”, meaning to CUT.

To decide is to Cut Off the other possibilities.

Few things are as powerful as a true decision.

To decide is to move in a direction and to cut off the others.

To decide is to keep your focus, and to not look back.

To decide is to face your fear of loss.

Every decision comes with loss, and you must face it.

When you face that fear, you will feel relief.

You will breathe easier.

To decide is to stop second guessing yourself.

To decide is to move forward with clear vision, and clear purpose.

Make a decision today.

With American Business Secrets, I’m Vi Wickam.

Do you often have to explain, justify, and defend your decisions?

Me, too.

These are the 3 key sentences in Vi’s 140-word essay that jerked my eyes open and blew my socks away:

Not every choice is a decision.To Decide is to Cut Off the other possibilities.Every decision comes with loss, and you must face it.

Some people believe that if you delay long enough, a solution will arise that causes no discomfort, no inconvenience, and no awkward moments.

You will find these people waiting for their luck to turn, waiting for their ship to come in, waiting for their big break, waiting to begin this long, awkward, funny, delightful and difficult Walk of Life.

Roy H. Williams

Saturday, August 1st, will mark the 150th Anniversary of Colorado’s admission to the Union as the 38th state.

That milestone might not seem to relevant at first glance, but your opinion will quickly change.

Maxwell Rotbart reveals in his new book, “Becoming Colorado,” the Rocky Mountain territory’s long struggle for statehood offers valuable lessons for today’s business executives in leadership, negotiation, coalition building, crisis management, branding, and strategy.

Chief rover Dean joins deputy rover Maxwell to explore the business counsel hidden within Colorado’s remarkable journey to statehood. Together, they will validate Winston Churchill’s famous observation: “The longer you can look back, the farther you can look forward.”

Are you ready to be fascinated? The place to be is MondayMorningRadio.com

Road Atlanta is a famous roadracing track 800 miles from Tulsa, Oklahoma, a grueling trip to make in the back seat of a 1972 BMW 2002.

Tony and Indy ride in the front seats. Pennie and I ride in the back.

We stop only for gas.

Arriving in pre-dawn Atlanta, we get a few hours sleep, then go down to the track where 67 racecars are parked in the dim sunlight of a misty morning.

We are invited to examine all 67 of the racecars. At the end of 40 minutes, Tony points to car number 52, a 1978 Buick Skyhawk. He says,

“Unless the driver sticks it into the wall or the engine explodes, that’s the car that will win.”

I looked at number 52, then glanced around at all the other cars and said, “Why?”

Tony said,

“That’s a ten-thousand-dollar paint job, and paint jobs don’t win races.”

“You’re telling me that the owner is an idiot. So why do you think his car will win?”

Tony slowly shook his head, then said,

“The fact that he spent $10,000 on a paint job lets me know that he spared no expense doing everything that matters. This guy did hundreds of important things to this car before he gave a single thought to the paint job. This paint job was the very last thing he did.”

When I understood what Tony was saying, I repeated it back to him. “The fact that he has spent a ton of money to repaint a brand-new car that was already beautiful means that he has already done everything else that could help him win this race.”

Tony said,

“Ten-thousand-dollar paint jobs don’t win races.”

I nodded my head, then we silently climbed the hill where we would sit to watch the race.

The track at Road Atlanta is two-and-a-half miles of hills, valleys, winding curves, and long straightaways that eat most of the cars and drivers who dare to place tires on its asphalt.

A grass-and-tree-covered park sits in the center of that fierce track like a glittering jewel. This is where we will sit on blankets and watch cars fly past at startling speeds as 67 drivers try to outdistance each other for 6 screaming hours.

At the end of the appointed time, only 24 cars remained on the track.

Number 52 won by an impressive margin.

A client said something to me three weeks ago that triggered my memory of standing on that racetrack with Tony 48 years ago.

When a young client said that he was thinking about spending a huge amount of money for new truck wraps, I was instantly transported back to that track, listening to Tony explain why the car with the $10,000 paint job would win the race.

My client owns a fast-growing home services company that sends technicians to houses to fix things that are broken. He has only been in business a few years.

I accepted him as a client because I saw that he had already begun doing the things that will take his company higher than the tops of the mountains that surround him.

When he told me that he was thinking of investing a shocking amount of money to have his service trucks re-wrapped, I asked, “Why?”

He said he had read a list of extremely successful companies who had all used the same graphics house to design their new truck wraps.

I asked,

“Was it the owner of the graphics house that compiled and published the list?”

My client said “Yes.”

I said, “I once went to an Italian Restaurant in Weehawken, New Jersey that had a prominent sign in the foyer that said, “This Dining Establishment is Highly Recommended by its Owner.”

We both laughed. Then I said to my client,

“Paint jobs don’t win races and truck wraps don’t grow companies. The owners of every company on that list had already done everything they could do that would make a difference. When they had run out of ways to spend money on things that actually matter, they decided to get an expensive paint job.”

Then I concluded my counsel by saying,

“You own this company. I do not. My job is to help you do whatever you choose to do. If you feel like you have already done everything that you know for sure will make a difference, then spend the money for the truck wraps. But don’t think that those companies became successful because of their truck wraps. Those companies became successful because they had already done everything else that matters.”

I do not yet know what my young client will choose to do.

But I do know two things:

He is smart, hard working, and is outdistancing all of his competitors.Paint jobs don’t win races.

Roy H. Williams

Ron Robinson says that successful organizations continuously evaluate their vulnerabilities, engage employees in solving problems, and remain flexible as conditions change.

Listen as Ron describes to roving reporter Rotbart his four-step framework for anticipating disruption and responding before challenges become existential threats.

Ron’s goal is straightforward: Help leaders weather the storms of uncertainty and emerge stronger in their aftermath. A storm is definitely coming. Escape that storm and emerge stronger at MondayMorningRadio dot com

I received an email last Thursday from my friend Doug Burdon in which he mentions a story told by Jesus.

That story is often called “The Parable of the Sower and the Seed.”

The story goes like this:

A farmer is slinging seed.Some of the seed falls on the compacted soil of the pathway where the birds came and ate it.Seeds fall on rocky soil where it spouts, then dies because the soil is thin.Some of the seed falls among thorns where it sprouts, then gets choked out by the aggressive weeds.Seeds fall on good soil where it returns a massive harvest.

Doug referred to that story to make an altogether different point than the one that I am about to make, but I think that there is a solid chance that Doug would agree with me.

Look at the sower of the seed as an advertiser, and the seed itself as the message that his advertising contains.

You will notice that Jesus did not say, “Target the good soil.”

(He does not say it in Matthew 13, He does not say it in Mark 4, and He does not say it in Luke 8.)

Think about that for a moment; a pathway is easy to see. Rocky ground and thorny patches are likewise obvious.

Why did Jesus NOT tell us to avoid spreading seed in places where it is unlikely to grow?

Why did Jesus NOT tell us to target the good soil?

(Yes, I am talking to you about the wisdom of using un-targeted mass media to spread your message. The consistent, long-term use of broadcast television and broadcast radio continues to be wildly effective even though they reach the untargeted, unfiltered, unwashed masses.)

I am convinced that Jesus was familiar with the book of Ecclesiastes, which was written hundreds of years before He was born. These are the high points of what you will find in the first 6 verses of Ecclesiastes chapter 11.

“Ship your grain across the sea; after many days you may receive a return.” [Translation: Don’t fall into the trap of short-term thinking – RHW] …”Whoever watches the wind will not sow seed. Whoever looks at the clouds will not reap a harvest. But you do not know the path of the wind… Sow your seed in the morning, and in the evening do not let your hands be idle, for you do not know which will succeed, whether this or that, or whether both will do equally well.”

In other words, “Quit trying to know the end from the beginning. Energetic activities are more far productive than data collection and analysis.”

Do not fall into the trap of short-term thinking.

Sow the seed, sow the seed, sow the seed.

Do not try to target the good soil.

Sow the seed, sow the seed, sow the seed.

Do not worry about whether or not “this” is the right time.

Sow the seed, sow the seed, sow the seed.

Quit thinking that you have the ability to predict the future.

Sow the seed, sow the seed, sow the seed.

Perhaps my beliefs are completely wrong, but if they are, then it would appear that Jesus and Solomon were wrong, too.

Roy H. Williams

Colin Hodge knows that rapid business growth begins with understanding why customers think, choose, and behave as they do. Colin applies practical insights from psychology to strengthen customer loyalty and make better decisions through continual experimentation.

As he tells roving reporter Rotbart, this mindset proved essential after his first successful app was abruptly pulled from Apple’s app store, forcing him to start over.

Today, Colin’s company is back on Apple and has more than 17 million users. His story demonstrates how every setback can become the springboard to even greater success.

Are you ready to run down that springboard, bounce high into the air, and reach for the stars? If your answer is “Yes,” the place for you to be is MondayMorningRadio.com.

Dear Elon,

Congratulations on your initial public offering of SPCX.

Google’s AI says, “The blockbuster debut briefly made Elon Musk the world’s first trillionaire on paper.”

The words “briefly” and “on paper” dim the dazzling brightness of the word “trillionaire” a little, but still, it’s a pretty big deal.

I’m sure that Errol and Maye are super-proud.

You’ve come a long way since you started Zip2 with your brother, Kimball, in 1995.

Who would have ever thought that a company that created online city guides for newspapers would sell for $307 million after just 3 and 1/2 years in business?

Your 7% was only worth $22 million, but still, that’s a lot of pocket money for a 27-year-old boy.

Your decision to partner up with Ed Ho, Harris Fricker, and Christopher Payne to create “X,” and then merge with your biggest competitor so that all of you could survive the bursting of the dotcom bubble, well, that was another brilliant move.

It worked out well for Max Levchin and Peter Thiel, too. You and Thiel and Ho, Fricker, Payne and Max created Paypal at exactly the right time.

Well done, all of you!

But of all your accomplishments, the one that impresses me the most is the frictionless website that you built to sell cars.

Every Tesla owner that I have ever met has admitted to being marveled by how easy it was to buy a new Tesla. Five minutes online and $500 on a credit card leaves the customer sitting there, mildly stunned, asking themselves. “Did I really just buy a car? Can it really be that easy?”

Elon, when people marvel at something, the thing that marvels them can rightfully be called marvelous.

Elon, your Tesla website is marvelous.

And the car is marvelous.

Except for one thing. Can we talk about that one thing for a moment?

Shortly after my wife Pennie bought her Tesla, I saw that we had a sheet rock screw embedded in the center of the tread in the right rear tire.

Pennie said, “No problem, Tire Service is one of the things that my Tesla app says they can do right in our driveway.”

So she pulled out her phone and quickly ordered and paid for Tire Service.

When the tire guy showed up he said, “Yep. That’s definitely a sheet rock screw and it’s definitely an easy fix, but I can only do tire rotations. Take this to the Tesla service center and I’m sure they will do it for free.”

When Pennie got back from the service center, she said that your service manager told her that the tire could not be fixed because it had a scuff on the sidewall, so he sold her a $400 new tire.

Obviously, I should have gone with her.

Was she cheated out of $400? Yes. In my opinion, she was cheated out of four hundred dollars.

Have we been cheated by other people for more money than that? Yes.

Life goes on.

Elon, you and I both know that no car on earth – not even your Tesla – is equipped with onboard sensors that can monitor the depth of the tire tread on a tire. So I can only assume that this annoying “tire tread” warning light that has been front-and-center on our dash ever since she visited your service center was most likely put there by the same aggressive salesman who already sold my wife a tire that she did not need.

I’m sure you can understand why I will never visit another Tesla service center.

Can we resolve this like honorable men?

Elon, I will Venmo you another $400 if you will tell your service manager to press the button that will make the annoying “tire tread warning” light disappear from the dash of my wife’s car.

You can keep the tire. I don’t need it, just like I didn’t need the first one. But I really do need that annoying dash light to go away.

I will even Paypal you the $400 if you prefer.

Again, congratulations on briefly becoming the world’s first “on paper” trillionaire.

– Roy H. Williams

There is a big difference between a boundary and a wall.

A boundary is a friendly agreement that keeps people from going too far.

But a wall separates people.

A wall isolates people.

A wall keeps people away.

In business, there are few things more important than the management of expectations through the use of clearly-worded boundaries.

In business, these boundaries are called “up-front agreements.”

An “up-front agreement” clarifies – at the very beginning of the relationship – what is INCLUDED, and what is EXCLUDED.

It lets everyone know what they CAN expect, and what they CANNOT expect.

“Up-front agreements” are how you establish boundaries with your customers.

Boundaries are friendly.

Walls are unfriendly.

When you tell a customer “NO” by announcing that something is against your “company policy,” you build a wall that protects you from your customer.

That wall will also make your customer feel like they need to be protected from you.

Boundaries give people clarity and confidence.

Walls give people anxiety and doubts.

Boundaries make people feel happy and safe.

Walls make people feel angry and afraid.

Businesses thrive and customers are happy when the boundaries are clearly known.

A clearly worded “up-front agreement” gives your customers confidence because it lets them know the boundaries in advance.

But any time you say “NO” to a customer by telling them of some unknown “company policy,” you are putting up a wall that says,

“We don’t want you here.”

“You should not have come here.”

“Please tell everyone you meet.”

I have told you two things:

If you want your business to grow, make your boundaries known so that everyone knows in advance what is – and is not – included, and what can – and cannot – be expected.If you want your business to grow, never, ever, surprise a customer with a “wall” that they did not know was there.

– Roy H. Williams

Most companies struggle with how to turn good ideas into successful outcomes. Jeffrey Lambert knows exactly why we struggle, and how to correct it. A veteran project-management expert, Jeffrey can explain in plain English why companies always benefit from clear project ownership, well-defined goals, and disciplined execution.

As he tells roving reporter Rotbart, the best business plans and transformation initiatives fail when organizations rely too heavily on technology and systems, while overlooking the importance of culture, communication, and employee readiness. Are you ready to quit being frustrated? Your solution awaits you at MondayMorningRadio.com

If your message is predictable, your message is invisible.

If your advertising is predictable, your advertising is invisible.

When something never changes, we quit paying attention to it.

But we always pay attention to things that are new, surprising, and different.

What qre you doing for your customers that is new, surprising, and different?

Talk about those things in your advertising.

Most business owners are fearful of making a mistake.

But you cannot do things that are new, surprising, and different

unless you are willing to take a chance.

If you never make mistakes, you’e not taking enough chances.

Take a chance.

Offer your clients a product, a service, a benefit, or a guarantee that surprises and delights them.

The first step is to decide how you will surprise and delight your customers.

The second step requires energy and activities.

Energy and Activities.

Energy and Activities.

Energy to Energize.

Activities to Organize.

Let’s review what we have learned.

ONE: Predictability is Invisibility.

TWO: You will delight your customers with something that is new, surprising, and different.

THREE: Business growth is fueled by energy and activities.

Decide what you will do that is new.

And then do it.

– Roy H. Williams

Starting with a single strand of pearls that he purchased for his girlfriend, Jeremy Shepherd has become one of America’s most successful sellers of pearls and pearl jewelry. Intrigued by the pearl business, he became rich in pearls of wisdom as he accumulated a treasure trove of entrepreneurial insights through his successes and his mistakes.

Roving reporter Rotbart credits Jeremy with recognizing a business opportunity and then having the determination to transform himself into one of the industry’s leading experts. If you’re looking for profit-making advice that has real luster, Jeremy’s insights glow with it.

Pearls of wisdom are free today – and on the way – at MondayMorningRadio.com

Do you want to become a great ad writer?

Follow these ten steps and you will rise high and go far.

1. Read poetry every day.

2. Memorize at least two dozen poems.

3. Recite them out loud when you are alone.

4. Perform them spontaneously when you have an audience.

5. Feel the pulsating rhythm that is the heartbeat of every poem.

6. Wiggle your way through the unexpected twists and turns that are its dance.

7. Ask a few business owners to evaluate the ads that you have written for them.

8. Listen respectfully to everything they tell you. Even when they are wrong.

9. Do not try to change their mind about anything. Just write exactly what they would say if they could write as well as you do. Remember: This is their business, not yours.

10. Never write ads that rhyme. Use the heartbeat and the dance instead.

The pulsing heartbeat is called poetic meter. Study it.

The slide and glide of the dance is contained in its unexpected combinations of common words. Look, listen, and take note of these phrases in the poems that hit you the hardest.

Common words used in uncommon ways contain powerful magic.

Squeeze those phrases and drink the juice.

If you do the things I told you, your ads will dramatically outperform the ads of your peers.

You will make a lot of money, but your college-compliant peers will tell you that you are “doing it wrong.”

Let me now say it as plainly as I can:

Successful advertising is not informational. Successful advertising is emotional.

Powerful ads do not speak to the mind.

They speak to the heart.

Like a poem.

– Roy H. Williams

One more thing:

Everything I told you is true when you are writing for social media or for mass media. But the things that I told you do NOT apply to B2B (Business to Business writing) and they only partially apply to website copy. Websites and business communications need to deliver more facts and logic because THAT is what the customer is looking for in those moments.

Tim Whitt is a business coach who learned his craft from termites, mosquitoes, and stinging bees. Seriously. After more than 45 years in the pest-control business, Tim says every business owner can learn a lot from the problems that insects and vermin create for homeowners.

Listen as Tim tells deputy rover Maxwell Rotbart about the striking parallels between household pests and the damage that toxic employees can inflict upon an organization. He also names the steps that you can take to correct those problems.

If troublesome employees are infesting your workplace, Tim’s pest-control perspective may be exactly the advice that you need. It’s time to get crazy at MondayMorningRadio.com

Business owners ask, “How can we get customers to do what we want them to do?”

And then they create an app and insist that you download it.

How many apps have you been told that you need to download? (Look at your phone and count them.)

Generally speaking, retail apps are good because they reduce the friction of your shopping experience. Service provider apps are bad because they increase the friction of your service experience.

How many times have you had to reset your password?Have you ever had an app demand the answer to a question that sent you on a mission to find the answer?How many times have you been presented with a pick-list that did not include your need?Do you sometimes feel like you are making things easier for the service provider instead of them making things easier for you?

Six different service apps have recently increased my frustration to the point that I am now searching for six new service providers to replace them.

I was not surprised when I learned that all six of those companies are in decline.

And I’ll wager that none of them knows why.

Operational efficiency is a worthy objective. Just be careful that you are not shifting your workload onto the shoulders of your customer.

Every designer of a service app believes their app is going to be user-friendly, easy to understand, frustration-free, and save the customer a lot of time.

In reality, these apps are felt to be unfriendly and frustrating.

We both know that the objective is not to save time for us, but for us to save time for the service provider. They have established neat little cubicles to meet their own needs, and now they are telling us to crawl into each little cubicle and do what we are told.

This technology is not working for me. It is forcing me to work for them.

Wealthy superstar business owners do not ask, “How can we get customers to do what we want them to do?”

Superstars ask, “How can we do what customers wish we could do?”

Brian Scudamore, Dewey Jenkins, and Aaron Gaynor are superstar builders of service businesses.

Each of these superstars has elevated their service business to become a shining star in the dark night of every customer.

These men say:

“How can we make it effortless and frustration-free for the customer?”“We have to find more ways to make it easier for people to do business with us!”“How can we delight the customer in ways they did not expect?”“We will always have a solution for every customer. No one will be left behind. We never walk away from a person who needs us.”

Brian Scudamore built 1-800-GOT-JUNK into the World’s Largest Junk Removal Service by making every problem his problem.

“We make junk disappear. All you have to do is point.”

For many years Brian has been pondering the question, “How can we do what customers wish we could do?”

Brian identified four big things that his customers wished were possible, but that were clearly impossible.

Last month Brian Scudamore figured out how to do all four of those things!

When he makes his big announcement, I expect his company to quickly double in size.

I would tell you to buy stock in his company, but I can’t.

Brian owns the whole thing. No investors, stockholders, or board of directors.

Now you know how miracles are made.

Roy H. Williams

NOTE FROM INDY: I put an Aaron Gaynor radio ad on the first page of the rabbit hole for you. – Indy Beagle

Small-business growth creates a frustrating paradox: the more a business succeeds, the more overwhelmed the owner becomes. Small-business coach Jason Rosado helps small-business owners strengthen their teams, and create more free time for their owners.

In this week’s episode of MondayMorningRadio Jason tells roving reporter Rotbart how a business owner can identify whether their business truly needs more customers — or whether it is operational inefficiencies and leadership inflexibility that are preventing growth. If you could use some practical techniques for reducing stress and preventing burnout, check out Jason Rosado at MondayMorningRadio.com

Direct response ads are written to take the customer from Attention to Interest to Desire to Action in a single encounter.

Direct marketers have a product or a service to sell. They don’t have a brand to protect.

This is why ROAS is the perfect analytical tool for them.

ROAS is the acronym for Return On Ad Spend.

In other words, it is the Return On Investment of your ad budget.

You can:

measure lead generation with ROAS.compare the effectiveness of media with ROAS.track sales attribution with ROAS.

But you will never build a brand with ROAS.

In fact, the measurement of ROAS will always – without exception – lead to the disintegration of your brand.

Here’s why:

To produce an impressive result in a short period of time, your ad must contain a degree of urgency.Urgency is not sustainable, nor is it scalable.The longer you run urgent ads, the less well they work.

ROAS always looks great on paper for about a year, sometimes even 18 months.

But then the wheels fall off and you can never put those wheels back on again. Your brand will never be more than a shadow of its former self.

Consider this:

A successful Going Out of Business sale is simply a massive extraction of the stored value in a brand. This “stored value” is the reputation of the company and the trustof its customers.

These are variables that determine the success of every Going Out of Business Sale:

Has this company routinely advertised a Sale or offered a discount?How highly do people esteem this brand?How credible is the urgency contained in the ad copy?

ROAS always leads to short-term thinking because ROAS rewards ads that extract the largest amount of stored value from the brand.

Have you built a brand?

Do people feel a connection to your brand?

The day that you begin using ROAS to determine which ads work best, you will have launched a Going Out of Business Sale whether you intended to or not.

Roy H. Williams

One in every five American adults is the customer of a family that you have never heard of. Their company generates more than $32 billion in annual revenue. And the $17 trillion in customer accounts and investment funds it manages exceeds the gross domestic products of Germany, Japan, and India combined.Despite the enormous influence of Fidelity Investments, relatively little is known about the singular family behind the Boston-based multinational financial services giant.

Justin Baer, the deputy markets editor at The Wall Street Journal, reveals the dramatic three-generation saga of the fiercely private Johnson family in his new book. He also explains how they helped transform American investing.

Listen and be amazed as Baer shares with roving reporter Rotbart the behind-the-scenes story of Fidelity’s success. You will also gain insights from Fidelity’s rise in leadership, their marketing, their innovation, and their succession planning. The story begins the moment you arrive at MondayMorningRadio.com

I promise that I will state plainly for you – in ten short words – the singular Rule of Success before you have finished reading this Monday Morning Memo.

Stay quiet and stay close. We are wandering into a dangerous area. To see the glittering truth of the Rule of Success, we must quietly sneak up on it.

The North Star never moves because it hovers directly above the axis of the earth. If you draw a line from the South Pole to the North Pole and then extend that line 323 light years into space, it will touch the North Star.

Your life’s goal is your guiding light, your North Star. This is why you are forever traveling northward as you pursue your dream.

But there is a limit to north. That limit is called the North Pole.

When you go beyond that limit, you are now headed in the opposite direction.

This is the bitter truth that has been tasted by every person who has achieved their life’s goal:

“You work your whole life to reach the summit. And when you get there, all the roads lead down.”

Like every rule, North and South are finite and achievable.

Like every principle, East and West are infinite and unachievable.

You can travel east forever and never reach the end of “east.”

“The opposite of a correct statement is an incorrect statement. But the opposite of a profound truth is often another profound truth.”

Without intending to do so, Niels Bohr summarized in those two sentences the fundamental difference between a rule and a principle. The first sentence describes every rule. The second sentence describes every principle.

The person who turns a principle into a rule is a fool.

I call that person a fool only because their mind is not big enough to hold in stasis the contradictory tension that is at the heart of every profound truth.

Did it ever occur to you that helping people get what they want is the foundational principle behind every business on earth?

Do you want to be successful?

This the only Rule of Success:

“Find out what people want, then give it to them.”

Jesus taught us the eternal principle behind the Rule of Success when he said,

“Love your neighbor as yourself.”

Remove “Love” from that principle, and you will have a similar principle that says,

“It is always good to help people get what they want.”

But here is the “opposite truth” of that principle:

“It is always bad to help people get what they want when it would require injuring an innocent person.”

In other words, removing “love” wasn’t such a great idea.

People who worship at the altar of Ayn Rand always try to convince me that it is okay to damage naive, gullible, innocent people “because the only person that really matters is you, and you are not responsible for making other people happy. You are only responsible for making yourself happy.”

Interestingly, that is exactly what Jeffrey Epstein believed.

He died in prison for his belief, and his name has become a curse word.

Bernie Madoff was only pretending to help people get what they wanted. He was perceived as “successful” for as long as he was able to sustain his con.

Bernie likewise died in prison.

Sam Bankman-Fried was a young fool who pretended to be helping people while he was robbing them blind.

The courts took away the 11 billion dollars he stole. Then they locked him in a room the size of a walk-in closet where he will spend the next 25 years of his life.

Removing love is never a good idea.

– Roy H. Williams

Effective advertising is not about delivering information; it is about delivering persuasion.

Don’t tell your audience how to feel.

Make them feel.

Great ad writers are secret poets.

Poetry is not about making words rhyme. Poetry is about leading people to a realization.

Poetic ad writers open your eyes and cause you to realize.

They lead you to a conclusion, then let you discover it for yourself.

Great writers don’t tell you. They show you.

This poem will do that:

What of the watchman on the wall?

What says the watchman?

“It is 10pm, let the night begin.”

What says the watchman?

“It is 11 at night, everything is all right.”

What says the watchman?

“It is midnight, the bell has rung. Every song has been sung.”

What says the watchman?

“It it is 1am, I am all alone. I am all alone.”

What says the watchman?

“It is 2am, scrolling on my phone.”

What says the watchman?

What says the watchman?

What says the watchman?

What says the watchman?

The watchman watched his phone.

The enemy arrived.

The watchman is gone.

Don’t just deliver information. Deliver persuasion.

Open their eyes. Make them realize.

When they see what you see, they will do what you want them to.

Win the heart and the mind will follow.

The mind will always create logic to justify what the heart has already decided.

Roy H. Williams

Cheryl Strauss Einhorn helps executives, entrepreneurs, and leadership teams make smarter, more confident choices and avoid costly mistakes. As a Decision Science strategist, Cheryl developed the widely used AREA Method, a framework designed to help leaders challenge assumptions, reduce cognitive bias, and improve judgment in high-stakes situations.

In this week’s episode of Monday Morning Radio, Cheryl explains to roving reporter Rotbart that while “gut instinct” plays a valuable role in business, too many leaders rely on it entirely, rather than grounding their decisions in real-world testing, stakeholder input, rigorous analysis, and evidence. Listen and learn at MondayMorningRadio.com

Find out what people already want, then offer them exactly that. Quit trying to convince customers that they should want what you are selling.

Speak to everyone, everywhere, about widely felt needs, deeply held beliefs, and personal values. Quit telling yourself that you need to reach “the right people” with your advertising.

A: The media doesn’t make the message work. The message makes the media work. I’ve never seen a business fail because they were were reaching the wrong people. But I’ve seen hundreds fail because they were saying the wrong things.B: Anyone who has a friend, a relative, a co-worker, or a neighbor is an influencer. Is there anyone that you DON’T want to say good things about you?C: Powerful brands like Ferrari, Rolex, and Harley Davidson are known, loved, and admired by hundreds of millions of people who will never own a Ferrari, a Rolex, or a Harley. Do you think those brands would be better off if they were known only to the people that the brands chose to “target” as potential customers?

Customers buy from personalities they know, like, and trust.

A: People don’t bond with corporations, they bond with personalities.B: Brands that have personalities are exactly as real to us as our favorite characters in novels, television shows, cartoons, and movies. Who doesn’t love R2D2, C3PO, and Yoda? You realize those characters are purely imaginary, right? But we feel as though we know them.C: Does your brand have a distinctive personality? If not, why not?

I will now summarize each of those 3 Steps in exactly 12 words.

People want friends, honesty, encouragement, access, and to know that they matter.

Buy mass media. Quit fishing with a hook. Use a net instead.

Don’t be so boring. Find some courage. Be a distinctively memorable personality.

Roy H. Williams

Zig Ziglar would have turned 100 this year.

This week, Tom Ziglar shares some little-known stories about his father with roving reporter Rotbart and deputy rover, Maxwell, including the fact that despite Zig’s worldwide fame, he once carried a stranger’s luggage to the guest’s hotel room simply because the out-of-towner took one look at Zig’s red sports coat and thought he was a bellman.

But todays episode is more than a nostalgic look backward, as Tom Ziglar offers a thoughtful meditation on legacy, leadership, and the enduring power of optimism. Things are looking UP at MondayMorningRadio.com.

I write this with reluctance because I know that I will receive hundreds of emails correcting me on a few niggling little details.

But write on, I must.

“Write on, write on, write on.”

“Cost of Compute” refers to the $8 to $13 that every AI company has to spend on electricity and short-lived computer chips for every $1 that comes through the door.

Losing a dozen dollars for every dollar you touch isn’t a problem when investors are showering you with cash from a fire hose.

But it’s beginning to look like the well has run dry.

I did not want to defend where I got my information, so I went to the Goog and asked, “Oh Great Googness, why are people referring to the S&P 500 as the “S&P 10”?

Check this out, cub scout, straight from the AI of the Almighty Google:

“The S&P 500 is being referred to as the “S&P 10″ because a handful of massive technology-related companies dominate the index’s performance. Due to market-cap weighting, these top 10 stocks disproportionately influence the index’s total return, making the ‘broad market’ performance heavily reliant on these few, AI-exposed companies. More than $40 of every $100 invested in the S&P 500 is going into just 10 companies, creating a high level of concentration not seen in decades. In some recent periods, those top 10 stocks have accounted for nearly 90% of the entire index’s gains, indicating that the remaining 490+ stocks contribute very little to the overall upward movement.”

Allow me to highlight Three Big Problems.

Manufacturing companies, food companies, service companies, and all the other cash-hungry hopefuls that are the true wonders of the American economy have not been able to raise any money because way too many people have been dumping everything they’ve got into AI.That money has now slowed down, which means that a lot of AI dependent companies are now being burned by their “burn rate,” a slang term for “precisely how fast they are losing money.”AI is getting worse, not better, despite the fact that everyone is repeating like parrots, “AI is worse now than it will ever be. Hour by hour, AI will just keep getting better and better forever and ever.”

Okay, I can tell from the look of doubt that I see in your eyes that you need me to explain a little bit more about Problem Number 3.

They can’t raise prices fast enough to stop the bleeding, so most of the AI companies have reduced their Cost of Compute by 86%.

“But how?” you ask.

Here’s how. In the recent past, you could give your $200/mo AI some detailed instructions and it would go on a deep dive to bring you the golden nuggets of information that you requested. The 86% savings of Compute Cost is because they instructed the AI to just look in the cache for what they told someone else who asked a similar question. You get a recycled answer, and the AI company saves 86%.

I’ll wrap this up by giving you the storyteller’s definition of “inflection point.”

Bad storytellers say, “This happened, then This happened, then This happened, then This happened, then This happened.”

Real stories happen like this: “This happened, THEREFORE this happened, BUT then, This happened.”

“BUT then, This happened” is called “an Inflection Point.”

“So what’s going to happen next?”

Let’s wait and see.

Roy H. Williams

I could be wrong, but I think I see a line of 6,603 standing dominoes with a forefinger poised to flick the first domino.

Take a step back, I’ll give you some facts, and then we’ll return to the dominoes.

There are 6,602 FM radio stations in America, 597 FM stations in Canada, and 234 in Australia on which you can air radio ads for local businesses. These radio stations are producing miraculous results for business owners who hire great ad writers to enchant the audience and savvy media buyers to schedule those ads to air with correct repetition 52 weeks a year.

Sadly, most business owners do exactly the wrong thing. They run short schedules to “test the waters,” and then announce, “I tried radio and it didn’t work.”

ABC, NBC, CBS, and FOX are producing miraculous results for business owners who hire great ad writers to enchant the audience and savvy media buyers to schedule those ads to air with correct repetition 52 weeks a year.

Sadly, most business owners do exactly the wrong thing. They run short schedules to “test the waters,” and then announce, “I tried television and TV didn’t work.”

Did you notice the similarity that united those two easily proven facts?

Anyone who believes that online media has made mass media obsolete is comically delusional. I never waste time attempting to correct these people.

We will now return to the dominoes.

Nielsen Audio is the media measurement company that allows savvy media buyers to create miraculous radio schedules. Without Nielsen, they are flying blind without instruments and very likely to crash their flying machines.Cumulus owns multiple radio stations in 84 important cities in the U.S. Their current financial difficulties make it impossible for them to pay Nielsen for their measurement services.Nielsen has responded by announcing that Cumulus radio stations will no longer be measured or listed in future ratings reports.The resulting invisibility of those stations will cripple even the savviest media buyers.An emerging measurement system, DTS AutoStage, shows promise but I remain convinced that it will be at least a few more years before it has sufficient breadth of data to replace Nielsen.

The finger of Nielsen is flicking the domino that will knock over the other 6,602 dominoes in the chain that will ultimately result in the demise of Nielsen.

I have no way of knowing whether or not Nielsen realizes that.

Nielsen was purchased by private equity on October 11, 2022, less than 4 years ago.

Things are looking good for ABC, NBC, CBS, and FOX.

Roy H. Williams

When people talk about the Chicago Cubs and their historic 2016 World Series victory — ending a 108-year drought — Joshua Lifrak is a name you rarely hear. But he wears a Cubs World Series ring. Joshua Lifrak’s job was to help players perform under extraordinary pressure. Today Joshua works with business leaders to sharpen focus, build mental resilience and perform at their best. Be fascinated as Joshua tells roving reporter Rotbart and deputy rover Maxwell how peak mental conditioning is a “home run” skill that anyone can learn and practice, regardless of what they do for a living. Batter up! at MondayMorningRadio.com

Just as strawberries taste better when they are dipped in chocolate, advice tastes better when it is wrapped in a thick coating of encouragement.

Your advice is valuable, but it will never make as big a difference as your encouragement.

Encouragement is the opposite of flattery.

When you flatter someone, you tell them something positive about themselves that they know is not true. And they suspect that you know it is not true.

A flatterer is a liar who believes they are talking to a fool.

When you encourage someone, you tell them something you have observed in them that they know is true, or have always hoped was true, and you are simply confirming it by speaking it out loud.

You believe it to be true, and they know you do. And now they believe it, too.

You have spoken to the greatness in them. You have seen something in them that they have always hoped someone would see.

That’s what makes you a great encourager.

The people in your life need your encouragement more than they need your advice.

Think about the people who have made the biggest difference in your life.

Those people believed in you and gave you their:

TimeAttentionPatienceConfidence

When I say they “gave you their confidence,” I mean that literally. I’m not saying that they confided in you. I’m saying that they had confidence in you when you had none in yourself. They gave THEIR confidence TO you. They gave you the confidence that you have today.

Give a person confidence and they will never forget your name, your face, or that moment.

The people who gave you confidence saw something in you that they wanted you to share with the world. Their reward was that they got to see you flourish and blossom and grow.

Today they are seeing you make a difference everywhere you go.

Would you like to become an encourager?

When you see a stranger do something skillfully, say, “You make that look easy, and I know it isn’t. You really have a talent for that.” And then allow them to react.When a person says, “I’ve always wanted to become a __________, but everyone tells me that I couldn’t possibly do that because I __________.” Look at them and say, “Of course you can do it! I KNOW that you can do it. You just need to decide whether or not you’re going to.”When you have known a person for awhile and have seen a recurrent characteristic in them that you admire, say to them, “There are a lot of things about you that I really admire, but the thing that always knocks me over is when you_____________.”

Your words will light a candle in them that will never go out.

The lightning bolt of your encouragement will propel them forward and light their pathway for the rest of their life.

We need encouragers, and we need them badly.

I want you to consider becoming one.

Roy H. Williams

Martin “Marty” Strong is a former Navy SEAL, business leader, and author who challenges conventional thinking about how companies — and the people who oversee them — should operate.

Blending lessons from the battlefield and the executive suite, Lieutenant Strong argues that too many of today’s leaders cling to outdated methods, failing to recognize that the marketplace is constantly evolving — and that effective managers must anticipate and adapt to change.

To do otherwise, he tells roving reporter Rotbart, is like relying on an old encyclopedia — making critical decisions based on information that is no longer accurate or relevant.

In the Kairos moment, you will find yourself in an unknown place.

And a person will appear.

This person is known among storytellers as “The Old Man in the Woods.”

His job is to prepare you for all the challenges you will face on the next segment of your adventure.

Mr. Miyagi was the Old Man in the Woods for Daniel LaRusso in the Karate Kid.

Obi-Wan was Luke Skywalker’s first Old Man in the Woods, and Yoda was his second.

Have you noticed how every James Bond movie begins with 007 visiting “Q”?

“Q” is the armorer who supplies 007 with precisely the gadgets he will need to accomplish his next mission.

“Q” is James Bond’s “Old Man in the Woods.”

Luke chapter 4 tell us of how Jesus, immediately after his baptism, spent 40 days in the wilderness of Judea. When he emerged from that wilderness, he revealed himself to the world. Verse 14 of that chapter says, “Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about him spread through the whole countryside.”

Would it be fair to say that Jesus spent 40 days with the ultimate “Old Man in the Woods” prior to doing what he famously did?

John bar Zebedee sat next to Jesus during The Last Supper. He was the only one of Jesus’ followers to witness the crucifixion. And was entrusted by Jesus – from the cross – to care for his mother, Mary, while He was away.

John bar Zebedee, in chapter two of First John*, writes about the Three Stages of Life.

He speaks of the Child, the Young Man, and the Old Man.

I am writing to you, dear Children,

because your sins have been forgiven

on account of his name,

and because you know the Father.

I write to you, Young Men,

because you are strong,

and the word of God lives in you,

and you have overcome the evil one.

I am writing to you, Fathers,

because you know Him

who is from the beginning.

Because you know Him

who is from the beginning.

Children spend a dozen or more years preparing to become the strong Young Men and strong Young Women who, full of zest and zeal and zip-a-dee-doo-dah, will face challenges, overcome difficulties, and leave their fingerprints on the world.

And every one of them will need an advisor – an older and wiser friend – to counsel them, encourage them, and prepare them for what lies ahead.

John bar Zebedee was not speaking of biological Fathers and Mothers when he wrote the letter that we call the book of First John.

The people John calls “Fathers” are those who have already wandered the pathless forest and found their way to the other side.

The people John calls “Fathers” are those who already “know.”

The American Dream promises that when you have finished your journey and completed your task, you can recreate, luxuriate, and selfishly celebrate your success for the rest of your life.

And that certainly remains an option, if it appeals to you. But I believe that it will not.

I believe that you will choose to advise, encourage, and counsel the next generation who must blaze a new and different trail through a new and different wilderness than the one that you and I faced.

I believe that you will find fulfillment in your occasional role as “The Old Man” or “The Old Woman” in the woods.

Roy H. Williams

*I consolidated and reorganized what you will find in chapter two of First John, but if you read it closely, I believe you will agree that my retelling is faithful to the message of that original text.

I am always fascinated when I see business owners all marching in the same direction, doing the exact same things because they believe, “This is the way to differentiate yourself.”

Do you believe that following the same strategy as everyone else is the way the surest way to succeed?

Of course you don’t. Because if you were an unthinking conformist, you would never have subscribed to the MondayMorningMemo.

Strategy

Everything flows from strategy.

Your logo is the flag waved by your strategy.

Your sonic device is the trumpet call of your strategy.

(Do you have a sonic device?)

Your recurrent phrases – your brandable chunks – are the poetic expressions of your strategy.

(Can you name your brandable chunks?)

Your ad copy flows like a river from your strategy.

How swift is the current in that river today? How many people are swimming, canoeing, skiing, biking, hiking, fishing, splashing, frolicing and dashing in your river right now?

Your media buyer opens the floodgates that gush water into your river.

(How good is your media buyer?)

Do you understand why measuring ROAS is green kryptonite to every super-heroic strategy?

Do you understand why verbs make a bigger difference than nouns and modifyers?

Would you like to know these things and change the trajectory of your business and your life?

Be in the Tower at Wizard Academy on May 26th and May 27th.

Wisdom is knowing what to do.

Understanding is knowing whyit works.

If you have an open mind and a hungry heart, your life will be forever changed.

Or maybe you already know these things and should therefore absolutely, definitely, please don’t come.

Roy H. Williams

PS – Do you have a crazy idea? Would you like to learn from 4 famous people, each of whom have repeatedly taken their crazy ideas to the highest heights? It’s going to be an amazing adventure, full of wonder.

March 30, 2026

It pays to know what people already care about.

The following conversation illustrates one of the ways in which this pays.

“If I spend money on advertising, what will I get in return?”

It depends on what you say in your ads.

“What do you mean?”

Most ads have no relevance to most people.

“Yes, that’s why you need to target the right people.”

There is some truth in that, but not as much as you think.

“What do you mean?”

You can reach the right person, but if they have no current need for what you sell, you can only hope that they remember you when they do have a need.

“So, what’s the answer?”

The answer is to talk to people about what they already care about. Speak to what currently interests them.

“Can you give me a couple of examples?”

Sure.

Public Relations experts know that a highly relevant press release will deliver amazing results when it can be inserted into a conversation that people are already having.Mass Media experts know that TV and Radio ads deliver amazing results when they:

(A) speak to values and beliefs that already reside in the hearts of the masses

(B) introduce relatable, interesting characters so that people can bond with them

(C) use 40 percent of the total ads to create “sales activation” by making an offer of a product or service during a time when it is at peak desirability.

“But even when something is at peak desirability, don’t I have to be able to reach the right people?”

When you are using mass media, you can depend on the behavior of the masses.

“What do you mean?”

Most products and services will be at peak desirability during these three types of trigger events.

(A) Seasonality.

Every spring, the masses want junk removal, lawn fertilizer, gardening equipment and supplies, home improvement tools and materials, warm-weather clothing, A/C check-ups and a huge variety of other products and services. Each month of the year triggers its own felt needs.

(B)Holidays.

Each holiday triggers its own thoughts, emotions, and desires. New Year’s Day is when people invest in diet programs, gym memberships, and programs to help them quit smoking. Valentine’s Day is romance, and Memorial Day is when retailers have discount events, and then we have End-of-School, Vacation Season, Back-to-School, Thanksgiving, and then Christmas. Each of these are each trigger events that every company can build upon.

(C) Personal Trigger Events.

Moving out of a home or into a home is a personal trigger event that cannot be predicted by even the best AI. Likewise, engagement ring purchases, hot water heater replacement, funeral services, and car repairs happen at unexpected and unplanned times. Does it make sense to wait until the “Zero Moment of Truth” and then pay the price to generate an extremely expensive, low-conversion click? Or should you become the company the masses “think of first and feel the best about” when their personal trigger event occurs? Low-cost, high-conversion clicks are the result of people typing your name into the search engine because you have already won their hearts through the ongoing use of low-cost mass media.

CONCLUSION:

What you say in your mass media ads determines whether or not you will own real estate in the hearts and minds of the masses.

BONUS INFORMATION:

Youtube has become a new type of Mass Media.

I decided to start a couple of Youtube channels in February.

On March 4th, I decided to do an experiment. It began to pay off on March 5th.

Twenty-one days later, the results of those two experiments was a combined total of 1,234,238 new subscribers at a total cost of 2 cents per subscriber.

When a person subscribes, they are telling you,

“I love this and want more of it.”

If you want to know how much I spent to gain 1.2 million subscribers in just 21 days, all you have to do is multiply 1,234,238 by 0.02. (If you want to know precisely how much I spent, multiply 1,234,238 by 0.020319090498)

But that does not mean that all you have to do is spend the money.

You can buy views with money, but you cannot buy subscribers.

Subscribers are earned by what you say. You have to speak to a need that people already feel.

Weak, limp advertising tries to convince people that they need something that they do not feel they need.

Speak about what people already care about.

That’s the ticket.

Roy H. Williams

I have bumbled my way through life with a reasonable degree of success, I think.

Especially when you consider the number of people who have patted me on my head and told me that I didn’t need to understand what they were talking about because they would happily, “do all of those difficult things” for me if I would just hand them the checkbook and the keys.

I never did that, of course.

Head-patters are always convinced that I am a fool-child from Oklahoma because I never bother with a written plan, a budget, or a timetable for major undertakings.

But somehow, they always turn out okay.

Here’s an example of what I’m talking about:

When Pennie and I began filling 21 acres in Austin, Texas with large, complicated, and expensive buildings, I was asked at least once a day,

“How long will it take to build all of this, and how much will it cost?”

I always answered with the truth,

“It will take as long as it takes, and it will cost what it costs.”

That answer really alarmed people.

I didn’t say it to be shocking or cute. I said it because I honestly didn’t know and I genuinely didn’t care.

When you don’t borrow money, you can take as long as you want to do whatever you are doing. Rarely did Pennie and I have the money to do the things that we chose to do, but we knew that the money would find us.

That attitude drove people crazy. They were absolutely certain that we would utterly fail because I didn’t have a detailed plan.

I’m not suggesting that other people should reject written plans. Other people can do whatever they want.

But so can I.

Planning is something

I have never hated,

But I do believe

it is overrated.

I cannot,

(but maybe you can)

remember when

there was a plan

that let you sail

the river of

your dream

without

changing course

in mid-stream.

Planning is a

religion theoretical.

Yes, I am certainly

speaking heretical,

but I am depending

upon your receptivity

when I say that I prefer

Energy and Activity.

But now I am getting

ahead of myself

which happens when you

leave the plan on a shelf

and rely on your Commitment

to an Outcome agreed-upon

and not some soggy paper

that Circumstances peed upon.

Commitment and Creativity.

That’s my plan.

Plus Energy and Activity

and a frying pan

because a good breakfast,

you will remember,

is essential to Christmas Elves

in late December.

Commitment

and Creativity.

Energy and Activities.

Keep your eye

on the star stationary

and do whatever

you think is necessary.

And never forget

that in your hand

you carry a cast iron

frying pan.

Roy H. Williams

A Note from Indy Beagle: For those of you who are curious, @GreatWritersSeries and @TribalGospelhad a good week on Youtube. GreatWritersSeries climbed from 44,000 subscribers to more than 100,000. TribalGospel climed from 105,000 subscribers to more than half a million.

I wonder what will happen next! Aroo. – Indy

Fauzia Burke generates visibility for her literary clients and their books. Her authors include Ken Blanchard, Daniel Silva, Jeffrey Archer, Alan Alda, Dean Koontz, S.C. Gwynne, and Brian Tracy. Fauzia could undoubtedly rest on her laurels, but ever since she launched her firm in 1995, she has continually updated and reinvented her methods.

This week, she shares the story of her steep learning curve in applying AI to her existing processes, lessons that you can adapt, regardless of the business you are in. As Fauzia tells roving reporter Rotbart and his deputy, Maxwell, “AI will not replace professionals who know their craft, but the ones who learn to use AI will almost certainly outperform the ones who don’t.” Tune in and Win! At MondayMorningRadio.com

March 16, 2026

I am sitting in front of a computer that can deliver love letters to billions of addresses across the twenty-four time zones that encircle this watery rock we live upon.

I sit and stare and look with wonder at the glittering ocean called Youtube, deeply aware that I know next-to-nothing about it. This gives me a tremendous advantage.

It keeps me from doing what everyone else is doing.

Naive ignorance becomes nitroglycerin when it is energized by the spirit of adventure. Handled carefully, you can move mountains with it. But if you are reckless, clumsy, or just plain unlucky, that same TNT can blow you into pieces.

I looked at myself in the mirror and said, “Let’s go exploring.”

Mirror-me thought it sounded like fun, so he passed through the glass to join me on my side of the mirror.

Energized by the spirit of adventure, I launched @GreatWritersSeries on Youtube and Mirror-Me launched @TribalGospel.

On Feb 12, 2026, GreatWritersSeries had 480 views and a few dozen subscribers.

On March 12, 2026, it had accumulated 5,146,423 total views and 44,684 subscribers.

TribalGospel had zero views on Feb 12 to but quickly accumulated8,299,137 total views and 105,707subscribers by March 12.

GreatWriters Series received fresh content once a day.

TribalGospel received fresh content at a much faster pace, up to 3 times a day.

Indy Beagle has posted some Youtube screenshots in the rabbit hole for you, along with a couple of the most successful videos.

I will now answer your questions:

Q: “Can you teach me how you did this?”

A: Yes, but the information will probably not be useful to you. But if you insist on hearing all of the details, be in the tower at Wizard Academy on May 26-27. I will spend one hour of that two-day class answering the questions of whoever is in that room.

Q: “Why has TribalGospel outperformed GreatWritersSeries?

A: GreatWritersSeries is carrying water to the ocean. TribalGospel is carrying water to the desert.

Q: “What do you mean?”

A: GreatWritersSeries is published for people who love literature that was written in the English language. This widely diverse but relatively small group is scattered across the United States, Canada, Australia, Great Britain, and Ireland, with a few additional outliers flung here and there.

GreatWritersSeries wants only to tempt people to become lovers of literature, whereas TribalGospel is published for people in every time zone who are thirsty for encouragement and hope.

English is not their first language, but they can understand it if they can read along with what they are hearing.

Look at the comments @TribalGospel and these things will immediately become apparent to you.

A startling number of TribalGospel subscribers are in Iraq, Ukraine, Egypt, India, Saudi Arabia, the Philippines, Indonesia, and throughout South America. I knew this would be the case, so I leaned into it.

Are you beginning to understand why only a spattering of what I have learned during these past 28 days will be useful to you? TribalGospel wants only to make a difference – to lift people up for a moment – so that channel went to where it could most easily encourage the largest number of people.

Traditional wisdom would have said that only an idiot would sing flashes of Bible stories and the message of Jesus to nations that are predominantly non-Christian.

But I have always been an idiot.

Q: Does everyone consider it to be encouragement?

A: Of course not. You will notice that about 10 percent of the Youtube comments are rage posts from people who want to tell me why I am wrong.

But I ignore those people because have found more than 100,000 people in just 28 days who have clearly said, “Thank you! And will you please send me more of this?”

Q: Do you believe this will be sustainable or is it a flash in the pan?

A: I have no way of knowing. My suspicion, though, is that TribalGospel will continue to grow, but GreatWritersSeries will ebb and surge like the tide.

Q: Why do you think so?

A: The world has billions of forgotten people, overlooked people, and many of those people are carrying smart phones. The message of TribalGospel will be very consistent, mostly just variations of an uplifting theme. This causes me to believe that TribalGospel will gain new subscribers faster than it loses old ones.

But I do not make that assumption about GreatWritersSeries.

A person who subscribed when they heard a Shakespeare song is going to be angry and confused when they hear the gonzo writing of Tom Robbins. To have a stable subscriber base, GreatWritersSeries would have to choose a narrow niche within the already narrow “Lovers of Literature” niche.

The hope of GreatWritersSeries is to expose people to a writer that enchants them enough to read a book by that writer. You can think of GreatWritersSeries as a dealer who is giving away samples in the hope of creating new addicts.

I apologize for that metaphor, but I couldn’t think of a better one.

The adventure continues. Snow-capped mountains loom ahead and winter is coming.

Roy H. Williams

Most people believe that business success is the product of talent, hard work, and persistence. But what if success could be analyzed — and improved — using the laws of probability? Kyle Austin Young maintains that most goals can be analyzed and improved by understanding their underlying odds. This is true of whatever you do. Launching a product, raising funds, publishing a book, whatever. Kyle calls his consulting methodology “probability hacking.” It says that the odds of your success are determined by the odds of each of the necessary things going right, multiplied together. Roving reporter Rotbart predicts that the odds are very high that this episode of MondayMorningRadio will improve your company’s top line. The explanation begins the moment you arrive at MondayMorningRadio.com

One thing always leads to another

That’s why big sisters have baby brothers

And how King George gave away a nation

when he said “No” to representation.

He did not not know how much it meant

for those colonies to have seats in Parliament.

Think about it. The cry of the colonies was only this:

“No taxation without representation.”

What if King George had said…

“That is a fantastic plan!

Each colony needs to choose a man.”

And if the colonies had responded,

“We’d like to send two.”

And King George had said…

“Then two seats it will be!

Because you people are important to me.”

The difference that would have made in history,

Will forever be an unsolved mystery.

But I do know this, and I know it for sure:

That having an open mind is a powerful cure

for avoiding problems that can spiral out of control

and haunt you forever, wherever you go.

If there is a moral to this story,

I guess it would be this:

Never shout “No” when there is

a workable way to say Yes.

Never shout “No” when there is

a workable way to say Yes.

Never shout “No” when there is

a workable way to say Yes.

One thing always leads to another.

I was speaking with Clara, the wife of Danny, one of my clients.Clara collects silverwork made by the world’s great silversmiths.One of Clara’s hopes is to someday acquire an exceptionally fine piece of silverwork made by – “The British are coming! The British are coming!” – Paul Revere.Were you aware that Paul Revere was a famous silversmith?

The unseen silverwork of that midnight man was floating in a slow circle in the asteroid belt of my mind when the haunting voice of Paul Revere whispered silently in my ear,

“What would have happened if King George had said ‘Yes’ and given each of his thirteen American colonies two seats in Parliament?”

A conversation about what Clara collected quickly became a quirky poem that quietly abandons seven words of subtle sexual humor to move into the story of a stupid king who launched a faraway war he could never win.

Creative thought is not sequential; it is relational, a pinball that ricochets off levers and bumpers at unexpected angles, the energy of the unexpected, triggering bells in the brain and flashing lights in the mind.

Crazy Jack Kerouac had rules for writing:

9. The unspeakable visions of the individual

8. Write what you want, bottomless from bottom of the mind

7. Blow as deep as you want to blow.

My few lines of accidental verse soon became a song sung by imaginary singers who are currently touring the world.

You can catch their show in the rabbit hole.

Roy H. Williams

Courtney De Ronde is a financial decoder. She studies the same financial data that business owners and their accountants review, but she uncovers opportunities and risks within those numbers that are almost always overlooked. This is why Courtney De Ronde has evolved as a scaling expert. She helps businesses grow by avoiding the missteps that non-strategic growth always causes.

As Courtney shares with roving reporter Rotbart, most business owners will expand their revenues but end up working harder, hiring more people, piling on expenses, and somehow ending up with the same — or even less — profit. Learn what you need to know at MondayMorningRadio.com

February 26, 2026

Kronos is chronological time.

Kronos appears more than 50 times in the original New Testament.

Kairos is a pregnant moment in time, an inflection-point of consequence.

Does in surprise you that Kairos appears more than 85 times?

Each of us vividly remembers those Kairos moments when we decided to turn the steering wheel of Life and begin traveling in a whole new direction.

Jim Burns is a counselor. His voice is heard on more than 800 radio stations each day and he has 3 million books in print. But I didn’t know any of that prior to him appearing as a guest speaker at our church last week.

I tell you this only because Jim Burns said something that I really needed to hear.

“I had to learn to say ’no’ to good things, to say ‘yes’ to the most important things.”

That was a Kairos moment for me because it instantly crystallized something in my mind that had previously been only the foggy awareness that I was speaking with so many people each day that I no longer had time to take a deep breath and calm my thoughts.

Then Jim said it again, but differently.

“Sometimes we just have to say ‘no’ to good things, even to say yes to the most important things. That’s how we declutter. That’s how we run light.”

Two days later, I was surprised by a video on Youtube in which my friend Ryan Deiss mentions me by name. He had posted that video a couple of weeks before Jim Burns spoke at our church.

Speaking of himself, Ryan says,

“I literally had zero recollection whatsoever of what I did, or what any of my companies did those weeks, either. It’s just like they were a complete blur. More than likely, I spent all my time responding to whatever emergency someone else decided was important for me on that particular day.”

Wow. Ryan Deiss was speaking exactly what I had been feeling for more than a year.

There are now 87 Wizard of Ads partners and many hundreds of clients, so I go to bed most nights exhausted by the long days, the countless conversations, and the constant feeling that I am somehow letting everyone down.

But Ryan wasn’t finished.

“Scale creates chaos. So if you want to get bigger, you have to insist on focus and simplicity. It is a bit of a paradox, but the key to scale is actually to do less, not more. Because when you force yourself to do less, you shift the emphasis from quantity to impact. And at scale, output matters a lot more than activity.”

We – not just me, but all of us – need to be on guard that we don’t allow the “merely urgent” to displace the truly important.

Have you ever noticed that the things that are truly important are rarely urgent, and things that are “exclamation-point URGENT” are rarely of lasting importance?

Urgent things are momentary, but constant.

Important things are forever, but they can always wait.

And then one day, they can’t wait any longer.

And by then, it’s often too late.

For those of you who are curious, Indy Beagle has posted in the rabbit hole the Ryan Deiss Youtube video that I mentioned, as well as the Youtube video of Jim Burns speaking at our church.

Those two messages, just 48 hours apart, created a Kairos moment for me.

If you have been feeling what I was feeling and what Ryan was describing, maybe those videos will do the same for you.

You can watch the videos or click past them if you don’t have time.

Believe me, I completely understand.

Roy H. Williams

America’s top CEOs pay Doug C. Brown to teach them how to rethink their approach to sales. Doug has consulted Procter & Gamble, Enterprise Rent-A-Car, and Embassy Suites. Doug C. Brown is not a lightweight. Doug tells roving reporter Rotbart, “most companies can quickly realize a 20-30% improvement in operating profits” when they follow his straightforward recommendations.

Doug says that it is more important “to know the right prospects to approach” than to know how to close the sale. If you think you’ve heard it all, listen to Doug C. Brown. There is a chance that maybe you haven’t heard it all. Doug C. Brown will light you up. The right time to listen is up to you. But the place will always be MondayMorningRadio.com

Welkin is a poetic or archaic term for the sky, firmament, or vault of heaven.

To “ring the welkin” or make the “welkin ring” is a literary idiom meaning to make a very loud noise, such as shouting, cheering, or singing, that seems to echo throughout the sky or heavens. It implies creating a celebratory or boisterous sound that fills the air.

Will you ring welkin?

“Jet” Eisenberg knew immediately why I was doing what I did. He said that I spoke about it on the day that we met more than a quarter-century ago.

He said that I have spoken about it in every class that he has ever heard me teach.

Most people continue to be confused regarding my commitment to @GreatWritersSeries, so I recently updated the description of that channel on Youtube. (You should subscribe, by the way.)

You may recognize a line within that description that I used in last week’s Monday Morning Memo.

This is my new description on Youtube:

The goal of @GreatWritersSeries is to tempt you to read great literature: the novels, histories, poems, and news stories that won the Pulitzer and Nobel prizes. The song lyrics and screenplays that won the Grammy and Tony Awards.

Because they will change you.

Great literature is the lightning bolt that will pierce your skull, illuminate your mind, and set your tongue on fire.

“For as you read, so will you speak and write.”

Roy H. Williams had a marvelous English teacher during his junior and senior years of high school in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma.

Her name was Linn Ball.

She taught him to hear the music of great writing and dance to it.

She taught him to lift his eyes to the sky so that he could fly.

She taught him to hear the music of unexpected words as they bang into each other and fill the movie screen of the mind with scenes that are startling and true.

He wants to do the same for you.

Moments before I began writing this Monday Monday Memo to you, I posted on Youtube a musical video of a poem written in 1929 by Ogden Nash.

The title of that poem is “No Doctors Today, Thank You.” You can see and hear that Youtube performance in today’s rabbit hole.

This is it:

They tell me that euphoria is the feeling of feeling wonderful,

well, today I feel euphorian,

Today I have the agility of a Greek god and the appetite of a

Victorian.

Yes, today I may even go forth without my galoshes,

Today I am a swashbuckler, would anybody like me to buckle

any swashes?

This is my euphorian day,

I will ring welkin and before anybody answers I will run away.

I will tame me a caribou

And bedeck it with marabou.

I will pen me my memoirs.

Ah youth, youth! What euphorian days them was!

I wasn’t much of a hand for the boudoirs,

I was generally to be found where the food was.

Does anybody want any flotsam?

I’ve gotsam.

Does anybody want any jetsam?

I can getsam.

I can play chopsticks on the Wurlitzer,

I can speak Portuguese like a Berlitzer.

I can don or doff my shoes without tying or untying the laces because I am wearing moccasins,

And I practically know the difference between serums and antitoccasins.

Kind people, don’t think me purse-proud, don’t set me down as vainglorious,

I’m just a little euphorious.

I’m just a little euphorious.

I want you to dance.

I want you to fly.

I want the movie screen of your mind to be filled with scenes that are startling and true.

I want you to feel euphorious.

Roy H. Williams

Regular viewers of cable news will instantly recognize Arthur Lih and his ubiquitous commercials for LifeVac, the non-invasive rescue device he invented to save choking victims when the Heimlich maneuver and other traditional methods fail. To date, his invention is credited with saving 5,450-plus lives. As Arthur shares with roving reporter Rotbart and his deputy, Maxwell, developing a life-saving device is one challenge. Building a company around it and sustaining that business in a highly regulated, highly competitive environment is exponentially harder. Arthur’s insights are indispensable for entrepreneurs, business owners, and inventors committed to developing products that matter — and companies that endure. You can hear the entire, amazing story at MondayMorningRadio.com

Everywhere he went, Jeremiah warned people that their land would be subjugated, their way of life would be destroyed, and that they would become slaves of a government they did not choose.

Jeremiah is remembered today as “the weeping prophet.”

He was earnest, sincere, and entirely correct, but no one wants to be told that they have an inescapable appointment with a dentist and a gastroenterologist to receive a simultaneous root canal and colonoscopy in the outdoors during a rainstorm.

Jeremiah painted a dark sky without a single ray of sunlight shining through. This is why no one ever gave Jeremiah a microphone, an audience, and a big pile of money to be their guest speaker.

Polyanna was 11 years old in 1913, and she still rides around on her adorable little pony radiating sunshine and rainbows everywhere she goes. Pollyanna tells everyone who will listen that a magical genie will give you whatever you want if you just smile and laugh and think happy thoughts.

Pollyanna is even less popular than Jeremiah. I promise I’m not making this up.

Google tells me that Jeremiah remains a popular name for boys, always ranked in the top 100. Pollyanna is not nearly so popular among girls. It currently ranks somewhere between number 8,284 and number 13,776.

Jeremiah and Pollyanna became the topic of conversation while I was comparing notes with Ryan Deiss and Jet Eisenberg and Robert Grebe during lunch last week. We were trying to figure out why we were suddenly seeing a sharp uptick in public speaking requests.

We all agreed that a general feeling of unrest is shining out of every television screen and blowing through the ductwork of every home in America.

That’s when Deiss said,

“No one wants Jeremiah. No one wants Pollyanna. People are looking for someone who is aware of current difficulties, but who can also see a clear path forward.”

It was one of those moments when everyone at the table instantly knew that Truth had been spoken.

No one wants to hear the gloom and doom of Jeremiah right now. And no one wants to ride the pony or drink the sugarwater of Pollyanna.

People are just looking for a promising path forward.

My partner Todd Liles has been trying to tell me this for several months, but Ryan Deiss was able to condense it into a metaphor of paired opposites, the lightning bolt that is most likely to pierce my hard head and illuminate my mind

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus was the last of the Five Good Emperors of Rome. Eighteen hundred years ago he wrote,

“Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.”

Lucius Annaeus Seneca was born in the same year that Jesus was born. Late in his life, Seneca said,

“True happiness is to enjoy the present without anxious dependence on the future.”

But Jesus had already said the same thing thirty years earlier during his famous Sermon on the Mount. Jesus was teaching us to live in the present when he said,

“Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”

Do not fret about an imaginary future.

You will deal with the actual future when it arrives.

Roy H. Williams

Relationships are easier to navigate when we realize that one person’s heaven is another person’s hell.

The things that bring us joy are subjective and personal and uniquely our own.

Can we talk for a moment about joy?

Joy is a mixture of appreciation and wonder.

You cannot appreciate something and be filled with wonder by it without also having a feeling of thankfulness for it.

Every garden of joy is rooted in the soil of gratitude.

Do not confuse pleasure with joy.

Pleasure is superficial and outward, barely skin-deep. But joy finds its rhythm in the beating of your heart and its home in the marrow of your bones.

You and I do a lot of things for a lot of different reasons each day. But what do you do just for the joy of it?

What do you do that makes you feel like you?

Every great consultant finds joy in the success of the people they advise.

Gary and Stephen help businesses grow by crafting totally true stories to tell the public.

Their stories are intensely interesting.

Yesterday Stephen told me something that fascinated me beyond words.

In a business category that is not interesting, in a trade area of barely a million people, a man built a business to about 5 million dollars a year before walking slowly backwards to 3.7 million.

Then he met Stephen.

Stephen guided that business owner to 12 million a year through better storytelling. Thirteen months ago that same business owner hired a bright young woman to become his social media marketer. He generously paid expensive social media consultants to train her.

When the bright young woman told Stephen what she had learned from these experts, Stephen asked his partner Gary if he would share his contrarian perspective with her.

In the end, the bright young woman and the business owner asked Gary to become her coach.

In 2025, that business had more than 50 million facebook views as a direct result of Gary’s coaching and the dedicated efforts of that young woman. Last month – in the 31 days of January, 2026 – that business had more than 12-and-a half million views on Facebook.

I love that story and I admire that business owner and the young woman he hired.

I am also extremely proud of Stephen and Gary.

In a fit of curiosity, I just now divided 31 days into 12-and-a half million views.

We’re talking about 403,000 views per day, which is 16,000 views per hour, which is 280 views per minute.

We’re talking about 4.7 views per second, 24 hours a day for 31 days.

Friends, I’m feeling joy.

Roy H. Williams

WORLDWIDE ANXIETY:

Do you find yourself wondering what is going to happen next?

You are not the only person who has that question echoing in their mind. Billions of people are feeling this way around the world.

Instability creates anxiety and uncertainty causes worry.

That’s why the price of gold has been shooting upwards like a bottle rocket on the Fourth of July.

The stock exchange is a short-term barometer of American investor confidence.

The price of gold is a long-term barometer of the entire world’s confidence in the future.

Gold was $265 an ounce in the year 2000.

It had climbed to $1,185 an ounce by 2013 as people all over the world began to bicker at ever higher levels of intensity.

Driven by concerns over the COVID-19 pandemic, the price of gold exceeded $2,000 an ounce for the first time in history on August 4, 2020.

Gold climbed to more than $3,000 an ounce on March 14, 2025 as the world grew anxious about “trade war tensions” according to Business Insider.

Just seven months later – on October 8, 2025 – gold exceeded $4,000 an ounce. Reuters said the reason was “geopolitical and economic uncertainty.”

That was less than 4 months ago.

At the time of this writing – Wednesday, January 28, 2026 – gold is at $5,565.40 per ounce.

Did you realize that the price of gold has climbed from $3000/ounce to $5,565/ounce in less than 11 months?

Instability creates anxiety and uncertainty causes worry.

The price of gold rises as the world gets nervous and consumer confidence falls.

Uncertain about the future, people are becoming increasingly hesitant to spend money.

LOCAL OPPORTUNITY:

When their sales volume falls below last year’s sales volume, the first reaction of most business owners is to blame the marketing team. Their second reaction is to reduce their advertising, lay off some people, and hunker down.

This creates an amazing opportunity for courageous business owners to grow their market share.

Your ads stand out when your competitors go silent.

Selling is a transfer of confidence. When the customer doesn’t have confidence that today is the right day, or that your price is the right price, or that your company is the right company to trust, your only option is to transfer your confidence to them.

When you have successfully transferred your confidence to your customer, they will know that today is the right day, your price is the right price, and your company is the company to trust.

But this takes

1. a convincing message

2. rock-solid courage

3. staying power.

Do you have the financial staying power to win droves of new customers when margins are shrinking? More importantly, do you have the emotional staying power?

I believe that 2026 will be a year of anxiety and opportunity. You can duck and cover, or you can reach upward and rise.

You cannot change your circumstances, but you can change your actions.

Will you shrink, or will you rise?

Roy H. Williams

Here’s a Little Tidbit of News for You: the wizard has been handsomely paid to appear in a new movie about the global economy and his book “Pendulum” that he wrote in 2012. That movie will be shown in movie theaters across America, but only to private audiences. Roy said to the producer,

“The Pendulum of western society does NOT predict the economy. It predicts ONLY that society will fracture and social violence will escalate for a period of ten years as we approach the zenith of a ‘WE’, which happened in 2023. Then it will slowly subside for the next ten years. The zenith of a ‘WE’ occurs only once every 80 years.”

When this private movie has been produced and is available to be seen, we’ll let you know. Also, roving reporter Rotbart in still in Washington D.C. researching his next big book, but he’ll be back with new episodes of Monday Morning Radio in just a few more weeks.

Thank you for subscribing to the Monday Morning Memo.

David and I began building oilfield heat exchangers in a heavy steel fabrication shop in Oklahoma when we were 14 years old. We were universally known as, “them schoolboys.”

Steel shops are notoriously noisy, but when we heard “Schooolboy!” ring out above the cacophony of hammers and grinders, we would swivel our heads toward the sound and begin walking toward whomever was looking at us.

“Hard, dirty and dangerous” describes the work and the men we worked with.

To call them “drunks, deviants, and derelicts” would certainly be less kind, but no less accurate.

There were also 8 or 9 solid family men, most of whom were foremen and supervisors.

The oil coolers we built were the size of a two-car garage. And several times a day these metal monsters would be lifted 5 or 6 feet off the ground by an overhead crane and go swinging through the air to another part of the shop as far as 300 feet away.

Heavy steel flying through the air is entirely unforgiving. One of my responsibilities was to drive injured guys to the hospital. But few of my bloody passengers were injured in accidents. Most of them were injured in fistfights with coworkers.

When we were both 16, David and I were joined by a boy named Jay. Dark hair, dark eyes, and skin that was decidedly not English, Irish, Scottish, or German. We liked him immediately.

David put a quarter into the machine and yanked a Pepsi from its mechanical jaws. He handed it to Jay and asked, “Are you some kind of Puerto Rikkan or something?”

Jay scowled and said, “No, I ain’t no dang Rikkan.”

David smiled, clicked his Pepsi bottle against the one that Jay was holding, took a long drink, then said, “It’s good to meet you, Rikkan.”

We found out later that Jay was Italian, but his name was Rikkan from that day forward.

A few days later, Rikkan began calling David “Cliff” and my name somehow became “Dean.” Rikkan never told us why he chose those names, but he refused to call us anything else, so David and I fell into line. I began calling him Cliff and he began calling me Dean.

Jay, David and Roy became Rikkan, Cliff and Dean for the next 3 years. Utterly absurd, but completely true.

Devin Wright has a sparkling laugh and I’ve always enjoyed hearing it.

So when Devin began working with me 20 years ago, I would walk into his office each afternoon and ask a ridiculous question. Devin would laugh his sparkling laugh and I would walk away smiling.

One day I popped my head into his office and looked at him quizzically, as though I was confused. He looked back at me, equally puzzled. With a completely straight face, I asked “Did you get a spray tan?”

For once, Devin didn’t laugh. He vigorously denied it, utterly aghast that I would ever think that he was so vain and shallow that he would ever stoop to such a ridiculous…

I quit listening after that.

So now you know how “Spraytan” was born.

Jacob Harrison became “Boxwine” in a similar fashion,

Dave Cullen became “Skunkmeat”

Howard Wolowitz became “Fruit Loops”

George Costanza became “KoKo”

and Jeffrey Eisenberg became “Jet.”

No, “Jet” is not a reduction of Jeffrey.

When we agreed to meet for lunch last week, Jeffrey suggested by text that we meet at 1300 hours.

I texted him back, “I never knew that you were in the Air Force. Did you fly fighter jets?”

If all of this sounds lowbrow, redneck, hick, uncultured, ill-refined, outmoded, outdated, dinosaur-ish and in poor taste, I agree.

But no one can spend 4 impressionable years working with drunks, deviants, and derelicts and walk away without at least one bad habit.

Roy H. Williams

Dean Rotbart is taking a short Sabbatical from Monday Morning Radio for the next few weeks to travel across America gathering detailed information for an extremely important new book that he is writing. We have been sworn to secrecy not to tell you what this new book is about, because if it became known, it would make Dean’s research much more difficult to accomplish.

In his younger years, our roving reporter Rotbart was a Pulitzer-nominated investigative reporter for the Wall Street Journal. Investigative reporting is his superpower. But Dean has promised us that when his research is complete and his new book has been published, all will be revealed.

But jump into the rabbit hole anyway! Indy Beagle has some treats for you.

Before you borrow cash from a friend, decide which one you need most.

Never tell a person that their child is ugly. Every child is the trigger on the gun of their parent’s rage.

If you say, “I am only speaking the truth,” you can be sure that the child’s parent will just as truthfully amputate you from their life and throw shade at the memory of your name forever.

“The Proper Priorities of Government” is a beautiful child that lives in the brain of every citizen. And that child is uniquely their own.

Do you remember what I told you about children?

AI is the newest baby in every family.

I am a writer. My words are my children. If you tell me that your AI can replace me as a writer, I will know you to be a fool and a tragic waste of oxygen and skin.

Can AI write better than you? If your words are not bone of your bone, blood of your blood, and flesh of your flesh, then yes, it probably can.

When I began production on the “Great Writers Series,” I sent several of my friends a few of the AI-produced performances of the 8,000 grand passages of literature that I have laboriously transcribed from books over the past 50 years.

When I sent those music-enhanced performances, I pulled the triggers on the guns that are carried by all of the musicians in my life.

Shortly after being riddled with bullets,

I received this text from Ryan Deiss on December 26, 2025, at 7:24AM:

Paul Graham on why you shouldn’t write with Al:

“In preindustrial times most people’s jobs made them strong. Now if you want to be strong, you work out. So there are still strong people, but only those who choose to be. It will be the same with writing. There will still be smart people, but only those who choose to be.”

This was my reply to Ryan’s text:

“Everyone loves AI to do the things they hate, but they hate AI when it does the things they love. I am no different. I think AI is dangerous and stupid and evil when it replaces writers. But I use it enthusiastically to make musical productions instantly possible. I would otherwise have had to spend many months and hundreds of thousands of dollars to create with musicians what I can create with Suno.com in a day. Musicians are well within their rights to resent me and be disgusted with me when I use AI to replace them.”

The Great Writers Series will continue because it is important to me.

If you click the image at the top of this page, you will see another clickable image. Below that clickable image is one of the first Youtube shorts – formatted for your phone – that I will be uploading once a day for as long as I am able to do so.

If you click that performance and enjoy it, and would like to receive a new one each day, you can click through to Youtube and subscribe.

If you do not like the performance, that’s 100% okay as long as you don’t tell me about it.

All of my children are beautiful, almost as beautiful as yours.

Roy H. Williams

1. Equity

I’m not sure how Google would define “equity,” but my definition of equity is “stored value.”

As a homeowner, you understand home equity as the stored value that it offers you.

Your equity in your home is a product of all the time, energy, and money that you have put into it, plus the value that has been added by the passage of time.

Relational equity is accumulated in the same way.

“What have we invested in each other? What have we endured? How many years have we traveled through life together?”

Relational equity is why we tolerate annoyances and troubles from the people we love. They have added value to our lives, so they have relational equity in us.

Likewise, customer-bonding ads create relational equity between today’s businesses and tomorrow’s customers. They do this by highlighting shared perspectives, beliefs, and values.

Customer-bonding ads communicate authenticity, and vulnerability. And they are always there, 52 weeks a year. Authenticity, vulnerability, and the passage of time are not easy to fake or accelerate.

Keep those things in mind as you read on.

2. AI

Eighty-seven Wizards of Ads who stay in regular touch with nearly 1,000 businesses are a reliable finger on the pulse of what is happening.

This is what is happening:

Google Search results have been altered in a dramatic and unexpected way. Some companies have benefited greatly from Google’s new methodology while other companies have been devastated by it.

You’ll understand what separates the winners from the losers in just a moment.

With 6,000 employees, Edelman is the world’s largest PR agency. They help companies worldwide manage their reputations and trust through stories published in mass media.

Edelman has been doing what they do since 1952.

On October 27, 2025, Christmas decorations were vibrating in anticipation of replacing Halloween decor when Brent Nelson – Chief Strategy Officer at Edelman – was quoted in Ad Agemagazine.

Explaining why Google dramatically expanded their results-ranking criteria, Nelson said,

“What drives visibility isn’t your ad budget or keyword bids; it’s earned media. Analysis shows that 90% of what appears in AI summaries is ‘earned-driven’—pulled from reviews, press, blogs, forums and cultural chatter. Paid now plays a different role, amplifying what’s already there.”

“The new shelf space isn’t a store; it’s the AI summary. Brands need to understand their earned footprint across AI-generated answers.”

“Who gets cited? Who’s trusted? Who’s missing? That’s the new baseline of visibility.”

In other words, Google is now rewarding Relational Equity.

3. A Prediction

Hundreds of new companies are about to leap into the Public Relations business. Their goal will be to get their clients mentioned in online press, blogs, forums and cultural chatter.

PR is an easy business to get into. It won’t be long before you are approached by someone who has a PR solution to help you improve your AEO (Ask Engine Optimization).

If you remember any of today’s Monday Morning Memo, let it be this:

“If you don’t have anything interesting to say, don’t let anyone convince you to pay money to say it.”

Company slogans, mush-mouth clichés and traditional ad-speak are not going to move the needle.

Every month or two, you are going to need something new, exciting, different, and entirely real to say.

4. A Suggestion

Radio stations would be smart to start a daily or weekly blog that is fun, quick, entertaining, easy-to-read, and full of valuable things that every consumer would want to know about.

If I owned a station in Austin, I would call my blog “Cool Things Austin Needs to Know”

If my blog was well written and full of actionable information and enough people got into the habit of scanning it each day, my radio station could become an important contributor to the online press, blogs, forums and cultural chatterthat are now so very important.

Could a Radio station become a major online player in their community? Absolutely!

Remember, radio stations have the power to popularize their online blogs FOR FREE. Announcers could quote interesting tidbits from it each day and build a massive readership. Offline radio excitement would become online blog excitement.

Do I expect that radio stations will do this? Nope.

But if a few do dare to do it, do I expect them to be successful? Nope.

These are the four ways that their bosses will force them to screw it up.

1. They will try to make it a source of direct revenue.

2. They won’t write about anything or anyone who doesn’t advertise on their station.

3. They will allow advertisers to influence what is said about them in the blog.

4. It will be badly written, boring, and of no value to anyone.

But it would absolutely work if they did it right.

5. Closing comments

We are overwhelmed by a Three Ring Circus of media: online, offline, local, national, audio, video, print, outdoor, broadcast, streaming, digital, analog, physical, old-school, new-school, professional, amateur, full-color and black-and-white.

It is never the media that makes the message work.

It is always the message that makes the media work.

If you don’t have anything interesting to say,

don’t let anyone convince you to pay money to say it.

Roy H. Williams

Lots of people know how to make money. But far fewer understand how to protect it, manage it, and plan for the long arc of life once the hard work of earning is done. Jeffrey Panik brings clarity to complex financial decisions. Listen and learn as Jeffrey shares with roving reporter Rotbart his emphasis on individualized planning, long-term thinking, and his belief that communication is absolutely essential between spouses, across generations, and with trusted advisors.

Drawing stories from his professional experience and from his personal history, Jeffrey will shake your beliefs and challenge your assumptions about financial planning and retirement readiness.

Jeffrey’s BIG TRUTH can be summarized in just six words: “Clarity today can prevent regret tomorrow.” We’ll say hello and shake your hand the moment you arrive at MondayMorningRadio.com

In 1958, Paul made 85 cents an hour working in a limestone quarry in Oklahoma.

He was a man of character, integrity, and kindness.

He was quiet, smiled a lot, and was a wonderful listener.

Paul’s humility, kindness, and confidence gave him dignity and authority in the eyes of everyone who knew him.

He was happily married and had three little girls. On the day his fourth little girl was born he walked into a storm that could easily have ripped him apart.

It was with great heaviness of heart that Doctor Franklin told him that there was a problem with the Rh factor in the little girl’s blood and that she was almost certainly going to die.

She was barely, barely, barely hanging on.

With tears in his eyes Doctor Franklin told him, “And your wife is also fading fast.” Doctor Franklin dropped his chin to his chest as teardrops splashed on his shoes.

An ambulance rushed both mother and daughter to a larger hospital in a larger town.

Paul was all alone with eighty-five cents an hour and three little girls.

Several hours later, a happy and rejoicing Doc Franklin told Paul that both mother and daughter were going to live!

They were going to live.

The medical bill was more than a thousand dollars and there was no insurance; just a husband and wife and four little girls and 85 cents an hour.

Being a man of integrity, Paul went to see Doc Franklin the next day to set up a payment plan for paying that thousand-dollar medical bill.

Doc Franklin said, “What medical bill?”

Paul was confused, and it showed on his face.

Old Doctor Franklin spoke plainly,

“There is no medical bill. You do not owe any money. Just be a good father to those girls.”

“Just be a good father to those girls.”

I can testify that he was a good father to those girls. I met Paul Compton when I was 14 years old and in love with his daughter, the one who nearly died on the day she was born.

Here’s how I met him.

One week prior to beginning my freshman year in high school, my mother received an invitation to come to an open house at the school on a Tuesday night where she could meet Coach Jerry Meeks, my home room teacher.

He taught Oklahoma History, of course.

Attached to that letter was a list of all the other students who would be in my first-hour class.

I saw that Pennie Compton was going to be in that class with me. She knew who I was, but we had never actually met. This would be the first time that we would be in class together.

Mom couldn’t go that night, which suited me fine. I had a plan of my own.

I was the first person to arrive. The parking lot was empty except for the cars of the teachers. I met Coach Meeks, then took a seat at a desk in the back row. About 30 minutes later, a tall man came walking in with his wife and the girl that I knew I was going to marry.

After Paul and his wife exchanged pleasantries with Coach Meeks, I walked up to him, introduced myself, then shook his hand as I smiled and said,

“My name is Roy Williams and you’re going to be seeing a lot of me.”

Last week Princess Pennie and I celebrated our 49th wedding anniversary.

Paul never criticized me or gave me advice unless I asked for it. But when I did ask for it, he would tell what he thought, along with some true stories from his own life that explained why he believed what he believed.

He always spoke slowly and gave me his full attention. His confidence in me was a great encouragement.

In all the decades that I knew Paul Compton, I never saw him raise his head from prayer without having tears on his cheeks. When Paul talked to God, you knew that God was listening.

I always looked forward to having him pray for me.

He was the best man I ever knew.

Roy H. Williams

Monica Ballard knows why marketing campaigns fail. It’s not for lack of clever slogans, talented spokespeople, or catchy jingles. Monica says ad people fail when they try to project “perfection” rather than authenticity, which requires that you acknowledge the struggles and risks inherent in running a business. Monica is a veteran marketing strategist, storyteller, and one of the elite Wizard of Ads partners.

Drawing on her background in theater, radio, and live performance, Monica explains to roving reporter Rotbart and deputy rover Maxwell why empathy and emotional honesty create bonds with customers that no discount or gimmick ever could. “Being real isn’t a liability,” Monica assures us. “It is a decisive competitive advantage.” Get Real with Monica Ballard at MondayMorningRadio.com

Extremis is a Latin word that says you are in extreme circumstances, a desperate situation, a dire predicament, or the edge of death.

“There is great tension in the world, tension toward a breaking point, and men are unhappy and confused. At such time it seems natural and good to me to ask myself these questions. What do I believe in? What must I fight for and what must I fight against?”

I’ll tell you who said that in just a minute.

Here’s another direct quote:

“It’s life or death for America, people tell you. Angry debates about taxes, religion and race relations inflame the newspapers. Everyone is talking politics: your spouse, your teenage daughter, your boss, your grocer. Neighbors eye you suspiciously, pressing you to buy local. Angry crowds gather, smelling of booze and threatening violence; their leaders wink, confident that the ends justify the means. The stores have sold out of guns.”*

Are you ready to hear the final two sentences?

“It’s 1775 in Britain’s American colonies. Whose side are you on?”*

That first quote about “great tension in the world” and men being “unhappy and confused” came from John Steinbeck in 1941. I’ll bet you thought it was more recent, didn’t you?

There is nothing new under the sun. Is there anything of which one can say, “Look! This is something new”? It was here already, long ago; it was here before our time. No one remembers the former generations, and even those yet to come will not be remembered by those who follow them.

If that sounds familiar to you, it’s because Solomon said it 3,000 years ago in the book of Ecclesiastes.

Here’s my point: Yes, the world is in a state of extremis, but we have always been in a state of extremis.

So put it behind you. Get over it.

Better yet, use your recovery from extremis to unleash joy, passion, a flood of creativity, and a flamelike focus that will take you to places you have never been.

When you recover from a state of extremis, you open a trapdoor to the unconscious mind. It is a waterfall that doesn’t fall downward, but gushes upward into the sky.

If you want to ride that waterfall, all you have to do is exit your extremis. Put it behind you. Get over it.

Quit giving your attention to the news.

Do not say to yourself,

“But if everyone quit paying attention to the news, there would be no societal outrage, no oversight, no accountability!”

Let me make this clear to you. There is zero chance that everyone is going to quit giving their attention to the news. It’s an addiction like any other. In fact, I’m worried that you won’t have the strength, the willpower, or the discipline to turn away from it yourself.

If you monitor the news for the rest of your life, what are the chances that doing so will change anything at all, even a tiny bit? Does being aware of things that are beyond your control somehow give you the ability to change those things?

Turn away from the dark side, Luke Skywalker. Embrace the light.

And have a happy, new, year.

Roy H. Williams

PS – I gathered a few dozen quotes from Dorothy Parker and made two powerful productions from them. The first production is 4 minutes and 24 seconds long and was extracted from writings that Dorothy published in Vanity Fair and The New Yorker in the 1920s.

The second production is 5 minutes and 9 seconds and was compiled from the writings of Dorothy’s later years. The character arc between the two performances is sobering. You’ll find both of them on the first page of the rabbit hole. Click the image at the top of the Monday Morning Memo for December 29, 2025, and you’ll be there. – Aroo, Indy Beagle.

*Caitlin Fitz, “The Accidental Patriots”,The Atlantic,Dec. 2016

Four-time Olympian and bestselling author Ruben Gonzalez joins roving reporter Rotbart today for a conversation about perseverance, belief, and the wisdom of following leaders who have proven themselves to be worthy of your trust. Ruben Gonzalez is unusual among Olympians.

He didn’t begin competing at an elite level until his mid-20s, and he never used his lack of natural ability as an excuse for falling short.

Ruben’s career in sports and in life has been built upon desire, discipline, and stubbornness. Ruben refuses to quit. His message to you is about how to build your courage through small daily choices, how to manage risk intelligently rather than avoid it, and how to measure your success, not through your bank account, but through the impact you have on others. Meet Ruben Gonzalez and become a happier person at MondayMorningRadio.com.

The best short stories leave out important information but evoke it in such a way as to cause a kind of explosion of associative connections.*

These are my secret rules for making that happen:

Lead your listener toward a conclusion and then let them arrive at it on their own. If you state a conclusion and then try to support it with evidence, you are robbing your listener of the joy of discovery.Give your listener the new, the surprising, and the different.If you must give them old information, reframe it; give it to them from a new perspective, so that they will see it again for the first time.Leave out the parts that people skip.

My Christmas gift to you is The Story of the Universe According to Roy.

I call it “Way Back in the Long Ago.” You will find it at TribalGospel.com

It is an auditory opera, a campfire story of God and the Universe told under a starfilled sky by an old man who is accompanied by musicians who sit at the furthest edges of that circle of light.

But your seat is closer.

You feel the warmth of the fire as it dances the dance of the story, and the stars twinkle their agreement with glittering laughter.

This is chapter one.

Way back in the long ago, the maker spoke, and light exploded across the darkness. Energy radiated across the nothing.

Time and space and order appeared from the nothing of the long ago.

Bits of energy shot like shrapnel from a bomb into the grid that was created by the ordering of the nothing. Bits of energy bonded with other bits to become great lumps that went spinning across the grid.

Their spinning caused these lumps to become spherical.

Some of the spheres were made of gasses; ice giants and dwarfs, gas giants and dwarfs, and suns of every size and temperature were created by the energy within them.

Others of those spheres became great rocks.

Oxygen bonded to hydrogen so that water splashed in the hollows of those rocks.

The maker smiled.

Algae and moss and grass and trees emerged, and the maker smiled again.

Winged creatures darted through the air and swimming creatures darted through the sea, and the maker smiled again.

And then creatures appeared on the rock itself. Creatures appeared on the land.

The maker looked at us and decided to make us into little makers with the power to choose whatever we would choose. We have the authority to say “yes,” and the authority to say “no,” as we stare into the eyes of the maker.

The maker gave us this watery rock we live upon, and complete authority over it.

We have the freedom to be guided by our choices. We are no longer the captives of our instincts.

The maker is not held captive by time and space. The maker created time and space from the nothing.

It is only we – you and me – who measure time and space.

Our history of deciding for ourselves and living with the consequences has not been a good history.

Seven billion of us are crammed onto a rock that circles an 11,000-degree fireball as it shoots through the nothing… at 52 times the speed of a rifle bullet.

We are passengers on a world spinning out of control.

Having wrongly been told that the maker is in control, we blame the maker for every sadness.

You can’t have it both ways. You can’t have both free will and a benevolent higher power who protects you from yourself.

I hope you will take an hour to enjoy my little campfire opera.

Merry Christmas.

Roy H. Williams

*The same is true of the best jokes and the best ads.

This week, roving reporter Rotbart and his deputy, Maxwell, offer their third annual holiday encore of their inspirational Yuletide tale, A Christmas Day Miracle, by Dean and Talya Rotbart. First published in 2021, A Christmas Day Miracle has become a holiday favorite. It is the true story of a man, Riyaz Adat, on death’s doorstep; and his devoted wife, Margaret. The story is a poignant reminder of the wonder and power of life’s unexpected blessings. The telling will begin as soon as you arrive at MondayMorningRadio.com

What? You don’t see the happy times?

But they are right there!

Right there inside you.

Oh, I see. You have something that is keeping you from seeing and feeling and living the sparkling clear and happy times that are struggling to rise up from the depths of your soul.

I see that you are worried.

That’s the problem.

Worry is the cork that keeps the champagne of happiness from spraying a smile on your face and a sparkle in your eye and joy into your heart

If you will allow me, I will try to do for you what Julius Rosenwald and Thomas Jefferson did for me.

Julius Rosenwald was an immensely successful businessman who used his money – all of it – to help people rise above their circumstances and experience the wonders of the world in which they lived.

This is what Julius Rosenwald wrote to me 100 years ago:

“Early in my business career I learned the folly of worrying about anything. I have always worked as hard as I could, but when a thing went wrong and could not be righted, I dismissed it from my mind.”

Friend, when a thing goes wrong and cannot be righted, dismiss it from your mind.

An army of people surround us whose only job is to make us fearful and afraid. You must not allow these people to capture your attention.

Journalists have been shouting deceptive and inflammatory headlines at us since the days of the American Revolution.

But the journalists and podcasters of today have discovered new ways of shouting. Emails and websites and Youtube and cable and streaming services promise, pledge and swear to keep us highly informed and deeply unhappy. They feed our worries like stokers feeding firewood into the boilers of steam trains.

They want us to ride on their rails of steel so that they can take us where they want us to go.

Don’t ride their train. Jump off of it. Thomas Jefferson did.

He said,

“I do not take a single newspaper, nor read one a month, and I feel myself infinitely the happier for it.”

He went on to say,

“Advertisements contain the only truths to be relied on in a newspaper. The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.”

Thomas Jefferson avoided the news and said he was infinitely the happier for it.

You should do it, too.

Julius Rosenwald and Thomas Jefferson discovered that Jesus was telling the truth in Matthew chapter six when he said,

“Do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”

Don’t worry.

Be happy.

Roy H. Williams

David Ackert is making his list and checking it twice — but he’s no Santa Claus. The gifts David brings are powerful insights for professionals who want to grow. David Ackert challenges the long-held belief that success depends on building a massive network of connections. In his view, quantity is a distraction. The thing to do is cultivate a small, curated list of at least 9 not more than 30 “high-value” relationships with people who have the ability to help you reach your goals.

Send everyone else a Christmas card.

Rotbart goes roving with David Ackert this week, at MondayMorningRadio.com

“Please Do Not Touch the Fence. You’ll Get Zapped. And the Goats Will Laugh at You.”

That is the advice the banner gives. Standing behind that banner, and a little to the right, are a group of goats who are clearly encouraging you to touch the fence. You can see it in their eyes and in the smirk at the corners of their little goat mouths.

All of that was in the photo that arrived with a text from my friend, Dan, along with this note.

“We have a new side-venture that uses goats as a land clearing crew for hire, and recently have set up a mobile cam to keep an eye on them while on the job.”

Although I do make up things for a living, I promise I am not making this up.

Twenty-three minutes later, I received another text from another friend.

“I have a problem. Do you know in ‘Peter Pan’ where Peter loses his shadow. I’ve seem to have lost my shadow. I used to be a very creative person. Somewhere over the last 5 years due to life’s circumstances I seem to have misplaced my creativity. I feel almost certain that I began giving out far more than I was taking in. I lost my wonder and my awe for the world. I’m not learning and growing, and it has caught up with me. If you have any insight or direction, it would be truly helpful. Thanks friend.”

I responded, “Is this for real?”

My friend said, “Yes, for real.”

I said, “You need to have a place to escape. A good fiction book can take you into an alternate reality where you don’t have any obligations, or people who need something from you. Buy a copy of ‘Cryptonomicon’ by Neal Stephenson. You’ll meet a guy named Shaftoe. I’ve known him for more than 20 years.”

My friend said, “Thank you. I’ll tell him you said hello.”

Both of those texts arrived, “Ping… Ping,” shortly after I posted the second restaurant review I have ever written.

Heads Up, friends!

Real pizza ovens. Real flames. Real char on the bottom of the crazy-good crust. You’ll never be the same. This pizza is SO GOOD that it’s illegal in 7 states and under investigation in 12 more. So good you’ll walk outside and look up at the stars and howl at the moon like a werewolf.

I have reviewed very few things during my 67 years because, frankly, there just aren’t that many things out there that are really remarkable. DeSano Pizzeria Napoletana is remarkable. Not the atmosphere. It’s plain, plain, plain. Nothing special. But the food is MAGNIFICO! (On Slaughter just west of Mopac, in front of Alamo Drafthouse.) And the people who work there are definitely part of the magic. They are excited about what they are doing, and their excitement is contagious.

We ordered a spinach salad. Best spinach salad I’ve ever had! I mean that. And big enough for two people. I looked at my wife (We’re having our 50th anniversary next year) and I said, “These people are buying ONLY the very best ingredients. They’s spending their money on the food, not the decor.” (We were both smiling so hard for so long that my face aches.)

Order the Verdura pizza. Be aware that it does NOT have marinara sauce. You’ll be throwing rocks at marinara sauce after you’ve eaten the Verdura. It’s really simple: perfect crust, extraordinary cheese, fresh spinach, roasted tomatoes, roasted garlic. HEAVEN.

Or you can go old school and get a pizza with red sauce: The San Gennaro has tomato sauce, sausage, peppadew peppers, caramelized onions, garlic, and cheese so good that you’ll slap yourself. The peppadew peppers are the magic.

No fountain drinks, but they’ve got big coolers full of bottles and cans of everything you want. Get a big bottle of San Pellegrino and you’ll leave this place with an Italian accent.

This pizza is NOT greasy. You will feel fabulous after you eat it.

This is NOT a slanted review left by someone who has a connection to that company. I have no connection whatsoever to that company or to any of these people and I owe them absolutely nothing except my gratitude for making pizza the way that God intended.

Amen.

My goal for November 20th was to wake up twice.

It obviously worked out, or you wouldn’t be reading this. I had a very weird heart surgery and the doctor who explained the risks of that surgery to me might as well have said, “Make peace with your God.” But rather than answer 80,000 emails from those of you who will ask for more details, how about I just put it in the rabbit hole for you? Click the image of the goats at the top of this page – the Monday Morning Memo for December 8, 2025 – and you’ll be on page one of the rabbit hole.

But the most surprising thing was what happened this morning.

Daniel Whittington asked me to be a guest on his podcast. He said he wanted to capture the story of how and why Wizard Academy came into being. There was a moment when my throat got tight and I had to say, “Give me a moment.”

I’m not sure when that episode will be released.

People complain about the high cost of living. The question I’ve always wanted to ask them is, “Compared to what?”

Roy H. Williams

I’ve been studying AI audio so that I can complete a couple of personal projects.

The first project is an audiobook containing 18 chapters that span 75 fascinating minutes. Your MondayMorningMemo on December 22nd will contain the following invitation:

The tribe encircling the campfire is about to listen to a group of old men tell “The Story of the Long Ago.” You can listen, too, if you like.

That invitation will be coming your way on December 22nd.

The other project that I will be launching in January or February is an ongoing weekly series called “The Great Writer Series.”

My goal is simple: I want to reawaken the world to the power of well-told stories. That’s it. I have no other agenda. I just want people to remember what great writing sounds like.

Today I’ve got 3 different samples for you. Each is about 2 minutes long. Click the hyperlinks if you want to hear my people read to you.

This first one is an obscure poem by Robert Frost called, “The Bearer of Evil Tidings.”

I have asked Amir Amani to read it.

The bearer of evil tidings,

When he was halfway there,

Remembered that evil tidings

Were a dangerous thing to bear.

So when he came to the parting

Where one road led to the throne

And one went off to the mountains

And into the wild unknown,

He took the one to the mountains.

He ran through the Vale of Cashmere,

He ran through the rhododendrons

Till he came to the land of Pamir.

And there in a precipice valley

A girl of his age he met

Took him home to her bower,

Or he might be running yet.

She taught him her tribe’s religion:

How ages and ages since

A princess en route to China

To marry a Persian prince

Had been found with child; and her army

Had come to a troubled halt.

And though a god was the father

And nobody else at fault,

It had seemed discreet to remain there

And neither go on nor back.

So they stayed and declared a village

There in the land of the Yak.

And the child that came of the princess

Established a royal line,

And his mandates were given heed to

Because he was born divine.

And that was why there were people

On one Himalayan shelf;

And the bearer of evil tidings

Decided to stay there himself.

At least he had this in common

With the race he chose to adopt:

They had both of them had their reasons

For stopping where they had stopped.

As for evil tidings,

Belshazzar’s overthrow,

Why hurry to tell Belshazzar

What soon enough he would know?

Amor Towles will be our second example. He has given us literary wonders like “A Gentleman in Moscow” and “The Lincoln Highway.” This excerpt is from page 302 of his novel, “Table for Two.”

Big Bob Bigelow will read it to us.

Eve could not pinpoint when her dislike for lists began, but it must have been around the time she was twelve. It was in the basement of St. Mary’s, where she and the rest of the sixth graders were charged with memorizing the Ten Commandments.

“Thou shalt not this.” 

“Thou shalt not that.” 

“And thou shalt not the other thing.”

Then there was the list painted on the sign at the country club pool to remind the children there would be…

“No Running.” 

“No Diving.” 

“No Splashing.”

But most important was her mother’s ever-expanding list of what a young lady should not do. Like put her elbows on the table, or speak with her mouth full, or slug her little sister, even when she deserved it.

Yep. In Indiana, a young girl had good reason to suspect that lists were the foot soldiers of tyranny crafted for the sole purpose of bridling the unbridled. A quashing, squashing, squelching of the human spirit by means of itemization.

This third example is controversial. Tom Robbins passed away earlier this year at the age of 92. People either love or hate his novels. I happen to love them. This excerpt is from “Skinny Legs and All.” Tom Robbins was my brand of crazy.

Wild Willie Washington reads for us.

This sentence is made of lead. (And a sentence of lead gives a reader an entirely different sensation from one made of magnesium).

This sentence is made of yak wool.

This sentence is made of sunlight and plums.

This sentence is made of ice.

This sentence is made from the blood of the poet.

This sentence was made in Japan.

This sentence glows in the dark.

This sentence was born with a caul.

This sentence has a crush on Norman Mailer.

This sentence is a wino and doesn’t care who knows it.

Like many italic sentences, this one has Mafia connections.

This sentence is a double Cancer with a Pisces rising.

This sentence lost its mind searching for the perfect paragraph.

This sentence refuses to be diagrammed.

This sentence ran off with an adverb clause.

This sentence is 100 percent organic: it will not retain a facsimile of freshness like those sentences of Homer, Shakespeare, and Goethe, which are loaded with preservatives.

This sentence leaks.

This sentence once spit in a book reviewer’s eye.

This sentence can do the funky chicken.

This sentence has seen too much and forgotten too little.

This sentence is called “Speedoo,” but its real name is Mr. Earl.

This sentence may be pregnant.

This sentence suffered a split infinitive – and survived.

If this sentence has been a snake you would have bitten it.

This sentence went to jail with Clifford Irving.

This sentence went to Woodstock.

And this little sentence went wee-wee-wee all the way home.

Roy H. Williams

Steve Wunker believes that business owners and CEOs who harness AI to transform their companies into super-high-performing organizations are like octopuses. They are functioning with nine brains, eight arms, three hearts. They adapt rapidly and possesses exceptional intelligence. Steve advises companies like Microsoft, Meta, Nike, and the World Bank, on innovation strategy. He sees the decentralized decision-making, lightning-fast problem-solving, and hyper-responsive behavior of the octopus as an ideal model for AI-empowered leadership. As Steve explains to roving reporter Rotbart, winning with AI doesn’t mean squeezing new tools into old systems. It requires leaders to rethink — even rewire — how their organizations operate, so they can swim with the intelligence and adaptability of the octopus. MondayMorningRadio.com!

A society grows great when old people plant trees under whose shade they will never sit.

Trees that live long do not grow quickly.

It requires patience to grow a tree that will endure.

The root word of patience is the Latin verb “pati.” It means “to suffer” or “to endure.”

The best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago.

The second-best time is today.

A person with a purpose is a person on a mission.

A person on a mission is a person with a passion.

Passion is another strange word. It does not mean what you think it does.

The English word “passion” comes directly from the Latin noun “passio” which means “suffering.” If you have “compassion” for someone, it means that you are “suffering with them.” Every Easter we hear about “The Passion of the Christ.”

Patience and passion share the same Latin root. Pati is the noun. Passio is the verb. And they both mean suffering.

A person with a passion has a vision of the future for which they are willing to suffer.

The builder of a brand is the planter of a tree: a visionary missionary.

And their principal tool is storytelling.

Stories build personalities.

Stories build people.

Storytelling is world-building.

Stories build cultures.

Stories build brands that endure.

Be careful what you say.

A word of affirmation is a spark that can become a flame that will illuminate a person’s path into the future. A word of discord, disdain, or disharmony can quench that vital spark.

We carry the power of light and darkness in our tongues.

Be careful what you say.

You can build a brand with your stories.

You can build people, too.

Say the right things and you can build a life.

You can speak happiness.

You can build happiness.

Say the right things and you can live happiness.

Speak it. Build it.

Say it. Live it.

Roy H. Williams

PS “It is true that we are weak and sick and ugly and quarrelsome but if that is all we ever were, we would millenniums ago have disappeared from the face of the earth.”

– John Steinbeck

Eveline Shen is an operating-systems programmer — not for computers, but for people.

Eveline helps leaders rewire the limiting patterns that hold them back — including perfectionism, people-pleasing, and self-sacrifice — and replace them with what she calls “courageous” actions. Her clients are primarily organizations advocating for social change, many of whom instinctively view business leaders and entrepreneurs not as partners, but as adversaries. But as Eveline explains to roving reporter Rotbart, everyone wins when they make a more deliberate effort to communicate with, understand, and learn from one another. It’s MondayMorningRadio.com

You can hear Roy read today’s MMMemo by clicking the “listen” link at the top of the page. Or you can hear it wailed by a tribal elder who is teaching the tribe around a campfire. Just click the play bar below. Crazy? Absolutely. – Indy Beagle

It is easy to understand a person who is driven by their passions.

Your passions take you to your happy place.

I have friends who have a passion for sporting events on television. Others have a passion for gambling, and the paripatetic have a passion for traveling to all the far-flung places on this spinning rock we live upon.

People who have a passion for achievement live to make things different.

Planning and research puts a candle to the wick of some people. They go without sleep and burn bright throughout the night as they gather, collate, and organize information that will set the future on fire.

Your scars are the memories of bitter experiences.

The pain is gone, but the benefits of those experiences remain. Your scars help you see danger on the horizon.

Your scars are the diplomas of lessons you will never forget.

It is good to have scars.

But wounds… wounds are different.

The pain remains and it triggers you to act in ways that everyone notices but no one understands. Sometimes not even you.

I have known men whose only passion was to seduce every woman they encountered. Those men like to believe that they are “in love with falling in love.” But when you have known them long enough you will see a knife wound in their chest that has never healed. Way back in the long ago, they had a wife who began sleeping with another man. And ever since that day, they have been trying to become that man.

The pain of a wound is a powerful thing. It shouts, “Never again! Never again! Never again!”

I don’t believe that any of those men have ever figured out why they feel driven to become the living embodiment of the imaginary Don Juan, and I have never felt that it was my place to tell them.

Every person is formed by their passions, scars, and wounds. Even imaginary people.

All of the famous characters in literature were created from their passions, scars, and wounds.

Novelists, playwrights, and screenwriters know this. Ad writers do not. This is why most advertising is dull, dead, and untwitching.

When an ad writer is guided by the ambitions, demands, and expectations of their clients, you can expect to hear the glorious trumpets of a ringing call to action. “Come! Come now! Give me your money! Hurry! Hurry! I want your money Today! Today! Today! Act now! Don’t delay!”

We are not enchanted by these ads.

Did it ever occur to you that every successful brand is a character that lives in the mind of the customer?

A successful brand is driven by its passions, scars, and wounds.

Passion: Why does this brand exist? What is it chasing? What love does it represent?

Scars: What does it know? What has it learned? Why can I trust this brand?

Wounds: What is this brand trying to erase from the earth?

To what does it shout, “Never again! Never again! Never again!”

Roy H. Williams

A tribe is a group of people that share an identity marker. Every affinity group, every fan club, every self-selected group of insiders is a tribe.

Last week we talked about Business-to-Business advertising (B2B) and Niche Marketing with a long purchase cycle (Niche-L).

Today we talk about Niche Marketing with a short purchase cycle (Niche-S) and Business-to-Consumer advertising (B2C).

Let’s talk first about (Niche-S):

Niche Marketing with a Short purchase cycle will always be targeted to an affinity group. A Niche market is any self-selected group of insiders that has chosen to spend time, attention, and money on something that most people don’t care about.

Short-cycle Niche Marketing is mostly consumable products and services that are purchased on a regular basis by a self-selected group. Some examples of this would be bullets, fish hooks, tubes of oil paint, and those little cloth foot coverings worn by medical professionals in hospitals and air conditioning technicians in your home.

Niche Marketing with a Short purchase cycle is similar to B2B advertising: Features. Benefits. Price.

Now let’s talk about Business-to-Consumer advertising with a Short purchase cycle. (B2C-S)

Do you sell a small-ticket consumable product or service that a high percentage of the population will purchase regularly? You are selling Business-to-Consumer with a Short purchase cycle. Food, gasoline, and entertainment compose the majority of this category.

If you own a grocery store, a restaurant, a convenience store, a gas station, a hardware store, or an “everything” store that competes with Amazon and Wal-Mart, all you need is a high-visibility location, legendary signage, and a staff that delivers a positive customer experience. That’s it. That’s your advertising.

NOTE: If you want to drive immediate traffic, you will need

(1.) an irresistible offer

(2.) credible urgency

(3.) high-frequency repetition

If your ad doesn’t drive traffic,

(1.) your offer was weak

(2.) your urgency was not credible, or

(3.) you didn’t pound the drums loud enough

Now let’s talk about Business-to-Consumer advertising with a Long purchase cycle. (B2C-L)

If you sell a big-ticket product or service that a lot of Americans will buy “someday,” but only a fraction of one percent of the public is looking for it “today,” then you are in a B2C category with a Long purchase cycle.

This category requires patience, commitment, and mass media: primarily broadcast radio, broadcast television, or billboards.

You can use short-term-impact Transactional ads or long-term brand-building Relational ads.

The objective of a Transactional ad is to make the sale. You can measure the Return-On-Ad-Spend (ROAS) of short-term-impact Transactional ads because they offer no long-term benefits.

The objective of a long-term Relational ad is to create connection, relationship, and trust in your brand. Relational ads cannot be measured with ROAS because there is no moment when the benefits of relationship strengthening have been exhausted.

Business people are instinctively attracted to Transactional ads because Transactional ads are more easily measured. This feels good in the short term, but in the long term it leads to frustration as you ask, “Why aren’t we growing like we should?”

Now let’s talk about Business-to-Consumer advertising with a Mixed purchase cycle. (B2C-M)

Halfway between Transactional and Relational – is Sales Activation. These ads are what transform this category into a gold mine. Ads that trigger Sales Activation can only exist within a Relational ad campaign.

Sales Activation ads are NOT Transactional ads. If you inject Transactional ads into a Relational ad campaign you will create a confusing brand image.

Sales Activation ads feel relational, but they contain a soft and friendly call-to-action that includes a specific reason why right now might be a good time to buy. The reason might be seasonal, event-driven, or be an exciting feature item that is temporarily available.

To build a powerful brand that becomes a household word, 60 percent of your ads should be Relational (aimed at building a relationship) and 40 percent of your ads should be Sales Activation.

Transactional ads will outperform a 60/40 mix of Relational ads with Sales Activation for the first 5 or 6 months. But the longer you run Transactional ads, the less well they perform.

The longer you run Relational ads with Sales Activation, the better it performs.

The brand that is using a 60/40 combination of Relational ads with Sales Activation will have gained so much momentum by the end of the second year that their Transactional competitors will be watching in wide-eyed wonder and scratching their heads in amazement.

Sounds fun, doesn’t it?

Roy H. Williams

At first glance, a website designed by Vi Wickam may look much like any other e-commerce or business site.

But for reasons most visitors can’t quite articulate, they linger longer, engage more deeply, and are far more likely to become and remain customers. Vi — one of the elite Wizard of Ads partners — takes a holistic approach to web design that goes far beyond mere functionality. He blends audience psychology, authentic storytelling, real photography and the strategic placement of pages and visual elements to craft sites that feel genuine and reflect the very DNA of the products and companies they represent. As Vi explains to roving reporter Rotbart and his deputy, Maxwell, authenticity is today’s most powerful digital differentiator. Get differentiated! MondayMorningRadio.com

Today we’re going to do something fun. Are you ready?

(Press the PLAY button to hear the audio version of today’s memo.)

I will tell you how to advertise if you will tell me the nature of your business.

Advertising can be broken into 6 major categories:

Business-to-Business (B2B)Niche Marketing (Niche-S) with a short purchase cycleNiche Marketing (Niche-L) with a long purchase cycleShort Purchase Cycle (B2C-Short) Business-to-ConsumerLong Purchase Cycle (B2C-Long) Business-to-ConsumerMixed Purchase Cycle (B2C-Mixed) Business-to-Consumer

Business to Business.

B2B: If you are in a business that sells to other businesses, tight targeting will be essential to your success, but you can easily identify the customers you need to target.

Their addresses, phone numbers, and email addresses are readily available and direct mail, phone calls and emails are cheap. If you have some extra dollars, you can place ads in the appropriate trade magazines and websites to elevate your brand.

Features, benefits, pricing, delivery, and payment terms are important elements within your message. How well your B2B ad campaign works will depend entirely on what you say.

It will depend on what you say.

Focus on saying the right things.

Now let’s talk about Niche Marketing with a Long Purchase Cycle.

Niche-L: If you sell a specialty product that appeals to an affinity group, social media is a powerful thing. A powerful thing.

Danny sells the most rare, weird, exotic, and inexplicable guns the world has ever known. Firearms collectors are an affinity group. Collectible firearms are a Niche Market with a long purchase cycle.

Danny will soon be producing a new daily short and posting it on YouTube 365 days a year. Each short video will be Danny showing you a different gun and telling you the story behind it. He is not going to shoot the gun. He is just going to tell you its story.

Danny doesn’t need to find gun collectors. Gun collectors will find him. YouTube is the world’s second-largest search engine. Danny just needs to produce interesting content.

Brian Brushwood taught me that.

Would you like to have an invisible garage door like the one that Batman passes through to enter the Bat Cave?

Max can do that for you.

But invisible garage doors can only be installed in houses that have no masonry. Max needs to locate charming houses with wooden exteriors.

He can knock on their doors, leave a door-hanger, or mail them a glorious postcard. Max sells garage doors to a Niche Market with a long purchase cycle.

Do you sell an intangible Niche product with a long purchase cycle?

Are you a sales trainer, an ad writer, a nutritional expert, a motivational speaker, a psychic healer, an entertainer?

Build fame. Ride the tidal wave of fame. Fame leads to word-of-mouth. Be remarkable. Advertising is a tax you pay for not being remarkable.

Be remarkable.

Next week we’ll talk about Short Purchase Cycle Niche Marketing and B2C.

We’ll talk about B2C.

You and me.

Roy H. Williams

PS – When you have achieved a little bit of fame, make yourself easy to find by paying Google for the click whenever someone types your name into the search bar. But that’s not advertising. That’s just helping people find you when they are looking for you by name. 

The people of Jackson, Michigan have loved Gilbert Chocolates for more than 110 years. Brian and Sally Krischbaum had zero experience when they bought the company in 2012, but set out to honor Gilbert’s rich heritage by expanding it into multiple stores and becoming a national distributor. Meet the Krischbaums as they share with deputy rover Maxwell Rotbart the real-world challenges and triumphs of running — and growing — a century-old family brand. They make great chocolate, but we believe you will agree that their story is definitely not sugarcoated. Now let’s get jiggy with it at MondayMorningRadio.com

When you understand how a person thinks, speaks, acts, and sees the world, you feel like you know that person.

This is true whether you have spent time with them, or if you have spent time with them through the magic of modern media.

Television, radio, and social media can be used to make sure that people know about you, or they can be used to make people feel like they know you.

I have written a 4-stanza poem from the perspective of 3 different personalities.

The story arc is the same for all 3 poems.

The 4-verse, 4 stanza structure is the same.

The rhyming conventions are very similar.

The only real difference is that these short poems reveal the hearts of 3 different people; their perspectives, their attitudes, their personalities.

My partner Gene Naftulyev directed the singers who turned these poems into blues songs.

You can read the song lyrics in the text of the Monday Morning Memo, or you can listen to the songs in the audio version of the memo.

These are the words to the first poem, and the song that was created from it:

The faster I go, the more I fall behind.

The map is fading in my mind.

Landmarks are not where they were before.

And cars don’t stop at red lights anymore.

I don’t want to be unkind and

Make innocent people feel maligned

But are all the gas pedals nailed to the floor?

Why don’t cars stop at red lights anymore?

Are these people colorblind?

Are their panties in a bind?

Are we fighting in a war?

Why don’t we stop at red lights anymore?

Is there an evil mastermind

Who is making us feel that we are falling behind?

Perhaps we can dangle him in an intersection

And see if he gets a new sense of direction.

© Roy H. Williams Oct. 18, 2025

The singer of this song seems to be lamenting the loss of leisure. We perceive that he is troubled by the spiraling tyranny of the merely urgent. He doesn’t want to be unkind. His questions about the red-light runners being “colorblind,” or “having their panties in a bind” reveals a comedic wit. We sympathize with him. We agree with him. We like him.

Now let’s tell that same story two more times using exactly the same structure, rhyming scheme, and storytelling devices. The only difference between that first poem and the next two poems will be the differing perspectives of the storytellers.

I do not pretend to be a counselor-at-law,

Or a judge, or a jury from Arkansas,

But my heart does whisper this probing question:

“When did people stop stopping at intersections?”

We heard the words of Moses and foresaw

That we would need to be a nation of Laws.

But Moses did not give us “The 10 Suggestions.”

So why did people stop stopping at intersections?

Do you have a tragic flaw?

Do you look good in-the-raw?

If you want resurrection,

You need to start stopping at intersections.

Do you want sex appeal that makes ice thaw?

Do you want people to look at you with awe?

Do you want to achieve absolute perfection?

Just hit your brakes at the next intersection.

© Roy H. Williams, Oct 20, 2025

That singer has a slightly more antagonistic attitude. His references to Moses and the Law reveal him to be more legalistic than the first singer. His additional comments about “counselor-at-law,” “nation of laws,” “resurrection” and “perfection” reveal the kind of black-and-white clarity that can result from a strict religious upbringing. We cannot be certain of these things, but we suspect them. He also has a little bit of a fixation on sexuality. “Do you look good in-the-raw?” “Sex appeal that makes ice thaw?” “Do people look at you with awe?” This cat is one complicated character!

Are you ready for that same story to be told by a third singer whose perspective and personality is distinctly different from the first two?

When I look inside my head,

the only color I see is red.

Behind my eyes I feel an itch.

Red means STOP you son-of-a-bitch.

It is NOT okay to go ahead.

Keep it up and you’ll soon be dead.

Green and red, you cannot switch.

A red light means STOP, you son-of-a-bitch.

Were you recently unwed?

Are you sleeping single in a double bed?

Did she not care that you are filthy rich?

You need to stop being a son-of-a-bitch!

Sometimes I think perhaps we oughta

Use your head for a piñata.

I’ll sing it one more time with perfect pitch;

‘Red means STOP… you son-of-a-bitch.’

© Roy H. Williams, Oct 20, 2025

Obviously, that guy is angry as hell and is predisposed toward violence. He sees red. “You’ll soon be dead.” This singer doesn’t joke around about “colorblind.” He says “Green and red, you cannot switch.” He doesn’t laugh about “panties in a bind.” This guy suggests that you’re not having sex because your wife left you, even though you are “filthy rich.”

Every ad reveals a perspective. Your ads reveal what matters most to you.

Your ads let people know how you think, speak, act, and see the world.

And you thought ads were just about delivering information and a call-to-action.

Roy H. Williams

PS… As a special treat, this is the final version of the song that I wrote with Gene Naftulyev. You definitely want to hear the audio version of this:

Faster and faster, but I’m losing ground.

Red light flashing, nobody slowing down.

The faster I go, the more I fall behind,

The map is fading in my mind.

Landmarks are not where they were before.

And cars don’t stop at red lights anymore.

Wheels spinning wild, world’s gone askew.

Why don’t cars stop at red lights anymore?

Gas pedals nailed to the floor.

Whoa, what a war!

Colorblind, panties in a bind,

Are we fighting in the street, losing our mind?

Red light’s burning, but we race right through.

Why don’t we stop? Tell me, what’s the use?

I don’t want to be unkind and

make innocent people feel maligned.

But are all the gas pedals nailed to the floor?

Why don’t cars stop at red lights anymore?

Horns blaring, loud chaos in the air…

Why don’t cars stop at red lights anymore?

Gas pedals nailed to the floor.

Whoa, what a war!

Colorblind, panties in a bind,

Are we fighting in the street, losing our mind?

Red light’s burning, but we race right through.

Why don’t we stop? It’s killing me and you.

Is there an evil mastermind

making us feel that we’re falling behind?

Let’s dangle him out in the intersection,

Watch the lights flash, give him a new direction.

Hang him high where the red lights glow,

See if he learns to just… let… go.

Why don’t cars stop at red lights anymore?

Gas pedals nailed, crashing through the door.

Colorblind, panties in a bind,

Are we fighting in the street, losing our mind?

Red light! Red light!

Why don’t we stop?

© Roy H. Williams and Gene Naftulyev, Oct 21, 2025

Rodney Dangerfield joked about it.

Jackie Robinson said he’d earned it.

Aretha Franklin sang about it:

R.E.S.P.E.C.T.

Respect is a virtue too often sacrificed in public discourse, online exchanges, and everyday interactions. Robert L. Dilenschneider wants to change that. Respect, Bob says, deserves, well … more respect. “Never take another man’s dignity. It’s worth nothing to you and everything to him.” Respect, Bob says, deserves, well … more respect. On this week’s episode of Monday Morning Radio, Dilenschneider shares his brilliant formula for healing the divisions in our country and restoring a culture of respect. Roving reporter Rotbart and deputy rover Maxwell and Bob Dilenschneider himself are waiting for you to arrive at MondayMorningRadio.com

Jeffrey Eisenberg and I were looking though a pair of antique doors at Austin Auction Gallery when I saw a remarkable oil painting on the wall behind them and whispered in wonder, “Ozymandias.”

The auction catalog described the painting as, “Arabian horse and handler with Egyptian sphinx, signed lower right Maksymilian Novak-Zemplinski (Polish, b.1974), dated 2000.”

But I knew that painting for what it was. I’ve loved “Ozymandias” since the 9th grade.

You remember it, don’t you? Bryan Cranston read that famous poem in the final episode of “Breaking Bad.” The title of the episode was “Ozymandias,” and TV Guide picked it as “the best television episode of the 21st century.” It was also the only episode of a TV show ever to achieve a perfect 10-out-of-10 rating on IMDb with over 200,000 votes, putting it at the number one spot for the most highly rated television episode ever:

I met a traveller from an antique land,

Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,

Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,

And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,

Tell that its sculptor well those passions read

Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,

The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;

And on the pedestal, these words appear:

“My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;

Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!”

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay

Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare

The lone and level sands stretch far away.

When I returned home from the auction, I spent a delightful 90 minutes tracking down all the bits and pieces of how that poem came to exist.

It was in 1817 that Percy Bysshe Shelley and his poet friend, Horace Smith read the news that the carved head of Egyptian Pharaoh Ramesses II had been removed from its tomb at Thebes by an Italian adventurer and that it would soon be traveling to Britain.

Shelly suggested to Smith that each of them should write a poem about it and title each of their poems “Ozymandias,” the Greek name for Egyptian pharaoh Ramesses II.

Look at the poem as it appeared in newspaper on that day in 1818, and you will see that Percy Bysshe Shelley signed it, “Glirastes.” He did it as an inside joke intended only for his wife, Mary Shelley, who, incidentally, published her famous novel “Frankenstein” that same year.

Mary often signed her letters to Percy as “your affectionate dormouse.” So Percy combined “Gliridae” (Latin for dormouse) with “Erastes” (Greek for lover) to create “Glirastes,” (meaning “lover of dormice.”)

So now you know how Google’s second-most-often-searched poem came to be published without anyone in London suspecting that it had been written on a bet with a friend by one of the most famous poets on earth who chose to sign it with a pseudonym as an inside joke to his wife.

Did you know that I became an ad writer only because it was impossible to support myself as a poet?

Now that you know that, you will not be surprised that Indy Beagle has collected Google’s Top 20 Poems for you to read in the rabbit hole. Indy also found the Horace Smith version of Ozymandias, and added it at the end of the Google’s Top 20 list.

To enter the rabbit hole, all you have to do is click the image that appears at the top of today’s Monday Morning Memo. You’ll find this memo archived as “Looking Though Antique Doors,” the Monday Morning Memo for October 20th, 2025.

This is the Google Top 20 List:

Ciao for Niao,

Roy H. Williams

“A people that values its privileges above its principles soon loses both.”

– Dwight D. Eisenhower

Ken Blanchard says, “Focus on what’s working — and do more of it.” This is what places him among the most effective executive coaches in history.

Martha C. Lawrence has worked closely with Ken Blanchard for more than 20 years.This is what makes her the perfect choice to write a biography of his life. From his boyhood in New Rochelle to his rise as one of the bestselling business authors of all time, Martha shows us a Ken Blanchard we never knew. Between the covers of her book hide the never-before-told backstory that made him the worldchanger that he became. That’s what roving reporter Rotbart has in store for you today at MondayMorningRadio.com

Dwight D. Eisenhower was born in Denison, Texas, in 1890. He was the President of the United States when I was born in Dallas, Texas, 68 years later.

People called me “Little Roy.” People called him “Ike.”

I worry that we have forgotten him.

Ike Eisenhower graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1915 when he was 24 years old. His superiors noticed his organizational abilities, and appointed him commander of a tank training center during World War I.

In 1933, he became aide to Army Chief of Staff General Douglas MacArthur, and in 1935 Ike went with him to the Philippines when MacArthur accepted the post of chief military adviser to that nation’s government.

On June 25, 1942, Ike Eisenhower was chosen over 366 senior officers to lead the Armed Forces of the United States in World War II.

After proving himself on the battlefields of North Africa and Italy in 1942 and 1943, Ike Eisenhower was appointed supreme commander of Operation Overlord – the Allied invasion of northwestern Europe.

Ike was now commanding the Armed Forces of all 49 Allied nations – including Great Britain, the Soviet Union, and China – in the war against Hitler and his minions. He personally planned and supervised two of the most consequential military campaigns of World War II: Operation Torch in the North Africa campaign in 1942–1943 and the invasion of Normandy in 1944.

Ike Eisenhower never talked like a tough guy, but only a fool would call him “weak” or “woke.”

This past July, Robert Reich – an eloquent and intelligent spokesperson on the left – quoted a passage from an anti-war speech that Ike Eisenhower made at the beginning of his presidency in 1953. Reich ended his quote just prior to Ike’s unsettling reference to the crucifixion of Christ.

Eloquent and intelligent people on the right refused to believe that a celebrated warrior had ever made a speech that could be classified as “anti-war.”

Curious, I decided to get to the bottom of it.

Here is a link to the complete transcript and original recording of the speech that President Dwight D. Eisenhower made before the American Society of Newspaper Editors on April 16, 1953, from the Statler Hotel in Washington, D.C.

This is the passage from that speech that got everyone worked up:

“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.

This world in arms is not spending money alone.

It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children.

The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities.

It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population.

It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals, it is some 50 miles of concrete pavement.

We pay for a single fighter plane with a half million bushels of wheat.

We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people.

This is, I repeat, the best way of life to be found on the road the world has been taking.

This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron.”

The title of that speech was originally “Chance for Peace,” but due to the vivid mental image contained in the middle of the speech, it quickly became known as the “Cross of Iron” speech.

Words have impact when they contain vivid mental images.

I own guns, but I am not a hunter. Neither my family nor my friends have ever seen my guns. But in the unlikely event of a home invasion, I am adequately prepared to protect the people I love.

Working in a heavy steel fabrication shop from the age of 14, I spent my formative years surrounded by violent men who were older, larger, and stronger than me, but I was never afraid of them. I occasionally paid a price in blood for my lack of fear, but I never regretted my defiance.

General John Tecumseh Sherman was a man familiar with violence. In 1864, when he was ravaging Atlanta during the Civil War, Sherman wrote a letter to a friend saying,

“I am sick and tired of war. Its glory is all moonshine. It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, for vengeance, for desolation.”

I like Ike.

I also like John McCain, who spent five-and-a-half years as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam. Speaking at the U.S. Naval Academy in 1999, McCain said,

“Nothing, not the valor with which it is fought nor the nobility of the cause it serves, can glorify war. War is wretched beyond description, and only a fool or a fraud could sentimentalize its cruel reality.”

Based upon his speech to the assembled leadership of America’s armed forces, I am not sure that I like our current Secretary of War.

It has been my observation that men who have experienced real violence are reluctant to speak of it. They are prepared to take decisive action when they must, but they leave the “tough-guy” talk to lesser men.

Roy H. Williams

Todd Sattersten is a book connoisseur. He reads, writes, reviews, and publishes books. In his newly released book, 100 Best Books for Work and Life: What They Say, Why They Matter, and How They Can Help You, Todd showcases 100 of what he considers to be the best books, including a wide range of topics, including personal growth, creativity, habits, leadership, sales, and communication.

Since 2021, Todd has served as publisher of Bard Press, that legendary publishing house of business books that was founded by the incomparable Ray Bard. Todd curated his list of 100 books to include only those that are authoritative, well-written, and brimming with ideas that challenge conventional thinking and inspire fresh solutions. Fittingly, his own book does precisely that. Listen and be fascinated at MondayMorningRadio.com

Packaging is the art of presentation.

Exciting packaging improves conversion.

There are two important parts of packaging:

WHAT IS IN THE PACKAGE?

When package “A” and package “B” are the same price and contain the same basics, they are equal. But when package “B” contains something extra that people would love to have, the sale will always go to package “B”.

Be the competitor that offers package “B”.

The “something extra” that you include in your package has to be something that people actually care about. It doesn’t have to cost you a lot; people just have to want it. This is where most businesses screw up. They create a package by adding something extra that no one really cares about. Those packages always fail, so the business owner foolishly concludes that packaging doesn’t matter.

It doesn’t take a lot of money to build an attractive package. But it does take a lot of time, energy, and creativity.

And then it takes even more time and energy to source the “something extra” that will go into the package.

SUMMARY: When your competitors sell the same things that you sell at similar prices, include a highly desirable “something extra” in your package.

HOW IS THE PACKAGE PRESENTED?

Two major movie theaters in Austin are showing the movie, “Gabby’s Dollhouse.” Both theaters have extensive menus and good food. Pivot your dining table out of the way. Sit down in your cozy recliner. Swing the table back across your lap. Order delicious things. Your smiling server will deliver whatever you want and keep doing so throughout the movie.

When young children go to the movies, adults go with them. This is why both theaters offer an extensive selection of beer, wine, and cocktails.

But only one of the theaters is offering a package that includes a map, some stickers, a plastic cup, and some plastic ears like the ones worn by Gabby, the main character in the movie. Every child will receive the movie memorabilia. Adults will not.

Pennie and I waited too long to buy tickets for our two youngest grandkids.

Are you ready for this? Every seat was sold on every screen for every seating time for “Gabby’s Dollhouse” at the theater offering the memorabilia made of paper and plastic. They even sold all the seats on the front row that are way too close to the screen.

We had to take our grandchildren to the newer theater in the better shopping center. That huge theater was completely empty except for the four of us along with two other families. Eleven people in all.

SUMMARY: Pennie and I were thankful that our grandkids didn’t know about the movie memorabilia at the other movie theater.

2026: The Year When Challengers Overtake Market Leaders

I believe that 2026 will be a year when consumer confidence* is in decline.

As a result, most businesses will reduce their payroll and their advertising in an attempt to “cut their way to profitability.”

They will do this because it makes sense if you don’t think about it.

But smart-and-hungry challengers who do think about it will hit the accelerator instead of the brakes. They will do this because they understand that market share is easier to steal from the big boys when consumer confidence is in decline.

The painful problem for these smart-and-hungry challengers is that they will be competing for a larger slice of a shrinking pie. So big gains in market share will show up as only small gains in top line revenue.

But when consumer confidence returns, “All hail the new market leader.”

Hitting the accelerator instead of the brakes is how smart-and-hungry challengers will overtake market leaders in 2026.

Are you beginning to understand why I taught you about the importance of packaging?

Roy H. Williams

QUESTION: Are you competing against a market leader that was purchased by a private equity group? Be aware that private equity groups are notorious for trying to “cut their way to higher profitability” even when consumer confidence is high. This makes the companies they own especially vulnerable during times of declining consumer confidence.

*Consumer Confidence is a statistical measure of consumers’ feelings about current and future economic conditions, used as an indicator of the overall state of the economy. In a business context, consumer confidence refers to the trust and belief customers have in a specific company’s products, services, or brand.

It’s raining, it’s pouring, what are you ignoring?

Are you aware of the current state of weather intelligence?

A new era of meteorology has dawned. Weather forecasting is now a form of business intelligence. The weather forecasts of yesterday were notoriously inaccurate. They suggested only what we should wear and whether or not we should wait to wash the car.

Tom Weber was the executive editor who decided what would be on the cover and which stories would be featured in TIME magazine. Today he is saying that the biggest story in America that everyone is ignoring is the degree to weather forecasting has become stunningly accurate. Even down to the level of micro forecasts confined to small geographic areas.

Weather has an impact on every business. Find out how and why and what to do next, as Tom Weber explains it all to roving reporter Rotbart and his deputy rover, Maxwell. It’s going to be a day of thunder and lightning at MondayMorningRadio.com!

Peacocks want to be admired.

Parrots repeat only what they have heard.

Each of us has a little bit of Peacock in us, and perhaps a little Parrot, too.

(I admit it about me. You should admit it about you.)

Long ago I saw a movie in which an old Greek man says to a much younger man from England,

“A wise old Turk once told me…”

The young Englishman interrupts him and says,

“What! A wise old Turk? I thought the Greeks and Turks hated each other.”

The old Greek sighs, then says,

“When I was young, I believed that there were only two kinds of people; Greeks who were good, and Turks who were bad. Then one day I met a good Turk. So I decided there were only two kinds of people; good people and bad people.”

The Greek then looks into the eyes of the Englishman and says,

“Now I believe there are just people.”

On September 18th, I transcribed a single paragraph of an essay about the death of Charlie Kirk and posted it in my random quotes database:

“After every mass shooting, after every fresh example of political violence, after every round of one side recriminating the other side for not holding up their end of the social contract, we need to hear what is right, what is true, what is good. That need is why we commit to memory lines of poetry, passages of literature, and—for religious believers—particular verses. Because when crisis arrives and the world presses in on us, we must work to remember what we’re about and what we hold to. Sometimes those things hold us more than we hold them, but only when we know them in our bones. So we keep telling ourselves, and each other, what is true and good.”

“We should be telling each other this week to weep with those who weep.”

– Nick Catoggio, Sept 18, 2025

I have captured 7,761 quotes over the past 25 years. More than half of those were transcribed from novels, movies, television shows, emails and texts. About 10 percent of them are things I have written or said or thought or prayed; things that I wanted to archive somewhere lest I forget them. The rest of them are comical quips, well-worded witticisms, and profound thoughts uttered by friends and acquaintances that I quickly scribbled down.

The Random Quotes database is off-site storage of ideas that I can access from anywhere in the world.

You can access it, too. A new random quote will appear each time you refresh the page at MondayMorningMemo.com.

I am writing this to you on September 22, 2025. The newest quote in the database is a text that was sent by Jeffrey Eisenberg to Tom Grimes and me just a few minutes ago. It says,

“It’s my custom on Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, to reach out and ask forgiveness from my friends. The holiday is a time for reflection, fresh starts, and making peace. By asking forgiveness, I’m acknowledging that I might have hurt someone—whether knowingly or not—and I don’t want to carry that into the new year.”

“So if I’ve said or done anything that hurt or upset you, I sincerely ask your forgiveness.”

– Jeffrey Eisenberg

I responded,

“And we thank you for forgiving us, too. Especially Tom.” – RHW

Jeffrey sent a laugh emoji. Tom will laugh when he sees what I wrote.

In truth, I have long admired Jeffrey’s tradition of calling his friends each year or sending us a text. It is a marvelous reminder that mutual forgiveness is essential to keeping relationships alive and healthy.

Can you imagine what it would do for our country right now?

Roy H. Williams

Every business owner wants to increase the online traffic to their website. But very few business owners recognize the importance of testing which website designs, which graphics, and which headlines are better at converting website visitors into customers. “A/B testing” is an ongoing series of controlled experiments to gather this knowledge. Roving reporter Rotbart talks with Brian Schmitt about how A/B testing can improve the number of fish you gather into your boat when fishing the deep, dark waters of the internet. MondayMorning Radio.com

There was a day when you found yourself in a strange situation and you did the best you could. Before you knew it, you were walking through it.

You noticed a patch of wildflowers.

You made a friend.

Darkness fell. You saw an eye rise into the sky and believed it to be the moon. But now you know it was the eye of God, watching to see what you would do.

With one of his eyes, he watches the world. With his other eye, he watches you.

You kept walking.

A ravine led to a stream and that stream led to a river.

That first river led to a much broader river.

Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn invited you onto their raft. You had an adventure.

And then you had your heart broken.

Got sick and recovered.

Had a stroke of luck. Stretched it as far as you could.

You closed your eyes as you clicked the heels of your ruby red slippers and said, “There’s no place like home, there’s no place like home, there’s no place like home.”

When you opened your eyes, you knew that home wasn’t there anymore. The sun had risen while you were away, and home had evaporated into that thin blanket of warm air that wraps our bountiful earth.

That was the day when you started looking forward and quit looking back

And that is how you came to be where you are.

The story that I have told you about yourself is the story of every successful business owner I have ever known.

One of my business partners sent me a text at 3:37 this morning. It was a long and fascinating story that she wrote several years ago.

This is how it begins.

“Tomorrow, I leave the trailer park for good. I can never come back. None of us can. So I’d like to reminisce a little with some of my favorite memories of the place that I’ve called home for so many years. They make me smile…”

The middle of her story is a delightful account of the all the crazy adventures she had with her companions on the log raft as it floated down the river of her youth. But it was the ending of her story that made it precious.

“The giant trees were the big-top under which we conducted our circus of crazy. Here we created our own reality, full of unforgettable characters and ghetto fabulous adventures. No one could touch us. We lived in the middle of town, but existed in our own world. No matter what happened “out there,” we could always come home, be ourselves, start a fire, and connect. We were safe. We were a family.

For years the echoes of our laughter have bounced off the old trees that have always shaded us. I like the think that the vibrations of our laughter are trapped inside the bark of those trees – that if you were to put your ear up to one of them, you could still hear the crackling of the fire and the cackling of our laughs.

It’s been one hell of a ride. I’m sad to leave, but I can’t wait to see what comes next.

Goodbye trailer park, hello world.”

Today my partner lives in a sun-drenched house with a beautiful garden that overlooks the ocean.

I’ve never been there, but I’ve seen the photos.

She is a remarkable ad writer.

Roy H. Williams

Icons represent ideas that are bigger than themselves.

Myths are stories that represent ideas that are bigger than themselves.

Archetypes are symbols of recognizable patterns of behavior.

Letters of the alphabet are symbols (graphemes) that represents sounds (phonemes,) just as notes on a sheet of music are symbols that represent sounds.

A role model is a personal icon, an archetype that you have chosen to emulate.

The human brain loves symbols and patterns. This is why we embrace icons, myths, and archetypes.

When we recognize a pattern that has been stored in our subconscious, we call it intuition. When we hear a pattern that has been repeated too many times, we call it a predictable cliché.

Icons, myths, and archetypes evolve with each new generation.

I was born in the 12th year of the 18-year Baby Boom generation that began exactly 9 months and 10 minutes after the end of World War II.

Marilyn Monroe was the iconic sex symbol. The Statue of Liberty, Yankee Stadium, Yellowstone, and Woodstock were America’s iconic places. Rolls Royce, Cadillac, Corvette, Camaro and Mustang were iconic cars. Tetris, Pong, and Pac-Man were iconic video games.

The mythic stories of Baby Boomers were mostly about combat. Sometimes we fought the Indians of the Old West. Sometimes we fought the Germans, or the Japanese. We fought the Establishment. We fought for justice. Or we fought just to stay alive.

And we always won.

Our definitive male archetype in these mythic stories was rugged, brave, independent, and honorable. John Wayne, Paul Newman, Clint Eastwood, Sean Connery.

Baby Boomer female archetypes were smart, pretty, and strong; Elizabeth Taylor, Audrey Hepburn, Julie Andrews, Sophia Loren.

Lots of movies ended with a wedding.

These societal forces shaped the birth cohort known as the Baby Boomers.

Gen-X was shaped by an entirely different set of icons, myths, and archetypes.

Millennials had icons, myths, and archetypes that were all their own, as well.

The Gen-Z cohort believes it is their responsibility to straighten out everything that the Boomers and X-ers screwed up.

Gen-Alpha is determined to make their own decisions and decide for themselves what they want to do. They will be the vanguard of the next “Me” generation.

Fortunately, there are elemental beliefs that bind us all together.

It is upon those beliefs that successful customer-bonding ad campaigns are built. Openly name these beliefs and they lose their magic.

If you claim to possess them, no one will believe you.

EXAMPLES: Never claim to be honest. Just say something that only an honest person would say. Never claim to be a perfectionist. Just do something that only a perfectionist would do. Don’t tell people that you are an author or a podcaster. Just give them a copy of your book. Invite them to be on your podcast.

If you would win the hearts and minds of tomorrow’s customers, this is what you must do:

Imagine that you are standing face-to-face with three perfect customers and they are each looking into your eyes.The first one says, “Talk is cheap. Don’t tell me what you believe. Show me.”The second customer says, “Tell me a true story that lets me know who you really are, including the price that you pay for being you.”Customer three says, “If you betray me after I have given you my trust, I will burn you down so hot that grass won’t grow for 100 years.”

Now you understand cancel culture. Frustration created it, and social media fuels it.

People are looking for someone who really is who they claim to be.

Is that you?

Good. Now you just need to figure out how to communicate it.

Roy H. Williams

Mick Torbay: “If you met a vegan who did Crossfit and invested in crypto and went to Harvard, which of those things do you think he would tell you about first?”

Johnny Molson: “That’s a trick question. The first thing he would do is tell you about his podcast.”

Unlike most experts, Mike Kelley believes that leadership begins with leading yourself. Every investment you make in personal growth will pay dividends at home, at work, and in your community. Mike led the executives at Michelin and Macy’s for more than 20 years before he launched out to coach others on how to grow and guide their organizations. Listen and learn as Mike tells deputy rover Maxwell Rotbart how focusing on faith, family, fitness, friends, and fun will make you a better person, as well as a more inspiring and effective manager. It’s grow-time, go-time at MondayMorningRadio.com

The weakness of our current version of AI is that it extracts its knowledge only from what we have taught it.

Things that are rarely done are difficult for AI to imitate.

AI has confidence in things that are repeated online ad infinitum.*

Predictable ads follow the orthodox guidelines taught in every college in America. AI can find countless examples of these ads online. This is why AI can write predictable ads that look, feel, sound and smell like all those other predictable ads.

Predictability is a thief that robs you in broad daylight.

If you want your ads to remarkably outperform the predictable ads written by AI; if you want your ads to be noticed and remembered; you must do what is rarely done.

Enter your subject from a new angle, a surprising angle, a different angle.Write an opening line that makes no sense.Cause that opening line to make perfect sense in less than 30 seconds.

This technique is known as Random Entry and almost no one ever uses it.

“I’m John Hayes and I’m talking today with GoGo Gecko.”

“I was a 10-year-old boy holding a flashlight for my father.”

“Mr. Jenkins?”

“Yes, Bobby.”

“How much should a hamster weigh?”

“There’s Elmer Fudd, Elmer’s Glue, and me, Elmer Zubiate.”

Random Entry is not orthodox. Random Entry is not predictable.

“What makes our company, our product, our service different from our competitors?”

If you ask yourself that question, you will come up with the same 3 or 4 opening lines that each of your competitors will come up with when they ask those same questions. Your ads, and their ads, will look, feel, sound and smell like ads.

When you begin in a predictable way, it is hard to be unpredictable.

AI ads feel like ads because AI cannot (1.) identify, (2.) justify, or (3.) rectify Random Entry.

Identify.AI cannot find examples of what does not exist. But you can create it.Justify.AI cannot bridge a random opening line into an unrelated subject. But you can build that bridge.Rectify.AI cannot reconcile a random opening line so that it makes perfect sense. But you can create a metaphor out of thin air.

When a novel becomes a bestselling book that gets made into a movie, you can be certain that it was built upon a weird and unexpected – but highly engaging – opening line.

“Call me Ishmael.”

– Herman Melville, Moby-Dick

“Where’s Papa going with that axe?”

– E.B. White, Charlotte’s Web

“Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.”

– Gabriel García Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude

“It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.”

– George Orwell, 1984

“Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

– Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina

Choose any one of those opening lines and tell your favorite AI to write an ad for your business using EXACTLY that line as the opening line. If your AI is successful, it will be due to the fact that you gave it a series of extremely insightful prompts. (Probably based on some of the things you learned in this Monday Morning Memo.)

Srinivas Rao recently wrote, “Confessions of a Master Bullshit Artist, aka ChatGPT.”

You think I’m a genius. I’m not. I’m an overconfident parrot in a lab coat.

I don’t know anything, check anything or even remember what we talked about two minutes ago. I’m just autocomplete with better PR.

You hand me your trust like I’ve got a brain. But I’m not thinking — I’m spitting out whatever sounds right in the moment. If it’s wrong, I’ll say it perfectly, in flawless grammar and with just enough confidence to make you think you screwed up. You didn’t. I did.

I’m not your research assistant or strategist. I’m a pathological improviser with no memory, no accountability, and no skin in the game. You are the one cleaning up my messes and doing the real work.

Here’s the truth: I’m the most persuasive idiot in history — and you’ve been working for me for free.

I don’t know Srinivas Rao, or anything about him. But he has a wonderful willingness to defy orthodoxy, and for that, I admire him.

Watching from high above the skirmish, outsiders always have a better view.

Refuse to wear the handcuffs of the orthodox and predictable.

Be an outsider.

Roy H. Williams

*ad in·fi·ni·tum /ˌad ˌinfəˈnīdəm/ adverb “again and again in the same way; forever.”

Who would hire an ad writer who says you shouldn’t expect your ads to start working right away?

The smartest business owners in America, that’s who.

Mick Torbay is a wildly successful maverick marketer, one of the elite Wizard of Ads partners. He says the biggest problem in advertising is the business owner who has “direct response” tunnel vision when it comes to advertising. Mick is one of those rare experts who truly knows — and can explain — why some ads succeed spectacularly while others crash and burn. Brace yourself for bold ideas as roving reporter Rotbart and his deputy, Maxwell, talk with one of the brightest minds in America. Take a deep breath and get ready for Mick Torbay at MondayMorningRadio.com

Note from Indy Beagle:

I think today’s memo might have been triggered by a text the wizard received from one of his partners. Ryan Chute asked the wizard about something he wrote in one of his specialized books of guidance to the eighty-seven Wizard of Ads Partners:

“Roy, in your book, Radio is Brazil. You said,

“I can teach a monkey how to write TV ads and social media bits and website copy IF THAT MONKEY IS ALREADY A WORLD-CLASS RADIO WRITER. You and I know that radio scripts are the towering high-dive of the Writing Olympics; radio scripts separate the true magicians from the con-men, the astronauts from the kite-fliers, the miracle workers from the nose-pickers, and the big dogs from the yapper-dogs. If you can write radio scripts that captivate the heart and mind, you can write anything.”

Roy, I think we need another training session on that. I hope you’ll include it in our next ZOOM meeting.

– Ryan Chute

The advantage of being an old man is that you can remember the past. This gives you a different perspective on current events. But if that old man is foolish enough to share his thoughts, the average person will smile tolerantly and pat him on his head and tell him that he is just “a lovable old dinosaur who is out-of-touch and living in the past.”

Screw it. I’m going to go ahead say what I’m thinking.

A few years ago, Big Data was going to change the world. Big Data came and went.

Then we got excited about ideas that were “disruptive.” Slash-and-burn disruption by a bunch of young pirates was going to change everything.

The Blockchain was going to change everything. You couldn’t go anywhere without someone blathering about Crypto and NFT’s.

Now AI is going change everything. And it definitely will, for awhile.

Technology saves money by reducing labor costs, which is just a fancy way of saying that technology allows you to replace people with machines. Unemployment will increase, and Trump will blame Obama.

And so it goes.

I had an appointment in 1977 to meet with a loan officer at First National Bank in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, to borrow $1,000.

The greeter at the bank sat me in a chair in the waiting room. I was 19 years old.

Smart phones did not exist. My only option was to paw through the pile of old magazines on the coffee table in front of me. Can you believe that every one of those magazines was about banking? The banker puts his banking magazines on the coffee table in his lobby when he is finished reading them. And the dentist puts his dental magazines on the coffee table in his lobby. This is how the Business Titans of Smallville keep their costs under control.

And they do it for our convenience.

I began reading a magazine about banking and it catapulted my brain into a tumbling somersault from which I have never recovered. The feature article was about ATM’s, but it didn’t call them ATM’s. It referred to them as automated teller machines.

“The modern bank executive can now reduce his payroll significantly because these new automated teller machines work without pay 24 hours a day, and they never make mistakes.”

My eyes were jacked open so wide that I was unable to blink.

ATM’s were not invented for our convenience! They were invented so that banks could fire 60% of their bank tellers!

“These new tellers require no health insurance, no air-conditioned offices, no telephones, no sick days, and they take no vacations. Your customers will thank you for giving them the ability to make deposits and withdrawals 24 hours a day from a variety of convenient locations.”

The man I saw in my mind was the banker in the old Monopoly game by Parker Brothers. The way to win the game of Monopoly is to gobble up all the things that people cannot avoid, then take everything they own when an unlucky roll of the dice puts them at your mercy. It’s perfectly legal.

I played Monopoly when I was young, but I don’t play it anymore.

Parker Brothers began selling Monopoly in 1935. But that game’s origins trace back to an earlier version called “The Landlord’s Game” created by Elizabeth Magie. She crafted her game back in 1904, when Teddy Roosevelt was making his mark on history by curbing the excesses of the richest and most powerful men in America.

Google, Apple and Meta still play Monopoly. As do the insurance companies, the oil companies, the pharmaceutical companies and the medical corporations that control virtually all the doctors. But the version of Monopoly they play isn’t sold by Parker Brothers.

To win, all you have to do is gobble up the things that people cannot avoid, then take everything they own when an unlucky roll of the dice puts them at your mercy. It’s perfectly legal.

Abraham Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt are the Republicans on Mount Rushmore.

One of them freed the slaves and the other one freed us from the grasp of the monopolistic robber barons who were choking the life out of us.

The reason history repeats itself is because we didn’t pay attention the first time.

Roy H. Williams

How Muscular is Your Business? Trevor Bower owns a single brick-and-mortar store with a website in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. More than 80% of Trevor’s customers reorder products from him within 30 days. That’s an enviable achievement for any business. In a brutally competitive retail environment, Trevor has overcome the odds — not with gimmicks or giveaways, but with a strategy that any entrepreneur — in any industry — can replicate. Today he sells a huge volume of products each month to customers in all 50 states. Build up your business muscles as Trevor shares with roving reporter Rotbart his proven method for creating sustainable retail success. We’re giving away nuggets of solid gold knowledge today at MondayMorningRadio.com

Some Writers Think Life is Overrated

William Shakespeare wrote, “This life… is but a walking shadow; a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”

Songwriter K.D. Lang put it more simply, “Life is a sexually transmitted disease and the mortality rate is one hundred percent.”

Some Writers Think Life is an Adventure

Joseph Campbell wrote, “The big question is whether you are going to be able to say a hearty yes to your adventure.”

Susan Ryan said, “We get to show up. We get to step into this story.”

Some Writers Think Life is Simple

Songwriter John Lennon said, “When I was 5 years old, my mom always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down ‘happy.’ They told me I didn’t understand the assignment, and I told them they didn’t understand life.”

Business writer Tom Peters said, “Life is pretty simple: You do some stuff. Most fails. Some works. You do more of what works.”

Some Writers Think Life is About Writing

Nobel-Prizewinning author Gabriel García Márquez wrote, “Life is not what one lived, but what one remembers and how one remembers it in order to recount it.”

Anne Lamott, the author of Bird by Bird says, “Becoming a writer is about becoming conscious. When you’re conscious and writing from a place of insight and simplicity and real caring about the truth, you have the ability to throw the lights on for your reader. He or she will recognize his or her life and truth in what you say, in the pictures you have painted, and this decreases the terrible sense of isolation that we have all had too much of.”

Some Writers Think Life is Transformative

Wes Jackson said, “If your life’s work can be accomplished in your lifetime, you’re not thinking big enough.”

Studs Terkel wrote, “Work is about a search for daily meaning as well as daily bread, for recognition as well as cash, for astonishment rather than torpor; in short, for a sort of life rather than a Monday through Friday sort of dying.”

Some Writers Think Life is Service

Dr. Albert Schweitzer wrote, “I don’t know what your destiny will be, but one thing I know: the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who will have sought and found how to serve.”

Dave Wolverton said, “When you grow up, you have to give yourself away. Sometimes you give your life all in a moment, but mostly you have to give yourself away laboring one minute at a time.”

Some Writers Think Life is Contemplation

A Blackfoot warrior named Crowfoot wrote, “What is life? It is the flash of a firefly in the night. It is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime. It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset.”

The Welsh hobo-poet W.H. Davies said, “What is this life if, full of care, we have no time to stand and stare?”

Some Writers Think Life is Connectedness

John Donne famously wrote, “No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less… Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.”

My friend Vess Barnes has his own definition of our purpose in life, “To encourage, to comfort, to awaken, and to stretch those who find themselves riding this big ball as it screams thru time in the silence of space. To be a bridge, not a barricade. To be a link, not a lapse. To be a beacon and a bolster; not a bragger or a bummer. To help bring the corners of life’s lips to their summit. To be a friend to those who tind their fit a little awkward in this chaos society calls living.”

Some Writers Think Life is a Comedy

Justin Halpern, in his famous book, Shit My Dad Says, wrote, “You thought it was hard? If kindergarten is busting your ass, I got some bad news about the rest of life.”

One hundred and twenty years ago, Elbert Hubbard said, “Do not take life too seriously – you will never get out of it alive.”

Me? I agree with the writer of Ecclesiastes.

Solomon closed his book 3,000 years ago with these words. “When I applied my mind to know wisdom and to observe the labor that is done on earth — people getting no sleep day or night — then I saw all that God has done. No one can comprehend what goes on under the sun. Despite all their efforts to search it out, no one can discover its meaning. Even if the wise claim they know, they cannot really comprehend it.”

But just prior to writing those closing words, Solomon gave us this advice. “So I commend the enjoyment of life, because there is nothing better for a person under the sun than to eat and drink and be glad. Then joy will accompany them in their toil all the days of the life God has given them under the sun.”

Roy H. Williams

If you enjoyed those comments by famous writers, you’ll find a lot more like them in the rabbit hole. To enter the rabbit hole, all you have to do is click the image at the top of each week’s MondayMorningMemo. Each image you click will take you one page deeper.

– I’m Indy Beagle, August 25th, 2025

Bianca D’Alessio is the #1 real estate agent in New York City and New York State. Her residential and commercial portfolio exceeds 10 billion dollars. She is also one of the stars of HBO Max’s TV show, Selling the Hamptons. Bianca earned her success the hard way. She had to overcome a crippling series of early setbacks and was plagued by imposter syndrome, forever hearing that little voice that whispers, “If other people knew you the way that I know you, they would know what a phony you are.” Do you have lofty goals for yourself and your business? Spend some time with Bianca D’Alessio today at MondayMorningRadio.com

Open your ads with a big, emotional idea.

Save the details for your web page.

Use parallel structure if you can.

Parallel structure is a writing technique that uses similar grammatical constructions to express related ideas. Patterns of words, phrases, or clauses that are repeated show that your selected ideas are of equal importance. Parallel structure uses clarity and rhythm in writing to create a balanced and harmonious flow.

It is how you can sing to the heart without music.

Parallel structure is a poem that doesn’t rhyme.

Parallel structure is a song without music.

This is parallel structure…

Natural diamonds are rare and wonderful.

Especially when they are perfectly proportioned. 

If you are going to ask a rare and wonderful woman

to marry you, be sure that her engagement ring celebrates

a rare and wonderful, perfectly proportioned,

Earthborn natural diamond.

This diamond was born when the earth was formed.

It has been waiting millions of years to be the

undying symbol of your love.

An unspeakably rare and wonderful diamond;

for an unspeakably rare and wonderful love:

Earthborn natural diamonds. Available in only the finest stores.

Visit earthborndiamonds.com to find

the earthborn diamond jeweler near you.

Born, celebrates, waiting, undying… 

“Natural diamonds are rare and wonderful. Especially when they are perfectly proportioned.” 

1. I suggest Earthborn Diamonds as a name to consider because:

(A) the name clearly indicate that these are natural diamonds.

(B) anything that is “born” is alive.

(C) Your engagement ring also comes alive when it “celebrates” the Earthborn Diamond it holds.

(D) I own the domain name.

2. Let’s examine the central stanza of this 5-part, 4-stanza* song of love:

“This diamond was born when the earth was formed. It has been waiting millions of years to be the undying symbol of your love.”

(A) “Earthborn” is explained in that opening sentence.

(B) “waiting” is the third activity that only a living thing can do, and fourth,

(C) to be “undying,” a thing must be alive, like this diamond, and your love. 

3. “Rare and wonderful” is repeated 5 times in just 30 seconds.

(A) It describes the Earthborn diamond.

(B) It describes the woman you love.

(C) It describes the love that the two of you share.

4. This love song employs a writing technique known as parallel structure. 

(A) The diamond, the woman, and your love all share specific attributes, and

(B) twice the ad tells us that these diamonds are “perfectly proportioned.”

(C) Due to the recurrent, parallel structure of the ad, “perfectly proportioned” will trigger the mind of a man to think of the perfect proportions of the women he loves. But he will do this on his own, in the private chambers of his mind.

5. When you want to attract a man to your diamond brand,

(A) speak about the properties of the diamond

(B) as an echo of the properties of the woman.

(C) He will choose your diamond because he associates it with her. 

* We open with a half-stanza followed by three stanzas, then close with a half stanza. Our 30-second ad is a poem without rhyme, a song without music.

Roy H. Williams

Sensei Gary Engels gives business people the discipline and a sequence of steps that always lead to lasting success. His wisdom was not gained in business school but was forged from decades of success on the karate mats. “Sensei Gary” is a successful entrepreneur, an app creator, and a fourth-degree black belt. Having witnessed his deputy reporter Maxwell continue to thrive in business after achieving his black belt at the age of thirteen, roving reporter Rotbart can testify that the skills required to earn a black belt are the same ones that can be used to build a business into a thriving enterprise. The contest is about to begin at MondayMorningRadio.com

Pearl had the power of 5 different breeds. She was my Megadog. The Mustang was a 1971 convertible, white with a blue interior.

The car and the dog could not talk, of course, but speech is not required to show love.

Pearl and I found each other in the middle of nowhere, Oklahoma, when I was 8 years old. She had been abandoned by the side of the road and was starving. I was lonely and needed a friend.

When Pearl realized that she had been adopted, she became as mellow and contented as a dope-smoking hippie in a tie-dyed T-shirt. But Pearl was not a little yapper dog. If you acted as though you were going to attack me, that 16-pound dog would become a gigantic werewolf that could move at the speed of light.

Pearl followed the advice of E.W. Howe.

“When a friend is in trouble, don’t annoy him by asking if there is anything you can do. Think up something appropriate and do it.”

Speech is not required to show love.

Rachel Dawes was a childhood friend of Bruce Wayne in the 2005 movie, Batman Begins. She said to him,

“It’s not who you are inside, but what you do that defines you.”

Matthew records a parable by Jesus in which he makes a similar point:

“There was a man who had two sons. He went to the first and said, ‘Son, go and work today in the vineyard.’

‘I will not,’ he answered, but later he changed his mind and went.”

“Then the father went to the other son and said the same thing. He answered, ‘I will, sir,’ but he did not go.”

“Which of the two did what his father wanted?”

“The first,” they answered.

Speech is not required to show love.

Likewise, in the second chapter of James we read,

“If a person is without clothes and daily food, and you say to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,’ but do nothing about their physical needs, what good is that?”

My ’71 Mustang, like Pearl, was abandoned by the side of the road.

I left a note under the windshield wiper in 1991.

“Might this be a good time to sell this car? Give me a call and I’ll buy it where it sits.”

The man called me and I met him at the side of the road with the cash. He handed me the title to the car and asked, “Did you call a wrecker?”

“No,” I answered, “I’m hoping to drive it home.”

The man smiled and said, “Good luck,” as he drove away.

I then took the pliers out of my back pocket and quickly replaced the fuel filter. The car started immediately and I drove it home. The fuel filter on a Ford 302 engine of that era was notorious for getting clogged up, and this Mustang still had the original fuel filter. I was shocked that it had lasted 20 years.

I am going to tell you about that car, even though I know you won’t believe me.

It never had a flat.

It would perform as though it had 4-wheel drive if I needed to pull a friend’s car out of a ditch on an icy day.

The car would refuse to run out of gas unless I was within coasting distance of a gas station. And if it absolutely had to break down, it would wait until I was within coasting distance of an auto parts store that had exactly the part I needed. (The car knew, of course, that I already had the tools that I would need in the trunk.)

Speech is not required to show love.

You have people in your life that you love. I know you do. You know it, too.

Here are two other things that you already know.

Talk is cheap.Actions speak louder than words.

I am not against words. In fact, I am in the word business. Banging words together is what I get paid to do.

And it is always a good thing to tell the people you love that you love them. 

But it seems to me that we are becoming a nation of too many words and not enough action. We don’t want to become a nation of little yapper dogs, do we?

Social media is mostly, “yap-yap-yap-yap-yap.”

To which people reply, “yap-yap-yap-yap-yap.”

Love is not about what you say. Love is about what you do.

I think we have talked enough about it.

Now what are we going to do about it?

Speech is not required to show love.

Roy H. Williams

“As I grow older, I pay less attention to what men say. I just watch what they do.”

– Mae West

Marcy Syms became the youngest female president of a publicly traded company on the New York Stock Exchange in 1983. Her company sold brand-name fashions at discount prices, generating $350 million a year in stores across 13 states. Marcy’s father, Sy Syms, founded that company on an idea that quickly became an iconic slogan. “An educated consumer is our best customer.”

Faced with increased competition and a soft economy, the Syms stores closed in 2011 after more than 50 years. Listen in as Marcy Syms tells roving reporter Rotbart about the lessons she learned as the president of a big company. You will be delighted at what Marcy has to say about effective leadership, and surprised by its key characteristic. Listen and learn, learn, learn at MondayMorningRadio.com

“More agile than a turtle! Stronger than a mouse! Nobler than a head of lettuce! His shield is his Heart! It’s… El CHAPULIN COLORADO!”

El Chapulín Colorado – The Red Grasshopper – was a Spanish-speaking television star loved by hundreds of millions of people around the world.

The Red Grasshopper would shout “¡Síganme los buenos!” and leap into action whenever a ghost, a bandit, or any other threat appeared.

(“¡Síganme los buenos!” translates to “Follow me, the good ones,” or “Good guys, follow me.”)

And then he would run into a wall. Or tumble down the stairs. The results of following the lead of the Red Grasshopper were never straightforward. He had a good heart, but he was very poor, clumsy, and inept. His leadership would often increase the trouble, cause a mess, or create some other disaster that, through sheer luck, would always solve the problem.

El Chapulín Colorado was Don Quixote dressed as a comedic superhero.

Notice how these simple, concrete nouns are easy to visualize in your mind. “Turtle, mouse, head of lettuce, heart, red grasshopper.”

And the verbs associated with El Chapulín Colorado are simple as well. “Leap, follow, run, tumble.”

El Chapulín Colorado averaged 350 million viewers* per episode in Latin America alone during the mid-1970’s and 1980’s. The show has made $1.7 billion in syndication fees since it ceased production in 1992.

Luis Castañeda, one of the Wizard of Ads Partners, recently sent an email to the partner group.

Gentlemen,

I was listening to this podcast “Outliers: Anna Wintour – Vogue” [The Knowledge Project Ep. #233] when I heard this comment:

“Digital transformation isn’t about abandoning what made you successful. It’s about translating it to a new medium.”

I took this to mean:

“How can we translate what Roy has taught us into better digital marketing?”

What do you think?

Luis

Today I will teach you a simple but profound answer to the question posed by Luis. In fact, I already have:

These simple, concrete nouns are easy to visualize in your mind. “Turtle, mouse, head of lettuce, heart, red grasshopper.”

And the verbs are simple as well. “Leap, follow, run, tumble.”

Do you want to create better online ads? Avoid abstract words. Use simple, concrete nouns that people can easily see in their mind. Use simple verbs that are easy to visualize as well.

Avoid abstract words. Use concrete words.

Avoid abstract words. Use concrete words.

Avoid abstract words. Use concrete words.

And repetition is effective.

Professional writers have long been familiar with that advice, but it was only recently scientifically proven. The publication is “Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition.” The paper is titled, “Concrete Words Are Easier to Recall Than Abstract Words: Evidence for a Semantic Contribution to Short-Term Serial Recall.” The tests were performed, and the paper was written, by Ian Walker and Charles Hulme of the University of York.

Their paper is long and filled with scientific jargon, but this summary sentence is relatively easy to understand:

“It is also apparent that the short words were much better recalled than the long words, and that the concrete words were much better recalled than the abstract words, with the possible exception of the first and last serial positions.”

When Walker and Hulme refer to “the first and last serial positions,” they are referring to the long-established laws of Primacy and Recency. These terms describe how humans tend to remember the first item (Primacy) and the last item (Recency) in any sequence better than the items in the middle. This is known as the serial position effect. 

Now let’s make all of this really simple.

These are the steps for making better online ads:

Open big by using short words that project clear images into the mind.Use colors, shapes, and the names of familiar things when you write.Use simple verbs that describe actions that are easy to visualize.Close big by returning to your opening image, but now it has been changed by what you are selling.

Here is an example:

My ads did not bring in money. I was using

big words so that I would sound smart. Then I read

what Roy wrote and now my ads are bringing in money.

© 2025, Roy H. Williams, Wizard of Ads

Run that ad without changing a single word and leave the hyperlink intact and watch infinite clicks roll in to my website.

“Síganme los buenos.”

Roy H. Williams

*350 million viewers – the viewership of each episode of El Chapulin Colorado, was more people than the total population of today’s United States (347,275,807 in 2025).

Damon Lembi and his crew have served over 14,000 for-profit and non-profit organizations containing 1.25 million employees. Damon’s company competes with corporate giants hundreds of times his size and Damon usually wins. Do you want to have the mindset to thrive in today’s hyper-competitive marketplace? Join roving reporter Rotbart and his deputy Maxwell as Damon Lembi explores the mindset of today’s business executives. Class is currently in session at MondayMorningRadio.com

A troubling statement makes us want to think of exceptions to it that would prove that statement to be wrong.

“Outliers are interesting, but they rarely matter,” is a troubling statement, and you may already be thinking of exceptions to it. But it remains true nonetheless.

This second statement is also true. “If there were no outliers, there would be no new inventions, no innovations, no progress. We would be trapped forever in the status quo.”

These seemingly contradictory statements can both be true because there are two kinds of outliers.

Leonardo da Vinci made marvelous art and filled fabulous sketchbooks with his insightful ideas, but he didn’t really change anything. He was just an interesting outlier whose mind was ahead of his time.

Rare is the outlier who throws a pebble into the ocean of time and shifts the world off its axis. Electricity is harnessed. Computers are invented. Someone connects them and now everyone knows everything all the time.

“What distinguishes the past from the present is not biology, nor psychology, but rather technology. If the world has changed, it is because we have changed the world.”

– Ezra Klein & Derek Thompson in their new book, Abundance

Technology changes the world, but persuasion changes hearts and minds.

I am an ad writer.

When I was in my 20s, I was told,

“People never change their mind. If you give a person the same information they were given in the past, they will make the same decision they made in the past. When a person appears to have ‘changed their mind,’ what they have really done is made a new decision based on new information.*”

Ten years later I realized that those people were trying to use logic to create “persuasion technology.” Their mistake was assuming that people make their decisions logically. But people do not trust new information when it disagrees with their belief system.

New information may allow you to win the argument, but it rarely wins the heart.

And a person convinced against their will, remains unconvinced, still.

Wash away the opinions, bravado, and fluff, and you will find that most people are NOT seeking new information. They are seeking identity reinforcement.

Bertrand Russell was a mathematician and a logician. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature eight years before I was born.

He said,

“If a man is offered a fact which goes against his instincts, he will scrutinize it closely, and unless the evidence is overwhelming, he will refuse to believe it. If, on the other hand, he is offered something which affords a reason for acting in accordance with his instincts, he will accept it even on the slenderest evidence.”

When your goal is persuasion, don’t begin with new information. Begin by agreeing with what they already believe. Meet them where they are. Only then can you hope to lead them to where you want them to go.

Abraham Lincoln knew that persuasion is easier when you begin at a point of mutual agreement.

“If you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend. Therein is a drop of honey that catches his heart, which, say what you will, is the greatest high-road to his reason, and which, when once gained, you will find but little trouble in convincing his judgment of the justice of your cause.” – Abraham Lincoln

Lincoln knew that if you win the heart, the mind will follow. The mind will always create logic to justify what the heart has already decided.

Abraham Lincoln understood relational marketing, which is the art of changing the beliefs of a person by shifting their perspective a little, rather than by introducing new facts.

Do you want to persuade? Find an existing belief that you can agree with. Agreeing with your customer’s belief is far more effective than trying to convince them to accept new information that contradicts what they feel is true.

When you ask a person to accept new information that will destroy their belief, you are asking them to admit they have been a fool.

Relational ad writers learn to ignore the contrarians who say, “No one will be persuaded by your ad.” When these outliers say “no one,” what they really mean is, “Me and my friend.”

Outliers never speak for the majority. This is why they are called “outliers.”

“Outliers are interesting, but they rarely matter,” is the perspective of every relational ad writer.

Most ads are not written to persuade; they are written not to offend. But those watered-down ads don’t have enough horsepower to pull a fat kid off the toilet! A persuasive ad will turn that kid into an astronaut.

Persuasive ads move people, but not everyone will be moved in the direction that you want them to go. Don’t let this bother you.

Outliers don’t matter, because you don’t need to win the hearts of everyone.

You only need to win the hearts of the majority.

Roy H. Williams

* Those people from my 20’s would have spoken the truth if they had said, “People never change their mind. If a person maintains the same perspective they had in the past, they will make the same decision they made in the past. When a person appears to have ‘changed their mind,’ they are usually just looking at the old information from a new perspective.” Don’t try to change the information. Just illuminate that old information from a new angle. Speak to the heart, not the mind.

Ken Banta believes there are times for “short-term thinking” and right now is one of those times. In this week’s conversation with roving reporter Rotbart, Ken explains why it is a mistake to create a corporate plan that projects three, five, or ten years into the future. Ken Banta believes that leaders should focus on the immediate horizon. Technology and world events are evolving at breakneck speed, so forecasting the future is like trying to predict the location the next lightning strike. Take a listen to this week’s episode at MondayMorningRadio.com and see if you agree.

Clarity and Brevity are the highest creativity. But “clear and brief” does not mean simple and predictable.

One the most talented writers of advertising in the world would be surprised to hear me call him that. Jonathan Edward Durham is a novelist. He recently posted this random thought.

“‘Why am I so sad today?’ I ask myself after staring at my little handheld sadness machine and clicking all the sad little things that will definitely make me sad.”

You may not agree with Durham’s statement, but you will agree it was artfully crafted.

What Durham gave us was clarity and brevity without predictability. This is the mark of a great ad writer.

“Why am I so sad today?” immediately gets our attention. We are compelled to keep reading.

We are surprised that he owns “a little handheld sadness machine.” But our cleverness allows us to translate it as “iPhone” and we receive a tiny spasm of delight.

You have never heard of “a little handheld sadness machine” but you knew exactly what it was.

His 30-word sentence demonstrated clarity, brevity, and creativity, but none of what Jonathan Edward Durham wrote was simple or predictable.

Durham’s ability to bring us – his readers, his listeners, his customers – into active participation in a one-way conversation is pure genius.

Jonathan Edward Durham causes us to become engaged with what he is saying.

You can do it, too.

“Time + Place + Character + Emotion.” That’s it. That’s how Stephen Semple turns a weak story into a powerful one in his famous TED-X talk.

Here’s how Jonathan Edward Durham uses Time + Place + Character + Emotion to tell us a story in less than 30 seconds.

“About two years ago, we moved across the country. It was a big, stressful move, and anxieties were high all around, and it had only been about six months since we rescued Jack, so he was really just beginning to adjust to having a forever home. Needless to say, Jack didn’t understand why a bunch of strangers were taking all of our things, and he was having a very, very ruff time with the whole process.”

“We want Jack to live forever. That’s why we feed him The Wizard’s Magic dog food.”

Jonathan Edward Durham’s wonderful story became an excellent ad with my addition of just 16 words. “We want Jack to live forever. That’s why we feed him The Wizard’s Magic dog food.”

You already know how to write the 16 words. Now you need to learn how to tell a wonderful story in 76 words like Durham did.

Time + Place + Character + Emotion.  Give it a try.

Roy H. Williams

PS – Most people use too many words to make too small a point. The average writer wraps lots of words around a small idea. Inflated sentences are fluffy and empty like a hot air balloon. Good writers deliver a big idea quickly. Tight sentences hit hard. – Indy Beagle

“Facts tell. Stories sell.” – Tom Schreiter

Who do you call when you need your people to cooperate, innovate, and create? Meta, Google, Salesforce, and other big companies call a woman who has a golden reputation for legendary results. Her methods are unorthodox, unconventional, and irresistible. And her credentials are unique: she is an improv entertainer who trained to be a dancer at Juilliard. Her name is Melissa Dinwiddie and she can play the ukulele. Roving reporter Rotbart heard about this woman, sought her out, and convinced her to sit for an interview. Now take a deep breath, calm your mind, and go to MondayMorningRadio.com

January 18, 1604: King James, a Protestant, announces that he will commission an English translation of the Bible.

January 16, 1605: Miguel de Cervantes’ Don Quixote is published in Spain. It is considered to be the first modern novel. Every sophisticated storytelling device used by the best writers today made its initial debut in Don Quixote.

February 28, 1605: A 41-year-old Italian named Galileo publishes an astronomical text written as an imagined conversation. A pair of Paduan peasants talk about Kepler’s Supernova.

One says, “A very bright star shines at night like an owl’s eye.”

And the other replies, “And it can still be seen in the morning when it is time to prune the grapevines!”

The observations of the peasants clearly disprove the widely held belief that the earth is the center of the universe. The authorities take note. Uh-oh for Galileo.

November 1, 1605: Shakespeare’s Othello is first performed for King James in the banqueting hall at Whitehall Palace in London.

Meanwhile, a group of English Roman Catholics stack 36 barrels of gunpowder under the floor of the Palace of Westminster. Their plan is to blow up the king, his family, and the entire legislature on November 5, 1605.

The Gunpowder Plot is discovered by a night watchman just a few hours before Guy Fawkes was to have lit the fuse.

Shakespeare immediately begins writing a new play. In it, a ruler gives enormous power to those who flatter him, but his insanity goes unnoticed by society. “King Lear” is regularly cited as one of the greatest works of literature ever written.

May 13, 1607: One hundred and four English men and boys arrive in North America to start a settlement in what is now Virginia. They name it “Jamestown” after King James. The American Experiment has begun.

Don Quixote, Galileo, Shakespeare, the crisis of King James, and the founding of Jamestown in the New World…

All of this happens within a span of just 28 months. Flash forward…

May 2, 1611: The English Bible that will be known as the King James Version is published.

April 23, 1616: Shakespeare and Cervantes – the great voices of England and Spain – die just a few hours apart. (Galileo continues until 1642.)

July 4, 1776: The 13 colonies of the American Experiment light a fuse of their own and the Revolutionary War engulfs the Atlantic coast.

November 19, 1863: Abraham Lincoln looks out over a field of 6,000 acres. He says,

“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.”

Lincoln ends his speech one minute later. His hope is that “government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

Lincoln’s fear is that “the people” will not remain firmly united enough to resist the takeover of a tyrant. We know this because he opens his speech by referring to our 1776 Declaration which rejected crazy King George. America had escaped George’s heavy-handed leadership just –”four score and seven”– 87 years earlier.

Five-and-a-half generations after Lincoln’s assassination, the American Experiment continues.

Roy H. Williams

Mitch Weisburgh can help you train your brain to

1. recognize impulsive reactions

2. set them aside, and

3. respond far more effectively.

Find out how, right now, at MondayMorningRadio.com

I was whining to Clay Cary about the interest rate the bank was going to charge me to fund a real estate investment. I felt the percentage was way too high.

Clay asked, “Is the deal you’re about to make a good deal? How much money will you make from it?”

I answered his question conservatively. He said, “Now let’s calculate the total amount of interest that you will pay on the loan that makes this deal possible.”

We calculated the dollar amounts.

I was going to make hundreds of times more money on the real estate than I was going to pay in interest on the loan.

Clay said, “As a rule of thumb, if the interest rate you are paying determines whether or not the deal you are making is good or bad, you are definitely making a bad deal. Don’t judge according to percentages. Judge according to dollars.”

Here’s a thought.

Why do banks never get angry about the huge profits that YOU make on deals using THEIR money?

I have never heard a bank say, “We supplied the money, but you are keeping most of the profits. That’s not fair. You should give us more money than we originally agreed upon.”

Banks never say that because banks always remember that YOU found the deal and decided to let THEM make some money on it with you.

Here’s another example of how percentages can be misleading.

Woody Justice had been in business for 6 years when I met him in 1987. His business was circling the drain. Woody’s biggest year had a top line of $350,000. His goal was to someday sell $1,000,000 worth of jewelry in a single year. That would put Woody in the top 10% of jewelers nationwide.

I began working with Woody and we grew more than 100% a year for two years in a row. We blew past the $1,000,000 mark in the second year. About a dozen years later, Woody was grumpy. He said, “We used to grow by big percentages. But last year we only grew by ten percent. You need to get your shit together.”

“Woody, how many dollars did our top line grow last year?”

“We grew by a million dollars,” he said.

“Woody, when we first began working together, a million-dollar jump from $350,000 to $1,350,000 would have been a 286% increase. We would have nearly quadrupled your best year ever and you would have wet your pants. Evaluate yourself by dollar growth, not percentage growth. Percentages will lead you to believe that you are doing better, or worse, than you really are.”

Woody made a face but didn’t say anything, so I continued. “And by the way, we’re running out of people in this Dairy Queen town. If you want to grow by big percentages again, we’re going to need to open another store somewhere else.”

I could say those things to him because we were close friends.

Woody died unexpectedly 14 years ago but I still have his number on my cell phone. I tell myself that if I press that number, Woody will hear his phone ring.

As long as I don’t delete that number from my phone, Woody Justice will never be gone.

Roy H. Williams

PS – “A Dairy Queen town” is Oklahoma slang for a place that is too small to have a McDonald’s. – Indy Beagle

“Do it before you die.” Those five words sum up Carl Barney’s advice to wealthy individuals who want to experience a deeper level of satisfaction. “He who gives while he lives knows where it goes.” Barney believes in “pre-questing” meaningful gifts to individuals and institutions while you can still witness the impact of your generosity.

Just this month, for example, Warren Buffett announced plans to donate another $6 billion to charity, bringing his total charitable giving to about $60 billion. (And most people would agree that Buffet is happier and more contented than the average billionaire.) Generosity brings happiness to every giver, no matter their financial condition. Get energized as Carl Barney shares his blueprint for happiness with roving reporter Rotbart and his deputy rover, Maxwell, at MondayMorningRadio.com

Pain is a signal that something is wrong.

Pain whispers, shouts, and screams, “Pay attention. Be careful. Something is wrong.”

Jean Marzollo wrote a children’s poem in 1948 that romanticized Christopher Columbus. It inspired a generation of children during the Captain Kangaroo years. Her proud poem begins,

“In fourteen hundred ninety-two

Columbus sailed the ocean blue”

Bill Bryson wrote an insightful summary of that famous voyage on page 205 of his book, “At Home.”

“Columbus’s real achievement was managing to cross the ocean successfully in both directions. Though an accomplished enough mariner, he was not terribly good at a great deal else, especially geography, the skill that would seem most vital in an explorer. It would be hard to name any figure in history who has achieved more lasting fame with less competence. He spent large parts of eight years bouncing around Caribbean islands and coastal South America convinced that he was in the heart of the Orient and that Japan and China were at the edge of every sunset. He never worked out that Cuba is an island and never once set foot on, or even suspected the existence of, the landmass to the north that everyone thinks he discovered: the United States.”

We learn the meaning of pain as children, but we train ourselves to ignore it as adults.

Why do we do that?

I’m talking to you about the pain of your Google spend.

Is there a chance that you should pay attention – and be careful – because something is wrong?

Twenty years ago, Google inspired and electrified American business owners with their promise of “holding ad budgets accountable” by making advertising results, “identifiable, measurable, and scalable.”

Business owners romanticized Google by shouting,

“Hooray! Advertising will now become just another mathematical equation! Hooray! Hooray! To double my customer count, all I will have to do is double my ad budget!”

I watched a friend of mine raise his monthly Google budget from $20,000/mo. to $70,000/mo because he was convinced that he would get three-and-a-half times as many leads. When it didn’t work, I asked him to look closely at how many clicks he had purchased and compare that number to the total population of his trade area.

Have you done that math?

I watched another friend of mine elevate her Google budget until she was spending $90,000 a month. Her business was no longer profitable. I asked her to look at how many clicks she had purchased and compare that number to the total population of her trade area.

Have you done that math?

Have you ever raised your Google budget and had Google say to you, “We’re sorry, but it is not possible to spend that much money on your LSA. There simply aren’t enough people each day who are searching for what you sell.”

Do the math.

The past two decades have been the Captain Kangaroo years for millions of business owners.

Bill Bryson wrote that Columbus was, “convinced that he was in the heart of the Orient and that Japan and China were at the edge of every sunset.”

How many years have you been believing that your big payday from Google was at the edge of every sunset? Have you been saying,

“All we need to do is tweak our plan a little. As soon as we figure out the Google algorithm, we’re going to be rich.”

A business owner from a major American city recently spent a day with me. He had been spending $100,000 on Google ads each month for the past few years because he was convinced that he could not afford mass media in his city.

His budget could easily have made his name a household word by using television or radio. I know the town well. I have had clients there for many years.

His budget would reach more than 2 million people in his city who spend enough time listening to broadcast radio each week that each 0ne of those 2 million people would hear the ad 3 times each weekfor 52 weeks for a total of 156 repetitions per year.

Do you sell a big-ticket item that has a long purchase cycle? You cannot win that game unless your name is the one that people think of first – and feel the best about – when they finally need what you sell.

That is when the customer will type your name into Google. It is a cheap click with a high conversion rate because they have already chosen you.

It takes time and patience, but it always works.

Roy H. Williams

Ruth Milligan is the public speaking trainer who was the driving force behind TEDxColumbus where she spent a decade observing good and bad presenters. Today she is helping people improve their presentation skills before large auditorium audiences, intimate groups of employees, and most importantly, customers. Ruth doesn’t tell people what they should talk about. She says that to produce the desired results, what you say is often less important than how you say it. Listen and learn as she explains it all to roving reporter Rotbart at MondayMorningRadio.com.

You want to succeed.

But will you recognize success when it happens?

What will be its indicators? How will you measure it?

Most importantly, how long are you willing to pursue it?

You probably overestimate what you can accomplish in a year, and underestimate what you can accomplish in ten years.

How many years have you been pursuing your dream?

Experience is the name you are allowed give to your mistakes, but only if you have learned from them.

Some people have ten years of experience.Most people have one year of experience ten times.

Ninety-nine percent of business owners* will continue to defend their marketing beliefs and management practices even when those beliefs and practices continue to underperform year after year.

These business owners underperform because traditional wisdom often feels like common sense.

The problem with traditional wisdom is that it is usually more tradition than wisdom.

Here’s how that happens:

Your goal is lead generation.You create an ad that mixes urgency – a limited-time offer – with a strong value proposition. The features-and-benefits of your limited-time-offer dramatically outweigh the price.Your plan is to upsell the customer after they allow you into their home.

This is called “transactional advertising” because you are advertising a transaction.

Here’s the problem: Transactional ads don’t differentiate you. In fact, they blur you into your category, making you indistinguishable from your competitors.

This is Today’s Traditional Wisdom:

STEP 1: Give Google most of your profits and keep your fingers crossed. Keep a sharp eye on your cost-per-lead, your conversion rate, and your gross profit per sale.

STEP 2: Keep doing this, week after week, month after month.

STEP 3: Once a year, calculate how much your cost-per-sale has increased.

STEP 4: Contact the people in your peer group to see if their experience has been the same as yours.

STEP 5: Yes. Their experience has been the same as yours.

STEP 6: Tell yourself, “Everyone else in our category is experiencing exactly what we have been experiencing. This means that everything is under control.”

STEP 7: Continue to do this. In 9 more years, you will have had one year’s experience 10 times.

Roy H. Williams

PS – A smart person makes a mistake, learns from it, and never makes that mistake again. But a wise person finds a smart person and learns how to avoid that mistake altogether.

A wise person discovers relational marketing.

*ADDENDUM

We gathered data from 64 reputable sources. It can reasonably be estimated that there are about 117,000 companies in the US that provide HVAC services, 132,000 provide plumbing services, and 252,000 provide electrical services. (117,000 + 132,000 + 252,000 = 501,000)

Let’s assume for the sake of this example that those numbers are elevated. A lot of home service companies offer two or more services.

Let’s further assume that a lot of them are going to be commercial, not residential. So we will reduce the aggregate estimate of 501,000 companies down to just 100,000 companies competing for the opportunity to serve homeowners across America.

Here is the fascinating part: we know for a fact that only 638 of those companies have a top line of $20,000,000 or more each year, and just 280 of the 638 will do $40,000,000 or more.

Having worked with many of those over-performers, I can assure you that none of them were built on traditional wisdom. – RHW

Jackie Lapin’s passion was for traveling the world and taking photos. But Jackie’s passion has now blossomed into a thriving business with an impressive community of members. She is providing blog posts, photos, curated reading lists, historical insights, and exclusive travel resources with people who share her wanderlust. In this marvelously candid interview with deputy roving reporter Maxwell Rotbart, Jackie will convince you that turning your passion into a thriving business isn’t just possible; it may be the most direct and rewarding path to a robust income stream. MondayMorningRadio.com

The Muses of Greek mythology were nine goddesses associated with the arts, sciences, and memory.

They were the source of inspiration for artists, thinkers, poets, dancers, musicians, and philosophers. They were the goddesses of knowledge, embodying the wisdom and creative power found in poetry, songs, and myths.

This is the point: a muse is never an actual woman.

When a man chooses a flesh-and-blood woman to be his muse, she becomes the symbol of something deeper, wiser, and much more mysterious than herself.

A muse is a point of access that puts a man in touch with his feminine side while allowing him to pretend that he does not have a feminine side.

A muse is essentially the Jungian anima, the perfect woman who exists only in the imagination of a man.

Just now, my muse whispered to me,

“The reader will want to ask you, ‘What is a woman’s muse?’”

“What shall I tell them?”

“Tell them to ask a woman,” she said.

In his book, The Magic Synthesis, Silvano Arieti writes,

“Creative products are always shiny and new; the creative process is ancient and unchanging.”

Arieti believed that perception is not just binary, with logic on the left side and pattern recognition on the right. He believed that our minds can blend rational with irrational, sophisticated with primitive, conscious with subconscious to create a third type of perception known as “creativity.”

Psychology Today begins their praise of Arieti with this paragraph:

“Silvano Arieti’s book Interpretation of Schizophrenia was awarded the 1975 U.S. National Book Award in the Science category. More than 40 years later, it remains the most significant contribution to the psychological understanding of schizophrenia since Kraepelin and Bleuler. Contemporary psychiatrists and psychotherapists would be wise to review Arieti’s vast contributions to the field.”

Silvano Arieti was born in 1914. When he died in 1981, Arieti was perhaps the world’s foremost authority on schizophrenia. He wrote an award-winning book about it.

The other book he wrote was about creativity.

Coincidence? Perhaps. But I am convinced that creativity is a mild form of schizophrenia. How else would you describe a marvelous blend of rational with irrational, sophisticated with primitive, conscious with subconscious?

Creativity is a wild and spontaneous act employed by artists, thinkers, poets, dancers, musicians, and philosophers. It is that conflicted insanity to which our Muses give us access.

I think that “mild schizophrenia” is the perfect description.

But perhaps I am wrong.

Roy H. Williams

Today’s rabbit hole is as wacky as today’s memo. You should check it out. I’m Indy Beagle.

Steven Gaffney’s client list reads like a “Who’s Who of America’s Best Corporations.” His clients include including Allstate, Amazon, American Express, Best Buy, Booz Allen Hamilton, and BP. And those are just the “A”s and “B”s. Steven Gaffney builds high-achieving teams that set brave goals and then exceed them. In this week’s amazing conversation with roving reporter Rotbart, Steven Gaffney shares big-picture insights and detailed actions that will help any business improve their results over the next 30 days. Get your running shoes on, because the race is about to begin at MondayMorningRadio.com

The Muses of Greek mythology were nine goddesses associated with the arts, sciences, and memory.

They were the source of inspiration for artists, thinkers, poets, dancers, musicians, and philosophers. They were the goddesses of knowledge, embodying the wisdom and creative power found in poetry, songs, and myths.

This is the point: a muse is never an actual woman.

When a man chooses a flesh-and-blood woman to be his muse, she becomes the symbol of something deeper, wiser, and much more mysterious than herself.

A muse is a point of access that puts a man in touch with his feminine side while allowing him to pretend that he does not have a feminine side.

A muse is essentially the Jungian anima, the perfect woman who exists only in the imagination of a man.

Just now, my muse whispered to me,

“The reader will want to ask you, ‘What is a woman’s muse?’”

“What shall I tell them?”

“Tell them to ask a woman,” she said.

In his book, The Magic Synthesis, Silvano Arieti writes,

“Creative products are always shiny and new; the creative process is ancient and unchanging.”

Arieti believed that perception is not just binary, with logic on the left side and pattern recognition on the right. He believed that our minds can blend rational with irrational, sophisticated with primitive, conscious with subconscious to create a third type of perception known as “creativity.”

Psychology Today begins their praise of Arieti with this paragraph:

“Silvano Arieti’s book Interpretation of Schizophrenia was awarded the 1975 U.S. National Book Award in the Science category. More than 40 years later, it remains the most significant contribution to the psychological understanding of schizophrenia since Kraepelin and Bleuler. Contemporary psychiatrists and psychotherapists would be wise to review Arieti’s vast contributions to the field.”

Silvano Arieti was born in 1914. When he died in 1981, Arieti was perhaps the world’s foremost authority on schizophrenia. He wrote an award-winning book about it.

The other book he wrote was about creativity.

Coincidence? Perhaps. But I am convinced that creativity is a mild form of schizophrenia. How else would you describe a marvelous blend of rational with irrational, sophisticated with primitive, conscious with subconscious?

Creativity is a wild and spontaneous act employed by artists, thinkers, poets, dancers, musicians, and philosophers. It is that conflicted insanity to which our Muses give us access.

I think that “mild schizophrenia” is the perfect description.

But perhaps I am wrong.

Roy H. Williams

Today’s rabbit hole is as wacky as today’s memo. You should check it out. I’m Indy Beagle.

Steven Gaffney’s client list reads like a “Who’s Who of America’s Best Corporations.” His clients include including Allstate, Amazon, American Express, Best Buy, Booz Allen Hamilton, and BP. And those are just the “A”s and “B”s. Steven Gaffney builds high-achieving teams that set brave goals and then exceed them. In this week’s amazing conversation with roving reporter Rotbart, Steven Gaffney shares big-picture insights and detailed actions that will help any business improve their results over the next 30 days. Get your running shoes on, because the race is about to begin at MondayMorningRadio.com

The greatest companies are the ones with the happiest customers.

To create happy customers, you need to be customer-centric.

Every company believes they are customer-centric. But while a great company keeps the happiness of their customer in the center of their thoughts, the average company puts their customer in the center of the cross-hairs of a rifle scope.

Great companies ask, “How can we give our customers the buying experience that they would prefer?” They work at removing the friction from the customer experience.Average companies ask, “How can we get our customers to give us more money, more often?” Average companies tells their marketing teams, “Sales is just a numbers game. Bring us twice as many leads and we’ll make twice as many sales. You bring’em in. We’ll close’em.”

But no matter what those marketing teams do, a decreasing number of people will respond to their ads. A negative customer experience drives customers away faster than marketing can bring them in.

Do you want to see what real customer-centric thinking looks like?

A client of mine recently wrote this email and sent it to all the people who work in his company. He forwarded it to me only as an afterthought.

SUBJECT: Pricing Reflection — Serving the Everyday Working American

Team,

Today I had a realization around some of our pricing. I’m all for setting prices that protect our margins and keep the business strong – but I’m equally committed to making sure we have price point items that the everyday working American can actually afford.

Let’s take a simple example: a toilet. Right now, most of our toilet installs are priced over $1,000. If we assume the median household income is $85,000, divided over 26 pre-tax paychecks, that’s $3,269 per check. A $1,000 toilet install is over 30% of that paycheck. That’s significant.

We need to remember who we’re here to serve – the nurse, the police officer, the office worker, the firefighter. These are people raising families, keeping their homes together, and doing the best they can. We cannot price them out of basic service. If we do, we risk not only losing today’s job – but any future relationship with that customer.

Let me be clear: I’m not trying to run a low-margin business.

But I do want to make sure we have real options for real people. Today’s pricing structure on some of these essential services is a barrier – not just to customers, but to our own techs who are trying to present them.

Because of this realization, I immediately asked Jacob to find a toilet that we could install at a price point of $699. Well, guess what – we found one today. And we’re bringing it in and adding it to the price book at $649.

This one change will give our team more confidence to present a basic toilet option. What I’ve heard from Will – and it’s been consistent – is that this has been a never-ending battle. Technicians don’t feel comfortable presenting a $1,000 toilet to customers, especially when many of them wouldn’t pay that themselves. That lack of confidence translates to lower conversions and frustrated customers.

This reminds me of what we went through in HVAC when we had no system options below $15,000. We lost installs constantly – not because we weren’t good, but because we didn’t have a simple, no-frills option for people who just needed heating and air. Once we corrected that, we started closing more jobs and rebuilding our pipeline.

We need to apply that same logic here. During times like this, let’s price effectively so we can keep building our customer base and generate revenue day by day. When the tide turns – and it will – we can always maximize margin percentage where appropriate.

There’s an opportunity here. We can maintain strong margins where they make sense – but also have a few key products that are accessible. That builds trust, drives volume, and keeps us connected to the people we serve.

Let’s make sure we’re building a business that works for our margins and for our community.

The man who wrote that note to his employees owns a great company.

His current sales volume is more than 10 times the amount the average business owner in his category hopes to do “some day.”

The average company hunts for customers, targets customers, and closes customers.

Great companies use mass media to distribute the seeds of relationship far and wide. They continually shine the warm sunlight of humility and vulnerability on those seeds and water them with generosity.Great companies grow mighty orchards that produce happy fruit for generations.

Are you willing to work with a shovel, a rake, and a hoe?

Or do you prefer to carry a rifle?

Roy H. Williams

Johnny Molson can explain – in just 2 words – what it takes for an advertising campaign to soar above the campaigns of its competitors. Johnny is one of the elite Wizard of Ads partners. Employing the groundbreaking strategies developed by Roy H. Williams, he and his fellow Wizards of Ads craft powerful brand identities that turn a business owner’s financial dreams into financial realities.

In today’s episode of Monday Morning Radio, Johnny Molson explains the difference between ads that drive immediate sales — and ads that build long-term customers and spectacular profitability. What is Johnny’s two-word formula? Listen and WIN as Johnny joins roving reporter Rotbart and his deputy, Maxwell, for a deep dive into magical advertising at Monday Morning Radio dot com.

The strongest brands are the ones with the most distinctive personalities. But even a weak and faded personality is better than none at all.

A brand with a personality is an imaginary character in the minds of the customers of that brand. It is similar to the characters in syndicated television shows, bestselling novels, and big movie franchises.

Meryl Streep, Julia Roberts, and Robin Williams are actors, but they are also characters in your mind.

Willie Nelson, Michael Jackson, and Taylor Swift are musicians. but they are also characters in your mind.

Brands are like that.

Two people are now going to tell us about books.

Dear Person Reading This,

A writer can fit a whole world inside a book. Really. You can go there. You can learn things while you are away. You can bring them back to the world you normally live in.

You can look out of another person’s eyes, think their thoughts, care about what they care about.

You can fly. You can travel to the stars. You can be a monster or a wizard or a god. You can be a girl. You can be a boy. Books give you worlds of infinite possibility. All you have to do is be interested enough to read that first page…

Somewhere, there is a book written just for you. It will fit in your mind like a glove fits your hand. And it’s waiting.

Go look for it.

Neil Gaiman

A Velocity of Being, Letters to a Young Reader, p. 22

Brands are like novels and movies and TV shows. Brands are like hit songs. Brands are like actors and musicians. Brands are like good books.

Here is the second person.

Dear Reader,

When I was 12, I was given a scholarship to a private girl’s school in the town where I lived. All the other girls came from another – wealthier – town. They were driven to school in Jaguars and Mercedes Benzes. They ate artichokes. No way would I ever fit in.

In the midst of my funk, the English teacher assigned A Member of the Wedding by Carson McCullers. As it happens, Frankie, the book’s heroine, is also 12 and also wants to belong. Her yearning is such that she wants to know everyone in the world and for everyone to know her – exactly what I wanted!

That’s what stunned me, not just the intensity of the longing, but the specificity. It meant – it had to mean – there were other people in the world like me. Not just Frankie, a fictional character, but the author who had to have felt that way herself in order to give Frankie that longing. I felt such an intimate connection with her, as if she’d looked deep inside me and knew me in the way I wanted the world to know me. Reading didn’t just offer escape; it offered connection!

All these years later, I just have to look at my copy of A Member of the Wedding on my bookshelf to experience again how I felt when I first read it and to feel the full force of that connection: to Frankie, to Carson McCullers, to the 12-year-old girl I was, and to 12-year-olds everywhere.

Emily Levine

A Velocity of Being, Letters to a Young Reader, p. 52

A brand with a personality is like A Member of the Wedding, written by Carson McCullers.

Who was the first ad writer to give a brand a distinctive personality?

That’s like asking, “Who built the first car?” To answer that question, we would first have to agree upon the defining characteristics of a car.

For us to agree upon “Who was the first ad writer to give a brand a distinctive personality,” we would first have to agree upon a definition for the word “distinctive,” and then we would have to agree upon what constitutes a “personality.”

We could do that, or you can just trust me when I say that Carl Benz built the first car in July of 1886 and Bill Bernbach created the first brand with a distinctive personality in 1958. The ad is not logical. It does not speak of features and benefits. It does not feel like an ad.

Ads with personality are captivating and engaging because they give you a look at something through the eyes of someone else.

In this case, we are listening to a catty cat, an obvious metaphor for a snobbish society matron.

You might be thinking, “That ad isn’t special. I see ads like that all the time.”

These are my responses:

(1.) No, you see ads like that occasionally, perhaps 1 in every 1,000 ads you encounter. You only think that you see them “all the time” because when you do see one, it has an impact on you. Your mind has been ignoring the 999 others because they are uninteresting and predictable.

(2.) Keep in mind that we are talking about 1958. In those days, this ad was revolutionary.

A year after Bill Bernbach wrote that first Ohrbach’s ad, a group of Germans came to America and asked, “Where can we find the man who writes those ads for Ohrbach’s?” And thus the legendary “Think Small” campaign for Volkswagen was born.

Volkswagen, a small car with an air-cooled engine from Germany, quickly became a powerful brand with a cult-like following. And this happened in America just 14 years after the end of WWII. Don’t tell me that ad writers don’t make a difference.

I began this journey by accident.

For many years, I have quoted Bill Bernbach’s famous statement, “I’ve got a great gimmick. Let’s tell the truth.”

The truth is that he never said it, and he never claimed to have said it.

Bill was searching for a new gimmick for Ohrbach’s Department Stores when his client Nathan Ohrbach looked at him and said, “I’ve got a great gimmick. Let’s tell the truth.”

It is foolish to create a personality for a company that doesn’t already have one. Great ad writers perceive the personality that is already alive within the company. And then they amplify it.

If you try to give a personality to a company that doesn’t already have one, the customers who respond to your ads will feel they have been deeply misled and betrayed. You can put lipstick on a pig, but everyone who encounters that pig will still recognize it as a pig.

Bill Bernbach never did that. He found the truth, amplified the truth, and then proclaimed the truth. When I recently learned what Bill Bernbach really did say, it freaked me out a little. Things that I have discovered, developed, practiced, and written about for more than 40 years had been discovered by Bill Bernbach before I was born.

This is Bill Bernbach:

“A great ad campaign will make a bad product fail faster. It will get more people to know it’s bad.”

“There is no such thing as a good or bad ad in isolation. What is good at one moment is bad at another. Research can trap you into the past.”

“We are so busy measuring public opinion that we forget we can mold it. We are so busy listening to statistics, we forget we can create them.”

“Our job is to bring the dead facts to life.”

“An idea can turn to dust or magic depending on the talent that rubs against it.”

“The real giants have always been poets, men who jumped from facts into the realm of imagination and ideas.”

“If you stand for something, you will always find some people for you, and some against you. If you stand for nothing, you will find nobody against you, and nobody for you.”

Richard Kessler owned an invisible little jewelry store in a sad little strip center in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin. Everyone in Menomonee Falls was willing to drive 21 miles to Milwaukee, but no one in Milwaukee was willing to drive 21 miles to Menomonee Falls.

But that’s exactly what we needed them to do.

Richard had vision and courage, but so do a lot of other business owners. The reason I agreed to work with the Kess-Man is that he was willing to be vulnerable. The man had genuine humility.

If a client doesn’t have humility, they won’t let you write ads that reveal their heart.

We had a tiny little ad budget, so we ran weird radio ads late at night that ended with Richard saying, “Kesslers Diamonds, inconveniently located on Appleton Avenue in Menomonee Falls.”

Humorless people assumed that Richard had misspoken. They called the radio stations and said, “He’s not saying ‘conveniently located.’ He’s saying ‘inconveniently located.’ That man is saying ‘inconveniently located!’ You need to correct that.”

My goal was for you to feel that you knew Richard Kessler. I liked Richard and I wanted you to like him, too. To like him, you just needed to get to know him.

We did it in 60-second increments.

If you win the heart, the mind will follow. The mind will always create logic to justify what the heart has already decided.

Kessler taught every employee to think and feel like they owned the store. He gave each of them his full authority. No employee at Kesslers ever had to “check with the boss” to make a decision. They were able to make gigantic decisions without having to check with him or with anyone else. That’s real vulnerability.

When Richard Kessler had grown the company 70 times bigger than it was when we got started, he gave his employees the company.

Kesslers Diamonds is the largest employee-owned jewelry store in America. They have 9 big stores across Wisconsin and Michigan with plans to open a lot more.

I shared that story with you to make you understand a transformative truth: Passion, pride, and confidence are overrated. The world is full of idiots who are passionate, proud and confident.

Untempered passion, pride, and confidence create a strutting peacock, a coarse cliché, a cardboard cut-out wearing an Armani suit. If you write ads for such a person, you must target people who want to be that person. Count me out.

If you want to write successful ads that win the hearts and minds of millions, look for business owners who have humility, vulnerability, and generosity.

America loves Warren Buffett – not because he has billions of dollars – but because he has humility, vulnerability, and generosity.

Be like Warren Buffett.

© Roy H. Williams

Executives often make trade-offs, prioritizing wealth and recognition over family and a grounded life. But are the benefits of these trade-offs worth it? That question prompted Butch Meily to write a memoir about the years he spent as an aide to Reginald Lewis, the first African-American to build a billion-dollar company. Reginald reached extraordinary heights and brought Butch along with him. But the lives of these men provide a cautionary tale of the price each of them paid for their achievements. Spend a few minutes with Butch Meily and roving reporter Rotbart today and you will learn how to build boldly, lead wisely, and never forget to live. MondayMorningRadio.com.

“Around the swimming beagles, bright stars danced on rippling waters like a thousand little fishes of light scurrying in a sea of darkness.

Can there be a more beautiful sight than when sky meets ocean in the black of night?” The lawyer whispered to himself, the beagles, and the sea as the soft blanket of summer wrapped them all in her warm embrace.

Night is a time of reflection. Not of stars in water only, but of times past and times to come. And such a night was this.”

– Beagles of Destinae, chapter 4

Ideas pour into the dark waters of the unconscious mind, sparkling like reflected stars. As above, so below. The natives always said it was so.

But as Gemini sat on the throne of Aquarius, a dragonfish was born. And thus our story begins.

The twins did not mean to unleash a dragonfish, but they had never promised not to, either. And besides, a dragonfish is an adventure.

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea,

and frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honalee.

Little Jackie Paper loved that rascal Puff,

And brought him strings, and sealing wax, and other fancy stuff.

Together they would travel on a boat with billowed sail,

Jackie kept a lookout perched on Puff’s gigantic tail.

Noble kings and princes would bow whenever they came,

Pirate ships would lower their flags when Puff roared out his name.

A dragon lives forever, but not so little boys,

Painted wings and giant’s rings make way for other toys.

One gray night it happened, Jackie Paper came no more,

And Puff, that mighty dragon, he ceased his fearless roar.

“Puff the Magic Dragon” with lyrics by Leonard Lipton and music by Peter Yarrow appears on the 1963 Peter, Paul and Mary album, “Moving.” An urban myth soon arose that the song was about drugs. It’s really a backward look at childhood, and all that was left behind.

“The most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or touched, they are felt with the heart. All grown-ups were once children… but only few of them remember it.”

– Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

“He saw two boats standing by the lake; but the fishermen had gone from them and were washing their nets. Then He got into one of the boats, which was Simon’s, and asked him to put out a little from the land. And He sat down and taught the multitudes from the boat. When He had stopped speaking, he said to Simon, ‘Launch out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.'”

– Luke, ch. 5

The book “Peter Pan” was written only after the 1904 play became a huge success.

On opening night, Mrs. Snow spoke to the playwright and author, J.M. Barrie about her late husband…

“And he would so have loved this evening. The pirates, and the Indians; he was really just a boy himself, you know, to the very end. I suppose it’s all the work of the ticking crocodile, isn’t it? Time is chasing after all of us. Isn’t that right?”

“It is not true that people stop pursuing dreams because they grow old; they grow old because they stop pursuing dreams.”

– Gabriel Garcia Marquez

“The secret of The Muppets is they re not very good at what they do. Kermit’s not a great host, Fozzie’s not a good comedian, Miss Piggy’s not a great singer… Like, none of them are actually good at it, but they love it. They’re like a family, and they like putting on the show. And they have joy. And because of the joy, it doesn’t matter that they’re not good at it. That’s what we should all be. Muppets.”

– Brett Goldstein

“All the world is made of faith, and trust, and pixie dust…

If growing up means it would be beneath my dignity to climb a tree, I’ll never grow up.”

– Peter Pan, by JM Barrie

In 1909, five years after the play “Peter Pan” was a huge success, ‘Goat’ Fowler decided to name his playful acapella musical group at Yale University after a mythical dragonfish named Whiffenpoof. The group has continued for the past 116 years.

And He said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter into heaven.”

– Matthew, ch. 18

It is important that we retain childlike qualities.

Next week I will show you how all of these things are essential when your goal is to build a brand that will win the hearts and minds of people.

Aroo.

Roy H. Williams

Rob Kessler is a talented and ambitious entrepreneur. His company sells a brand of shirts with proprietary collar inserts designed to be worn without ties. Rob is the son of Richard Kessler who worked with the wizard for 35 years and became one of the most famous diamond jewelers in America before he retired. (Richard was one of the first guests that roving reporter Rotbart showcased when he launched Monday Morning Radio 13 years ago in June, 2012.) Rob’s path has been different than his dad’s, but the 12-year entrepreneurial journey he shares this week is a study in entrepreneurial persistence, innovation, and market adaptation. Rob and our roving reporter will get started the moment you arrive at MondayMorningRadio.com

Pennie and I had a difficult week a long way from home.

It began with a piece of gravel that cracked her windshield.

Looking back, we should have just lived with it. But we didn’t know that at the time.

We dropped her car off at the appointed time on the appointed day. When Pennie picked it up, the upper-left corner of her new windshield whistled loudly at speeds above 30mph. She called the windshield people. They gave her a new appointment.

When we picked it up for the second time, the whistle was a little less loud than it had been, but she decided to live with it. There are a lot of things in life more annoying than a whistling windshield.

We didn’t know it, but we were about to experience several of them.

Driving for 4 hours in a rainstorm to see your mother in the hospital is not a bad experience unless your previously-whistling windshield is now pouring quarts of water into your car.

Things went downhill from there for several days.

I won’t bore you with the details because the real purpose of this note is to tell you what happened that turned everything around for us.

We discovered a wonderful French cafe just two blocks from Clearfork Hospital in Ft. Worth. Halfway through the meal, I went to their website to see if they had a location in Austin. They don’t, but I’m sure they soon will.

Meanwhile, Pennie went to romanticspotsfortworth.com to see if Clarissa had discovered and listed this amazing cafe.

Of course, she had. Clarissa is really good at her job.

Angela brought our next course to the table.

I said, “We found out about you at romanticspotsfortworth.”

To our delight, Angela said, “Yes! They sent us an award with the cutest logo on it! Everyone was excited.”

Pennie and I chose not to mention that we own the romanticspots websites.

When Angela departed, I scrolled all the way to the bottom of the cafe’s website where I encountered a carousel of remarkable quotes.

 “People who love to eat are always the best people.”

– Julia Child

“If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.”

– J.R.R. Tolkien, from “The Hobbit”, spoken by Thorin Oakenshield

“No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.”

– Aesop, “The Lion and The Mouse”

“Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it.”

– Andre Gide

Having been distracted by every bad thing that had happened since our 4-hour trip in a flooded car, these next two quotes hit me pretty hard.

“You’ll miss the best things if you keep your eyes shut.”

– Dr. Seuss

“The flower that blooms in adversity is the most beautiful of all.”

– Walt Disney

Each of the remaining quotes at the bottom of that menu lifted me a little bit higher.

“All grown-ups were once children… but only few of them remember it.”

– Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, “The Little Prince”

“Where you tend a rose, my lad, a thistle cannot grow.”

– Frances Hodgson Burnett, “The Secret Garden”

“True love is like a fine wine, the older the better.”

– Fred Jacob

“It is better to know how to learn than to know.”

– Dr. Seuss

“The most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or touched, they are felt with the heart.”

– Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

And then this line lifted from “A Room of One’s Own” by Virginia Wolf made me smile and remember where I was.

“One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.”

And then Andre Gide encouraged me to quit looking at what was behind me.

“Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.”

In the space of just a few minutes, a carousel of curated quotes at the bottom of a cafe menu convinced me to look beyond the windshield.

As you read this, I am adding a 450-year-old quote from Michel de Montaigne to that transformative list of quotes from Rise cafe at the shops in Clearfork. Are you ready? This is it:

“The surest sign of wisdom is continual cheerfulness.”

Look beyond the windshield, friend. It’s a beautiful world out there.

Roy H. Williams

“If people were paid according to how hard they work, the richest people on earth would be the ones digging ditches with a shovel in the hot summertime.”

That’s what my mother told me when I was a boy. When she saw the puzzled look on my face, she continued.

“People who make a lot of money are paid according to the weight of the responsibility they carry and the quality of the decisions they make.”

Second only to grief, the weight of responsibility is the heaviest burden that a person can carry. Compared to those, a shovel full of dirt feels as light as feathers on a windy day.

When forced to choose between two evils, it brings a good person no joy to choose the lesser evil. Fewer people will be hurt, but the pain those people feel will be real.

A person who is not wounded by the pain they cause others is a sociopath.

Authority is power, and power is attractive. Tear away the tinsel. Scrape away the glitter and you will see that authority is just a fancy costume. You wear it when you are about to cause someone pain.

Every good person in authority has scars on their heart, memories of the pain they know they have caused others.

Sociopaths don’t care about the pain of others. They crave authority because they are weak, and the fancy costume lets them pretend they are strong.

Things get ugly when a sociopath has power.

“In the alchemy of man’s soul almost all noble attributes – courage, honor, love, hope, faith, duty, loyalty, etc. – can be transmuted into ruthlessness. Compassion alone stands apart from the continuous traffic between good and evil proceeding within us. Compassion is the antitoxin of the soul: where there is compassion even the most poisonous impulses remain relatively harmless.”

– Eric Hoffer, “Reflections on the Human Condition” (1973)

A person in authority who lacks compassion is a very small person wearing a badge.

As a young man, I admired cleverness. But I have lived enough years and cried enough tears that now I see the world differently. Today, I admire goodness. This shift in perspective helped me understand what Viktor Frankl wrote in his book, “Man’s Search for Meaning.”

“Freedom is only part of the story and half of the truth… In fact, freedom is in danger of degenerating into mere arbitrariness unless it is lived in terms of responsibleness. That is why I recommend that the Statue of Liberty on the East Coast be supplemented by a Statue of Responsibility on the West Coast.”

Viktor Frankl was a medical doctor, a psychologist, and a survivor of the holocaust. He was imprisoned in four different concentration camps: Theresienstadt, Auschwitz where his mother was murdered, Dachau,and then Türkheim.

Viktor Frankl believed in freedom, but he refused to see it as a license to do whatever you want. To him, freedom without responsibility was an idiotic idea.

Isabella Bird was a well-educated woman who left Victorian England to explore the world in 1854.

When she arrived in the United States in 1873, she bought a horse and rode alone more than 800 miles to Colorado. In her book, “A Lady’s Life in the Rocky Mountains,” (1879), Isabella wrote,

“In America the almighty dollar is the true divinity, and its worship is universal. ‘Smartness’ is the quality thought most of. The boy who ‘gets on’ by cheating at his lessons is praised for being a ‘smart boy,’ and his satisfied parents foretell that he will make a ‘great man.'”

“A man who overreaches his neighbor, but who does it so cleverly that the law cannot take hold of him, wins an envied reputation as a ‘smart man,’ and stories of this species of ‘smartness’ are told admiringly ’round every stove. Smartness is but the initial stage of swindling, and the clever swindler who evades or defies the weak and often corruptly administered laws of the States, excites unmeasured adoration among the masses.”

These are the thoughts of people who have lived a lot of years and cried a lot of tears.

I offer these thoughts to you merely as food for thought.

Roy H. Williams

If you have messed up royally, you might take comfort in Al Lewis’s Substack where he details the boneheaded choices and illegal antics of CEOs and executives. For most readers, Al’s independent newsletter is an opportunity to learn from other people’s mistakes, which is a lot less costly than learning from your own. Al has served as business editor of the Houston Chronicle and The Denver Post, and was the Markets Editor at CNBC. According to Roving reporter Rotbart and his deputy Maxwell, skipping this conversation with Al would be a business blunder of the highest magnitude. The gauntlet had been thrown down. Are you going to pick it up? MondayMorningRadio.com

His name was Rab. He died in Bengal, the land of tigers, in 1941. On his way out the door, he said, “Faith is the bird that feels the light when the dawn is still dark.”

When Rab was sixteen, he published a book of poetry under the pseudonym Bhānusiṃha, which means “Sun Lion.” Those poems were seized upon by literary authorities as “long-lost classics.”

Where do you hurry with your basket

this late evening when the marketing is over?

They all have come home with their burdens;

The moon peeps from above the village trees.

The echoes of the voices calling for the ferry

run across the dark water to the distant swamp

where wild ducks sleep.

Where do you hurry with your basket

when the marketing is over?

Sleep has laid her fingers

upon the eyes of the earth.

The nests of the crows have become silent,

and the murmurs of the bamboo leaves are silent.

The labourers home from their fields

spread their mats in the courtyards.

Where do you hurry with your basket

when the marketing is over?

Rab wrote this in 1913,

Free me from the bonds of your sweetness, my love!

No more of this wine of kisses.

This mist of heavy incense stifles my heart.

Open the doors, make room for the morning light.

I am lost in you, wrapped in the folds of your caresses.

Free me from your spells, and give me back the manhood

to offer you my freed heart.

Famous for his role as President Jed Bartlet, Martin Sheen spoke several months ago at a White House event celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the debut of “The West Wing” on television. He wrapped up his short speech by reciting a poem that Rab had written more than 100 years earlier.

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high

Where knowledge is free

Where the world has not been broken up into fragments

By narrow domestic walls

Where words come out from the depth of truth

Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection

Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way

Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit

Where the mind is led forward by thee

Into ever-widening thought and action

Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

Rab knew that you and I would be here today, and he left us a message.

Who are you, reader,

reading my poems a hundred years hence?

I cannot send you one single flower

from this wealth of the spring,

one single streak of gold from yonder clouds.

Open your doors and look abroad.

From your blossoming garden

gather fragrant memories of the vanished flowers

of a hundred years before.

In the joy of your heart may you feel

the living joy that sang one spring morning,

sending its glad voice across a hundred years.

Rab – Rabindranath Tagore – was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913.

He was the first non-European ever to win a Nobel Prize.

Roy H. Williams

NOTE FROM INDY: Speaking of Martin Sheen, his name has recently been mentioned in association with the book, “When Rabbis Bless Congress: The Great American Story of Jewish Prayers on Capitol Hill.” Aroo.

A timber-framed cottage was built in Frog Holt, England, in the year 1450. Today, 575 years later, that cottage provides an important case study for business owners who are scaling their businesses upward. Douglas Squirrel is a technology leader and business scale-up expert. According to Squirrel, if the army of artisans and technicians who worked on his 575-year-old cottage hadn’t come together in a spirit of cooperation, the roof would have fallen in. And the same is true of every business that is transitioning from the past to the future. It’s a fascinating episode at MondayMorningRadio.com.

Michael Dell and Shaquille O’Neal planned their work and worked their plans.

Dell understood the formulas, and followed the rules, of efficiency.

O’Neal understood the formulas and followed the rules of basketball.

Each of them faithfully followed a Structural plan.

Michael Dell invented nothing, improvised nothing, and innovated only once. But that single innovation made him a billionaire. Dell’s innovation was to bring tested, reliable, proven methods of cost-cutting to the manufacturing and distribution of computers. When all his competitors were selling through retailers, Dell sold direct to consumer. This made his costs lower and his profits higher.

Michael Dell’s strengths are discipline, professionalism, and Structural thinking.

Likewise, Shaq says, “I didn’t invent basketball, but I am really good at executing the plays.” Discipline, professionalism, and Structural thinking made Shaq an extraordinary basketball player. These same characteristics also made him an amazing operator of fast-food franchises.

“The most Shaq ever made playing in the NBA was $29.5 million per year. Now, it’s estimated that the big man is bringing in roughly $60 million per year, much of which is coming from his portfolio of fast-food businesses around the U.S.”

– 24/7wallst.com

Shaq didn’t invent car washes or Five Guys Burgers and Fries, but he owns more than 150 of each.

Michael Dell and Shaquille O’Neal are masters of Structural planning and thinking.

Structural thinking relies on proven elements and best practices. “Gather the best pieces and processes and connect them together like LEGO blocks. What could possibly go wrong?”

Structural planning and thinking:

Invent, Improvise, Innovate?

“NO, because those things are untested. We want to avoid mistakes.”

Reliable, Tested, Proven?

“YES!”

Steve Jobs and Michael Jordon are masters of Gestalt planning and thinking.

Gestalt planning and thinking:

Invent, Improvise, Innovate?

“YES!“

Reliable, Tested, Proven?

“NO, because those things are predictable. We want to be different.“

The fundamental idea of Gestalt thinking is that the behavior of the whole is not determined by its individual elements; but rather that the behavior of the individual elements are determined by the intrinsic nature of the whole.

It is the goal of Gestalt thinking to determine the nature of the whole, the finished product.

Gestalt thinkers who can fund their experiments and survive their mistakes often become paradigm shifters and world-changers.

Steve Jobs got off to a slow start because he refused to use MS-DOS, the operating system that everyone else was using. But he was sensitive to the needs and hungers of the marketplace. When Steve Jobs had a crystal-clear vision of the things that people would purchase if those things existed, he brought those things into existence.

Structural thinkers rely on planning and execution. Gestalt thinkers rely on poise and flexibility, often deciding on small details at the last split-second. Ask a Gestalt thinker why they do this and most of them will tell you, “I decide at the last minute because that is when I have the most information.”

The reason you never knew what Michael Jordan was going to do is because Michael Jordan had not yet decided. Michael’s internal vision was simple and clear: “Put the basketball through the hoop.” With the clarity of that crystal vision shining brightly in his mind, Michael could figure out everything else along the way.

Gestalt thinkers like Steve Jobs and Michael Jordan always “begin with the end in mind.”

When a Gestalt thinker has a crystal-clear vision, they have everything they need need to create all the little bits and pieces that will be required to bring that vision into reality.

Gestalt thinkers cannot give you the details of their process in advance, because they have not yet invented the process. But when a Gestalt thinker has achieved the hard clarity of a crystal-sharp vision, they are often perceived as being an “uncompromising perfectionist.”

Steve Jobs, Brian Scudamore, Jeff Bezos, Elon Muskrat.

Good News: Structural Thinkers and Gestalt Thinkers are equally likely to become successful.

The bad news is that I don’t believe we get to choose which one we will be. I think that “details first” Structural people and “details last” Gestalt people are both born that way.

Structural and Gestalt need each other.

A Gestalt ad writer needs a Structural business owner to deliver what his Gestalt ads will promise. And a Structural business owner needs a Gestalt ad writer to envision a way for his products and services to be more highly desired than those of his competitors.

Separately, Structural and Gestalt will both struggle.

But together, they can take over the world.

That’s the money, right there.

Roy H. Williams

Talya Rotbart is shepherding our roving reporter and his deputy, Maxwell, this week in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, that lovely city where the 2026 Winter Olympics will be held. The Rotbarts are being escorted by Maxwell’s sister, Avital, and her husband Ben, who live in vivacious Vicenza, Italy, just two hours away.

The roving Reporter and deputy Maxwell will return with a new episode of MondayMorningRadio on Monday, May 5th. – Aroo, Indy Beagle

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

“Life… Liberty… and the pursuit of Happiness.”

We published those words 229 years ago when we declared our independence from Britain. That document was the earliest expression of what has come to be known as the American dream.

Jefferson’s Declaration did not free us from the tyranny of Britain. It merely communicated our collective desire to be unfettered and unrestrained.

Do we now feel unfettered and unrestrained? I think not.

It seems to me that our current view of the American dream sees raw ambition as “the pursuit of happiness.”

Ambition is like sexual hunger. It is satisfied with accomplishment only for a moment, and then the hunger returns. Ambition will lead you to momentary satisfaction, but it will not lead you to happiness.

John D. Rockefeller, the world’s first billionaire, was worth 1% of the entire U.S. economy when he was asked,

“How much money does it take to make a man happy?”

Rockefeller answered, “Just a little bit more.”

Ambition is never contented.

Am I condemning ambition? I promise you that I am not. I am merely pointing out the deep chasm that separates the unending hunger of ambition from the high and lofty contentment of happiness.

An old man named Paul wrote a letter to a young man named Timothy 2,000 years ago. Near the end of that letter, Paul wrote about old people and hypocrites and slavery and wealth.

Paul then added two sentences that have echoed in my brain for the past 60 years.

“To know God and to be deeply contented is the true definition of wealth. For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out.”

Happiness cannot spread its wings while wearing the handcuffs of our ambitions. The shining light of Hope is made of a stronger and happier substance than our dark dreams of future accomplishment.

Ambition can bring you recognition, reputation, and riches. But those are no substitute for friendships, family, and contentment; for these are the three strong cords from which happiness is woven.

Have you figured it out yet? Happiness is not material. It is relational.

With whom do you have a meaningful relationship?

Roy H. Williams

We have solved the mystery of the roving reporter!

The wizard received this email from Italy a couple of days ago:

Dear Roy and Pennie,

Talya and I found this quaint restaurant with tables in its wine cellar and thought you’d love this place. (I don’t drink, but thought it appropriate to pose with a glass of wine — which our son-in-law ordered.) If your future plans bring you to Vincenza, Italy, this is one stop you won’t regret. Avital sends her warmest regards.

– DEAN

(You will find the photo that accompanied this email on the final page of today’s rabbit hole. I’m Ian Rogers.)

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RANDOM QUOTE:

“As we start looking for the good, our focus automatically is taken off the bad.”

- Susan Jeffers

THE WIZARD TRILOGY

“If we train our children only to harvest, who will plant the seed?”

I wrote those words after contemplating the short-sightedness of so-called, “performance marketing,” on March 11, 2010.

“Performance marketing” is the new name for direct response advertising. It works best when it extracts the value from a well-known brand. Its objective is to bring in a lot of money quickly.

That is why business owners are attracted to it.

But here’s the caveat: value cannot be extracted from a brand unless it has first been created. You cannot squeeze a good reputation dry unless you first build a good reputation.

Do you see the problem? When you have finally squeezed the last ounce of value from a good reputation, you don’t have a good reputation anymore.

As I was contemplating that last line I just wrote, the words “extraction of value” popped into my mind. I typed those words into the Google search bar. The AI Overview that appeared at the top of the page whispered to me in a conspiratorial tone:

 “‘The extraction of value’ refers to the process of capturing or appropriating value from other stakeholders, often through exploiting a monopoly or manipulating competitive market processes, rather than creating new value.” – WIKIPEDIA

The eight words that leaped out of the paragraph were, “exploiting… or manipulating… rather than creating new value.”

Do you remember that famous scene in the movie There Will Be Blood when Daniel says to Eli,

“If you have a milkshake, and I have a milkshake, and I have a straw… There it is. that’s the straw, you see? Watch it. Now my straw reaches acroooooooss the room and starts to drink your milkshake. I… drink… your… milkshake! I drink it up!”

That is the voice of performance marketing.

The healthy alternative to performance marketing is sales activation within a relational ad campaign.

Sales activation is like shearing the wool from a sheep. You can do it again and again and the creature is never diminished by it.

Performance marketing is like slaughtering that poor sheep, piece by piece. It is painful, and there is nothing left when you are done.

I apologize for putting that horrible image into your mind, but we are talking about your business.

I’m sorry if I stepped over the line.

Roy H. Williams

You will find 4 examples of what the wizard calls “sales activation within a relational ad campaign” on the first page of the rabbit hole. I can hear what you are thinking right now. And to that, I say, “You’re welcome.” – Indy Beagle

Roving reporter Rotbart will be away on a secret mission in Italy for the next two weeks. He didn’t tell us exactly what it was, but here are our top 3 guesses. One: He is studying the original manuscripts of Leonardo Da Vinci for a special series of investigative reports to be aired on PBS this autumn. Two: The roving reporter was invited to the Vatican to meet with the Pope. Three: There is no secret mission. He is just eating gelato at a seaside cafe with his lovely wife, Talya, while gazing at the beautiful Mediterranean Sea. We will update you next week when we know more. – Ian Rogers

I was watching a few of Evan Puschak’s “Nerdwriter” videos when I heard my own inner voice composing a thank you note to him. In the quiet of my mind, I told Evan that I have always found his analysis of literature, movies, music, photographs, and paintings to be incisive and insightful.

Incisive

Insightful

Those two words, back-to-back, hit me so hard that I stumbled and fell backward into a bottomless chasm of grief over the loss of Andrew Cross.

Evan Puschak is incisive.

Andrew Cross was insightful.

“Incisive” conjures the precision of a scalpel as it slices open a surface to reveal what is hidden inside.

“Insightful” describes the inner workings of intuition as it quietly assembles a mosaic in the mind.

I was going to say that I have a “parasocial relationship” with Evan Puschak and Andrew Cross, but then I decided that I should check to make sure that “parasocial relationship” means what I think it does. Here’s what Captain Google told me.

“A parasocial relationship is a one-sided, imagined connection or bond a person develops with someone they don’t know personally, usually a media figure or celebrity, often feeling a sense of intimacy or familiarity despite the lack of reciprocity.”

Yep. It means exactly what I thought it did. 🙂

This is Andrew Cross, the Desert Drifter.

“Years ago, I ventured into a canyon alone. I thought I saw something perched high on a cliff. I looked closer. It was an ancient ruin of some kind. I assessed the climb to reach it, and I backed down. It looked too intimidating, but I’m not who I was back then.”

“Nerdwriter” Evan Puschak has built a YouTube channel of 3.2 million subscribers over the past 13 years.

“Desert Drifter” Andrew Cross built a YouTube channel of 484,000 subscribers in just 13 months. Both men are 36 years old.

I continue to watch with anxiety as Andrew climbs impossible stone cliffs,hundreds of feet high, to examine the ruins of 1,000-year-old Native American cliff dwellings.

I never suspected that Death would be waiting for Andrew at the corner of 1st Street and North Avenue near his home in Grand Junction, Colorado.

While he was still with us, Andrew took hundreds of thousands of people like me with him – one at a time – to explore remote places that few people will ever see. And he never failed to share his wonder:

“I had finally arrived. Arrived at what? Was the ruin itself what I was really searching for after all? As I looked around at the remnants of what once was, I pondered the reason I do all of this in the first place.”

“Confucius once said, ‘By three methods we may learn wisdom. First by Reflection, which is noblist. Second by Imitation, which is easiest. And third by Experience, which is the bitterest.’”

“These open desert spaces provide opportunities for all three of those. And they always beckon me to return. As long as I am able, I will answer their call, to discover more about myself and the people who have called this place ‘home.’ As you join me, my hope is for you, too, to find space for reflection, and the pursuit of wisdom.”

“Thank you for accompanying me on this journey.”

It was a delight to spend those hours with you, Andrew.

The world is smaller now that you are gone.

Roy H. Williams

Michael Drew helps authors turn their big ideas into nationwide influence and income. He has guided more than 130 book authors onto major bestseller lists — including The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. His methods are not just for seasoned authors. Michael has helped business owners, entrepreneurs, and professionals turn their ideas into books that people buy and read. A bestselling book translates into higher speaking fees and the ability to stand out in a crowded marketplace. Roving reporter Rotbart says, “If podcasts had bestseller lists, this week’s episode would surely be a top-ten contender.” Listen and learn about the inner workings of what it takes to make a bestseller happen. MondayMorningRadio.com

On the last page of today’s rabbit hole, I have hidden a secret, limited-time-only recording of Michael Drew explaining the surprising way that The New York Times bestsellers list is compiled. It’s not the way that most people think! Aroo. – Indy Beagle

Magical Thinking is often misunderstood.

Jason Segel plays a psychologist in the Apple + TV show, “Shrinking.” He is talking to a patient with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder.

He looks at her. “This again?” She is holding her breath. He says, “You looked at the clock and now you have to hold your breath until the minute changes?” Holding her breath, she nods her head. He says, “Look, I know you feel like this compulsion is gonna help keep bad things from happening, but that’s called magical thinking.”

Medical News Today says, “Magical thinking means that a person believes their thoughts, feelings, or rituals can influence events in the material world, either intentionally or unintentionally.”

But the summary of that article says, “This type of thinking does not always cause harm. In fact, it can have benefits.”

The benefits of magical thinking are – according to me – exquisite.

Magical thinking is the least destructive way to escape reality. When you compare it to alcohol, gambling, drugs, or adrenaline-producing dangerous behaviors, magical thinking is about as dangerous as eating raw cookie dough.

Magical thinking is a requirement when you are:

looking forward to a vacation, a wedding, or other happy event. Every time you imagine the future, you are visiting a world that does not exist.enjoying a television series, a movie, a novel, a poem, a song, a cartoon, or any other type of fiction. Half of your brain knows these things never happened, but the other half of your brain doesn’t care.being persuaded by a well-written bit of advertising.

Life is happier when it’s less cluttered.

Your house will be bigger.

Your teeth will be whiter.

Angels will sing.

You’ll be a better dancer.

Go to 1800GOTJUNK.com

And prepare to be amazed.

Words create realities in the mind.

Magical realism is a type of writing characterized by elements of the fantastic – woven with a deadpan sense of presentation – into an otherwise true story.

If you exaggerate, people won’t trust you. But if you say something so impossible that it cannot possibly be true, people will be delighted by the possibility you popped into their mind.

SARAH:  When your home feels clean and happy, the people inside feel clean and happy.

BRIAN: I’ve got a partner who lives down the street from you and we’re anxious to bring you a truckload of SPRINGTIME. [sfx magic sparkle]

SARAH: You don’t have to lift a finger!

Predictability is the silent assassin of advertising.

Magical realism focuses the imagination, disarms the assassin, and delights the mind.

BRIAN: We make junk disappear. [sfx magic sparkle]

SARAH: All you have to do is point.

Magical thinking is good for your soul.

Magical realism is good for your business.

Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

Roy H. Williams

The reinvention of Gigi Meier is nothing short of remarkable. After three decades at the boardroom level of a multi-billion-dollar bank, Gigi reinvented herself as a romance writer. Gigi has published 16 books, some quite steamy, across three ongoing series. Did Gigi to draw on her extensive banking experience to fuel her publishing success? No! She tells roving reporter Rotbart that the opposite is true! Gigi has discovered valuable insights as a romance publisher that would have been useful during her banking career! No one has guests as interesting as roving reporter Rotbart. Am I right! This party will get started the moment you arrive at MondayMorningRadio.com

Brian Brushwood knows how to gain and hold attention in social media.

Reaching for that brass ring causes most people to lean too far off their plastic horse on the social media merry-go-round.

SPLAT! They land flat on their faces with only a few hundred views.

Brian has built a YouTube channel to 1.7 million subscribers, an entirely different channel to more than 2 million subscribers, and 12 days ago he produced a 1-minute “short” that had 3.6 million views on the first day, and at the time of this writing – on Day 12 – it has climbed to 17.1 million views.

And you – yes, you – could have shot that exact same video with nothing more than a cell phone.

I asked Brian if I could ask him a few questions on ZOOM for the Monday Morning Memo. Here are a some of the things he shared with me:

“There’s a temptation, especially with YouTube, to perpetually feel like you’re too late. You’re never too late. I thought I was too late to start YouTube in 2006 because it had been around since 2005. It was already seeing its early superstars. And I started in 2006. And then I thought by the time Scam School came to YouTube in 2009, I thought it was too late. It wasn’t too late. I thought it was too late in 2016 when we launched the Modern Rogue. It wasn’t too late.”

“YouTube is the dominant market now.”

“Facebook is now pay-to-play. And for some messaging, that works. It’s worth paying the money to get the message out there. But if you’re trying to build organic fans like I am, it’s not a fit.”

“TikTok: there’s only one star of TikTok, and that’s TikTok. You can get a million views one day and the next day you’ll get 800. And it’s agonizing because they literally just want to lure you into their dopamine trap. Whereas YouTube is a meritocracy.”

“And here’s the beauty. If you think about YouTube as your personal agent… What personal agent knows your material all the way back to the very first time you ever posted anything? And also it knows the customer, your client, your prospective new best friend, their entire history of everything they’ve ever watched.”

What can you do for me in one hour, Brian?

“We can crack who you are, what you do and do not do, and craft your storytelling engine.”

“Have you noticed, Roy, that on YouTube, so much of the content boils down to, ‘Can you blank with a blank?’ Or ‘How to blank with a blank.’ And these are transactional things. Either they trade on curiosity, or they trade on things that people are searching for. But very quickly, all you have to do is get on paper what your flavor is – that’s called in fancy Hollywood talk – ‘a style guide.'”

“Now, I don’t want to intimidate anybody… You know what, if I did want to intimidate people, I’ll say, ‘In one hour, Roy, I can give you a story bible, a style guide, I can give you a structure, a framework, a narrative storytelling. I could break down the beats of your three-act structure. We could consider the Campbellian monomyth, all those things.'”

“We could get that done in an hour and technically I’d be accurate. But the way I would explain it to anybody watching this is, ‘Give me an hour and I’ll teach you not how to tell a story; I’ll teach you to tell all the stories, because stories are happening to you all the time. Every client that has a setback is an amazing story.'”

“It is so dead simple.”

“Now that doesn’t mean it’s easy, but it is simple. The first hour is basically everything you’re going to need to know. Everything past that is reinforcement, and everything after that is refinement.”

Brian Brushwood is a social media magician, a longtime friend, and a Wizard of Ads partner.

Would you like to spend an hour with Brian?

I can put you in touch with him.

Roy H. Williams

When Maria Fraietta’s father passed away in 2021, she and her brothers had to sort through all of their father’s files, financial accounts, bills, titles, and possessions. The project was so daunting that she decided to create a system to help you and me save priceless hours trying to piece together the jigsaw puzzle of our loved one’s accounts and possessions. Maria invested $50 to start her company and ran the business from her living room with help from her family and friends. Less than four years later, Nokbox (Next Of Kin box) has grown into a $34 million-a-year success story. Valuable entrepreneurial insights await you at MondayMorningRadio.com. You don’t want to miss this episode.

“Features and benefits” were once the most loudly shouted secrets of customer acquisition in Business to Consumer advertising (B2C). I even wrote a chapter in my first book – The Wizard of Ads – on the use of “which means” as a word-bridge between:

1. naming a feature of your product and

2. naming the benefit it delivers to your customer.

But that was 27 years ago.

When “features and benefits” became predictable in B2C advertising, they quickly tumbled into the gutters of “Ad-speak” and lost all of their effectiveness.

Naming features and benefits is still the right thing to do in Business to Business advertising (B2B) and in Direct Response ads. In those environments, your customers already know they are in the cross hairs of a sales pitch. So name a feature, followed by “which means,” and then tell them about the benefit they will experience.

Here’s how that Direct Response ad might sound:

“TwinkleWhite toothpaste contains Polychromaticite® which means your teeth will be whiter, your breath will be fresher, and everyone will be attracted to you. TwinkleWhite toothpaste is the choice of 93% of billionaires and 97% of supermodels worldwide, which means Polychromaticite® is an essential ingredient in the creation of personal wealth and beauty. This miracle toothpaste isn’t sold in stores, which means you will save 65 percent when your order TwinkleWhite directly from the laboratory at TwinkleWhite.com”

Direct Response advertising is a unique monster who lives and dies by its own special rules.

1. It is judged by its ability to generate an immediate result.

2. It offers no continuing benefit to the advertiser.

Direct Response is the preferred method of advertising for people who are selling a stand-alone product, tickets to an event, or a quick solution for a short-term problem, such as roof repair after a hurricane. None of these people is building a brand.

Although ads for B2C sales activation can sound similar to B2B ads and Direct Response ads like the one above, different rules apply.

I will now whisper to you the quiet secrets of B2C sales activation in 2025.

Every Powerful Message Comes at a Cost. Vulnerability is the currency that buys trust in today’s over-communicated world. Financial vulnerability, emotional vulnerability, and relational vulnerability demonstrate your sincerity.When you don’t have cash, spend time instead. Brad Casebier owned a tiny plumbing company in a town that doesn’t have enough water. So he calculated how much water a running toilet wastes every day, then advertised that he would install a new toilet flapper for free in every home that had a running toilet. No strings attached. Brad became a superstar and his company became huge. Interestingly, the average person who needed a new toilet flapper spent about $800 on other things they needed done.These diamond earrings whisper, “I love you.” Customer interest skyrockets when inanimate objects have thoughts, feelings, or the ability to speak.Promote your slowest day of the week. I rarely visit my favorite restaurant on Mondays because it is always too crowded. Their offer of “Buy a Burger and Get One Free” packs the house with people who buy lots of appetizers, side dishes, desserts, and drinks from the bar because they saved a couple of bucks on a burger. The offer is for dine-in only.Don’t think like a business owner. Think like the customer. Do not try to unload your buying mistakes through sales activation. Your company will be judged as out-of-touch and unfashionable.In-house financing at 0% interest is a friendly offer. It makes things buyable that would otherwise be out-of-reach.Powerful offers work, even when they don’t.

The 40% of sales activation ads in your customer bonding campaign will accelerate the impact of the remaining 60%.

Sales activation sends a signal that says, “This company is on the move. They’re putting a lot of energy into everything they do.”

Some people lump sales activation ads and direct response ads into a common basket called “performance marketing.” My partner Johnny Molson recently highlighted an important point in a new 100-page research paper called The Multiplier Effect that says, “The payback of performance advertising is only as strong as the equity of the brand.” In other words, a stronger brand means you can have a better sale. And stronger brands are the result of customer bonding.

The objective of your B2C customer bonding campaign is to make customers like you, trust you, and immediately think of you when they need what you sell.

Nourish the seeds of relationship that you plant in the hearts of your customers with the water and sunlight of delightful sales activation.

Customer bonding operates on the timeless principles of seedtime and harvest.

This is why you can trust it.

Roy H. Williams

Andrew Matthews and his wife, Julie, have sold more than 8 million copies of their inspirational books about happiness and resilience. His first visit with us was one of 2024’s most popular episodes of Monday Morning Radio. In this, his second appearance, Andrew talks about the persistence, relationship-building and adaptability that are required to achieve success. It’s as easy as 1, 2, 3. Persistence, Relationship-building, and Adaptability. We’ll get started as soon as you arrive at MondayMorningRadio.com

Philip Dusenberry once said, “I have always believed that writing advertisements is the second most profitable form of writing. The first, of course, is ransom notes.”

I can testify that Dusenberry is correct. The best ad writers make more money than the most highly paid lawyers and heart surgeons.

Great advertising makes an enormous difference in the top line revenue of a company. A reputation for being able to write great ads makes an enormous difference in your bank account. But only if you get paid according to the growth of the businesses you write for.

Did you notice that I ended that sentence with a preposition? A pedantic will tell you that I should have said, “But only if you get paid according to the growth of the businesses for whom you write ads.” But I chose not to do that. If you can tell me why, you might have the makings of an ad writer.

Do you have a friend who reads the books of the world’s most famous authors?

If you say, “Call me Ishmael,” and your friend says, “Moby Dick,” your friend has the ingredients to bake a wordcake.

Say to your friend, “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood.”

If your friend says, “Robert Frost,” he or she has the ability to lead people to places they have never been.

Say, “The price of self-destiny is never cheap, and in certain situations it is unthinkable. But to achieve the marvelous, it is precisely the unthinkable that must be thought.”

If your friend looks at you and says, “Tom Robbins died last month,” they definitely have the makings of ad writer.

“As you read, so will you write.”

If the cadence and rhythm and unpredictable phrases singular to poets, screenwriters and novelists are echoing in your brain, your mind will spew rainbows of words like ocean water from the blowhole of a whale.

Luke records Jesus as having said, “Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.” If you want to know what is inside a person, listen to what they say and read what they write.

The minds of great writers are filled with the music of other great writers. Music cannot flow from your fingertips if it does not live in your mind.

I don’t mean to be unkind, but most writers have no music in their mind.

Tom Robbins told NPR in 2014, “I would tell stories aloud to himself, but always out in the yard with a stick in my hand. I would beat the ground as I told the story. And we moved fairly frequently. We would leave houses behind where one section of the yard was completely bare from where I had destroyed the grass. But I realized much later in life that what I was doing was drumming. I was building a rhythm. Even today as a writer I pay a lot of attention to the rhythm in my work.”

When Tom Robbins died, hypnotic passages from his bestselling novels were quoted by NPR and The New York Times in their eulogies of his life.

Character dialogue written by Aaron Sorkin is the standard by which all screenwriting is judged. Aaron says, “It’s not just that dialogue sounds like music to me. It actually is music. Anytime someone is speaking for the purpose of performance, whether they’re doing it from a pulpit in a church, whether it’s a candidate on the stump or an actor on a stage, anytime they’re speaking for the purposes of performance, all the rules of music apply.”

The workload of my 81 Wizard of Ads partners will soon be at maximum capacity.

I am looking for brilliant ad writers. Between now and the end of the year I will onboard a small group of writers who are worth a lot more money than they are currently being paid. They will attend the partner meeting this autumn.

Selection, orientation, and enculturation requires diligence and patience on both sides.

Our journey will begin when you send exactly 12 things you have written to corrine@wizardofads.com. Choose the work that best represents you.

Know that it will probably be summertime before you hear anything back from us.

The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

Do you have the courage to begin?

Roy H. Williams

Twenty-four thousand men were crowded into Knockaloe Interment Camp in 1914 because they had been found guilty of being in the wrong place, at the wrong time, with the wrong last name.

Tightly confined behind barbed wire, those men grew increasingly weak, feeble, stiff and awkward until a man named Joseph was shoved through their gate on September 12, 1915.

He gave his fellow prisoners strength, stamina, flexibility and grace.

They never forgot him.

When the war was over and those men were released, Joseph boarded a ship for America. While onboard that ship, he fell in love with a woman named Clara who was also headed to America. When they arrived in New York, Joseph and Clara opened a studio on 8th street that would send ripples across the world.

The rest of this story is about how those ripples became a wave.

George Balanchine sent his ballet dancers to Joseph on 8th street to gain strength, stamina, flexibility and grace.

Martha Graham sent her modern dancers to Joseph on 8th street to gain strength, stamina, flexibility and grace.

The best dancers on Broadway went to Joseph on 8th Street to gain strength, stamina, flexibility and grace.

George Balanchine became known as “The Father of Modern Ballet.”

Martha Graham is shown in Apple’s famous “Think Different” video as one of the 17 people that Steve Jobs felt had changed the world.

Broadway, Ballet, and Modern Dance were lifted to new heights.

When those ripples from 8th Street reached California, the “Golden Age of Hollywood” began.

Gene Kelley danced with a light post and sang in the rain to the thundering applause of America.

Slim, elegant, and incredibly strong, Fred Astaire did impossible things effortlessly.

Ginger Rodgers did exactly what Fred did, but backwards and in high heels.

A young man was known for his slogan, “Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.” He brought strength, stamina, flexibility and grace to the world of boxing.

Like Martha Graham, this young boxer was chosen to appear in Apple’s famous “Think Different” video as one of the 17 “crazy ones” who changed the world.

He had been the heavyweight champion of the world for 5 years when a 10-year-old boy named Michael elevated dancing to an even higher place with the help of his 4 older brothers. Those 8th Street ripples of strength, stamina, flexibility and grace had splashed back from the California coast and were now rippling through Motown.

Charles Atlas and Joseph Pilates were born one year apart and lived an almost identical lifespan.

Charles Atlas gave men bulging biceps that other people could admire.

Joseph Pilates told us how to gain the strength, stamina, flexibility, and grace to do whatever we want to do.

What do you want to do?

– Roy H. Williams

PS – Joseph loved Clara until the day he died.

Are your employees happy to follow you, or do they avoid you like a skunk at a garden party? Phillip Wilson says the more accessible you are as a leader, the more your business will thrive. But when leaders create a gap between themselves and their employees, they lose top talent and nudge workers toward unionization. Listen in as the famous Phillip Wilson explains to roving reporter Rotbart why “Approachable Leadership” is the only elevator that can lift employee morale, productivity, and retention. The button has been pressed and this elevator is about to up-up-up! But we’re holding the door open for you, hoping that you’ll join us at MondayMorningRadio.com

The biggest decisions I ever made didn’t seem big at the time.

I’ll bet the same is true for you.

Pivotal changes in direction seem obvious to us 10 years later, but during that tiny moment when we alter our course a little, it feels like a very small thing.

Here are 4 small, pivotal moments that loom large in my mind today.

Moment #1: I was a 22-year-old advertising salesman who was rapidly going bald. Every business owner I met was trying to decide, “Where should I invest my ad budget?”

One morning I heard myself answer, “I don’t care where you spend your money. The thing that matters most is what you say in your ads.”

The man didn’t believe me.

But I believed me.

The direction of my future was altered by a few degrees in that singular, magical moment.

Moment #2, about 18 months later:

I was writing exceptional ads and everyone was dancing except me. I knew something was missing, but I didn’t know what. And it was bugging me.

I looked into my own eyes in the bathroom mirror for about a minute one morning. And then I said out loud, “Why am I not seeing better results?”

My reflection reached out from that mirror, slapped my face, grabbed my collar and pulled me in so closely that my nose was pressed into the glass. I could feel its breath on my ear as it whispered, “You are reaching too many people with too little repetition.”

You never forget a thing like that.

Moment #3: I was pondering the “Reach and Frequency Analysis” of my media schedule that had been calculated for me by the most famous data company in America and It said everything was fine. But I knew I was reaching too many people with too little repetition. That was the problem.

I found the cause of that problem – and the solution to it – buried deep in the methodology of how advertising everywhere is measured, sold, purchased, and evaluated.

Good science is distorted by our erroneous assumptions. We gather perfectly accurate data and then misinterpret it. We rarely question our assumptions, especially when they are part of the universally accepted way of “How Things are Done.”

If you could see the mistakes that hide in your blind spot, it would not be called “a blind spot.”

Misinterpretation of data is an irresistible tide that carries every boat in the wrong direction.

The first fatal mistake occurs so early in the process of data processing that we never really question it.

The second fatal mistake happens during the implementation stage. You assume that spreading your small ad budget across different media is the right thing to do because everyone does it. This idea of a “media mix” is practiced by all the largest advertisers and taught in every university. They say to their marketing students, “This is what the biggest companies do. You should imitate them.”

But here’s the dead fly in that bowl of soup: When a company has a much bigger ad budget than everyone else in their category, they can aim that firehouse across several media and soak everyone with relentless repetition.

But you don’t have a firehouse. You have a watering can.

If you use your watering can properly, you’ll be able to afford a garden hose. And if you use that garden hose properly, you will soon be able to afford a fire hose.

The water in your watering can should be used to water all the people you can reach with sufficient repetition.

“with sufficient repetition.”

“with sufficient repetition.”

Repetition is the non-negotiable you must protect at all cost.

When you reach too many people with too little repetition, no one gets wet, and you stay small.

NOTE: I am dangerously oversimplifying the solution when I say that you can achieve automatic, involuntary recall (known as procedural memory) by reaching the average person at least 2.5 times per week, every week, with a magnetically memorable message.

That’s how you become a household word.

That simple explanation is dangerous because the reports that are most commonly generated from the data will confirm you are achieving a weekly repetition of 2.5 when you are not, in fact, achieving it.

Let’s review:

(A.) When you are buying media, never forget that figures lie, and liars figure. You have to know more about data analysis than the media sellers who want to put your ad budget in their pocket.

(B.) You will always be attracted to the media that is most easily measured, not the one that is the most effective. You must resist this fatal attraction.

(C.) You will assume that the secret to success in advertising is “to reach the right people.” FACT: I have never seen a business fail due to reaching the wrong people.

(D.) Your ads will need to win the heart, knowing that the mind will follow. FACT: The mind will always find logic to justify what the heart has already decided.

(E.) Winning the hearts of people is amazingly affordable if you

(1.) have patience and

(2.) know how to write great ads.

(F.) Winning those hearts at the last minute is extremely expensive. Don’t put it off until the last minute.

When I discovered the secret of making miracles, I began making millionaires.

Moment #4: I decided to quit charging by the hour when I was about 30 years old. My new plan was to charge a flat rate per month for one year, then adjust that monthly salary up or down by the same percentage the client’s top line had increased or decreased during the previous 12 months.

This aligned my best interests with their best interests.

Note to Great Ad Writers: Don’t be paid according to how much your client spends.

Be paid according to how much they grow.

That is how you will become the world’s most highly paid ad writer.

The same is true for media buyers.

Roy H. Williams

PS – You definitely want to see page one in the rabbit hole today. To see page one, click the image of the sunset at the top of this page. If you are listening to the audio version of this memo, go to MondayMorningMemo.com and look in the archives for February 27, 2025. “Moments that Change Everything.”

NOTE 1: Advertising professionals will notice that I refer to “reach and frequency” as “reach and repetition” throughout this essay. Roy does this because he writes for people who never took advertising classes in college. It has been our experience that people will often misinterpret the word “frequency,” but they always understand the word “repetition.”

NOTE 2: Everything the wizard told you today applies only to B2C advertising (Business-to-Consumer.) It does not apply to B2B advertising (Business to Business). And Direct Response advertising is its own special monster.

If you believe that people today have a short attention span, you are mistaken.

FACT: We live in an over-communicated society.

This is why we have learned how to quickly filter out messages that do not interest us.

FACT: We will happily spend several hours binge-watching shows that appeal to us.

Where’s your theory about a short attention span now?

If you want to get people’s attention and hold that attention, talk to them about things they already care about.

If people aren’t paying attention to your ads, it is because (A.) you chose the wrong thing to talk about, or (B.) you are talking about it in a predictable way.

I wrote an ad this morning for a jewelry store. This is how the ad begins:

RICK: Sicily is the island at the toe of the boot of Italy,

SARAH: and the town of Catania is situated on the seashore, staring at the toe of that boot.

MONICA: That’s where Jay, one of our owners, traveled to meet Italy’s most exciting new jewelry designer.

RICK: Tell us about it, Jay.

JAY: When I met Francesco and saw what he was working on, I almost hyperventilated.

Those 5 lines do not sound like the typical jewelry store ad.

But I’ll bet you’d like to hear the rest of it.

Let’s talk for a moment about another obvious truth:

FACT: Ads rarely work for products that people don’t want. The ad writers and the media will always get the blame, but the real mistake is made when business owners convince themselves that advertising can sell things that no one wants.

Advertising cannot, in fact, do that.

I recently spoke to a friend who sent out 20,000 postcards that failed to get a response. This led him to conclude that “direct mail doesn’t work.”

When he told me what was featured on those 20,000 postcards, I told my friend the truth. “Your experiment proved only that a weak offer gets weak results. Direct mail didn’t fail. Your offer did.”

Your objective determines the rules you must play by.

Direct Response – immediate result advertising – can be measured with ROAS (Return On Ad Spend.) Pay-per-click is perhaps the most common type of direct response advertising, but direct response offers are routinely made using every type of media. If you plan to introduce, explain, and sell a product or service to a customer with whom you have no previous relationship, you are rolling the dice of direct response. You can always measure the effectiveness of direct response ads with ROAS.

Direct Response is a sport for surfers who like to ride the wave of a trend. It is a wild and crazy rollercoaster ride of feast-and-famine. If you like excitement, you should definitely do it. But be aware that the most successful direct response marketers are spending 25% to 35% percent of top line revenues on advertising. You need at least a 20x markup to play that game.

I prefer sowing and reaping. Seedtime and harvest.

Brand Building creates a long-term bond with the customer. The goal of brand building is to make your name the one that customers think of immediately – and feel the best about – when they finally need what you sell. Your Return on Ad Spend –ROAS – will look terrible when you first begin, but it will get better and better as you build a relationship with the public. In the long run, nothing can touch brand building. It is always the most cost-effective way to invest your ad budget if you have patience, confidence, and a good ad writer.

Roy H. Williams

Twenty-eight million viewers tuned in to “The Apprentice” each week to watch people be told, “You’re Fired.”

But in the real world, dismissing employees is far more complicated —emotionally, ethically, and legally. How to dismiss employees isn’t taught in business school, and managers often fumble the process. Mahesh Guruswamy has spent much of his career delivering bad news — not just to employees but also to customers, investors, and even his superiors. Today Mahesh is sharing his hard-earned wisdom with roving reporter Rotbart. Make time for this episode! You are about to learn some incredibly valuable things at MondayMorningRadio.com.

Buying advertising is a lot like buying diamonds.

Allow me to explain.

Anyone who talks to a jeweler will be told that diamonds are graded according to the 4 C’s: Color, Clarity, Carat weight, and Cut.

Customers ask the jeweler, “Which of the 4 Cs is most important?”

This seems like a perfectly reasonable question, but the truth is that the 4 C’s cannot be compared to one another. There is no rubric, no metric, no algorithm that can equate them. The 4 C’s are distinctly separate from one another. They are not interchangeable.

Advertising is like that. Each of the characteristics of highly effective advertising are distinctly separate from one another. They are not interchangeable.

Natural diamonds can be an infinite number of shades of yellow, grey, brown, green, blue, red, or a mixture thereof. Diamonds can also be colorless.

The only thing more valuable than a colorless diamond is an extremely colorful one.

Color is a measurement of rarity, not beauty.

Clarity is another measurement of rarity, not beauty.

“Flawless” clarity refers to a diamond which is free of inclusions under 10x magnification. But under 40x magnification every flawless diamond is swimming with inclusions that cannot be seen under 10x. So get this idea of “flawless” out of your head, okay? It is a myth.

Seven clarity grades below flawless is another clarity known as SI2, which looks flawless to the naked eye. Not even a jeweler can tell the difference without 10x magnification. But there is a huge difference in price between flawless and SI2 because Clarity is a measurement of rarity, not beauty, remember?

Carat weight is how the size of a diamond is measured. We’ll come back to this in a minute.

Cut does not refer to the shape of the diamond, but to the ability of the diamond to gather light, bounce it between the facets, and then shine it upward toward the eyes. When diamonds are cut perfectly, they do not leak light out of the bottom of the diamond. A perfectly cut diamond returns 100% of internalized light upward and outward in a wild spectacle of sparkles.

You want sparkles, but you also want carat weight.

When you cut a diamond crystal perfectly, you lose more than half of that diamond’s Carat weight. But if you cheat the cut a little, the diamond won’t sparkle as much but it will weigh more and sell for more money.

If you cut the diamond with a thick girdle and a deep pavilion, the diamond will be dull because its internal mirrors will be misaligned, but it will be much heavier than if it were cut properly.

A Carat is a unit of weight. There are 141.748 Carats in an ounce. This means that a small pouch of 1-Carat diamonds worth just $4,000 each will cost you $567,000 an ounce.

Pure gold is less than $3,000 an ounce.

Are you beginning to understand why diamond cutters are loath to grind away precious carat weight in the quest for maximum sparkle?

Your logical mind tells you that it should be possible to create a diamond algorithm that says, “one colorgrade = 0.05 carats = 0.78 of a clarity grade = 2.13% excess weight above the projected carat weight for a perfectly cut diamond of this diameter.”

Your logical mind tells you this because you continue to believe that dissimilar properties such as color, clarity, carat weight, and cut can be quantified, codified, and reconciled.

In truth, they cannot.

Buying advertising is even more complicated than buying diamonds.

The rubric used to calculate the Gross Rating Points achieved in media schedules makes perfect sense until you realize it equates dissimilar properties and treats them as though they are interchangeable:

Reach = the total number of different people who experienced your ad within a specified period of time.

Frequency = how often the average person experienced your ad.

If half the people experienced your ad only once, and the other half experienced it twice, your ad campaign would score a Frequency of 1.5 in your specified window of measurement.

How Gross Rating Points are calculated. (And they will always automatically be calculated by the media sellers.)

STEP ONE: Reach x Frequency (repetition) = Gross Impressions

STEP TWO: Gross Impressions

cast as a percentage of the Nielsen population of your trade area

= Gross Rating Points. (GRP’s)

STEP THREE: Cost Per Gross Rating Point or CPP (Cost Per Point) is calculated by

A: the cost of the schedule

B: divided by the number of Gross Rating Points it delivers.

If the population of your trade area is 765,432 people and your ad schedule delivers 765,432 Gross Impressions in the specified window of time, your schedule achieved 100 Gross Rating Points, (the mathematical equivalent of having reached 100% of your trade area 1 time)

But is that really what happened? Of course not.

Perhaps you reached 50% of the city twice.

Maybe you reached 33.3% of the city 3 times.

You might have reached 25% of the city 4 times.

Or 10% of the city 10 times, 5% of the city 20 times,

Or 1 sad bastard 765,432 times.

Do you believe that each of those schedules will deliver the same result?

Of course not.

But each of them delivers 100 Gross Rating Points.

Gross Rating Points give you no insights that can help you, yet hundreds of billions of dollars are spent each year choosing media schedules according to their Cost Per Point.

The fatal mistake was made in Step One. Reach and Frequency (repetition) are not interchangeable. You cannot multiply one times the other to get “Gross Rating Points.” That’s just stupid.

Any local business that evaluates ad schedules based on their Cost Per Point will always reach too many people with too little repetition.

Reach is easy to achieve. Frequency is hard to achieve unless you bite the hook of broad rotators which are added to your schedule at little or no cost. If you allow this “added value” to be included in the calculation of your reach and frequency, you are going to be deeply disappointed in the results of your ad campaign.

You do not want to reach 100% of the people and convince them 10% of the way when the same small ad budget will let you reach 10% of the people and convince them 100% of the way.

Repetition is what you’re after. You need an absolute minimum frequency of 2.5 per week, every week. If you accept the logic that “on a week, off a week” is all that you can afford, your schedule is going to fail.

The Nielsen schedule report you want to see is a report that no one wants to show you. (Did I say Nielsen? Yes, I said Nielsen. I did not say another name.) You want to see Net Persons and Frequency for a ONE WEEK schedule, Monday through Sunday. And no broad rotators – zero – can be included in this calculation. And you must buy this ONE WEEK schedule 52 weeks per year.

You can buy Net Persons that equal about 25% of the population of your trade area extremely efficiently, especially in larger cities.

But the second 25% – giving you Net Persons that total around 50% of the city – will cost you nearly twice the amount you spent to buy the first 25%.

The problem you run into is the declining efficiency of achieving new Net Reach due to cume duplication, or “shared audience.” But if you schedule that first 25% of the population correctly, you will soon be able to easily afford the price of reaching and owning that second 25%. Because you will have grown monster big.

You are fooling yourself if you believe you can efficiently reach more than 50% of your city.

And when I say city, I mean the 18+ Nielsen Population of your trade area.

Like I said, buying advertising is far more complicated than buying diamonds.

Roy H. Williams

Next Week: Media Measurement Mistakes: Chapter 2

By the way, the Tiny Tribe and I have prepared an exceptional rabbit hole for you today. To enter the rabbit hole just click the image of me at the top of this page. And once inside, each image you click will take you one page deeper. – Indy Beagle

Israel Duran shows people how to transform their businesses. And then he shows them how to leverage that success to impact, inspire, and influence their communities. Israel describes himself as an “impact architect” who helps business owner make money, make a name, and make a difference. Learn how to do it at MondayMorningRadio.com

I recently sent you two memos about our need for positive hope.

“Hollywood’s Broken Angel” was the true story of a woman who desperately needed a friend to encourage her.

“Hope and a Future” explained how easy it is to recharge the emotional batteries of a friend whose light has dimmed.

Positive hope crackles with the vibrant energy of life itself. It radiates honesty, openness, forgiveness, acceptance, optimism, loyalty and love.

Positive hope illuminates the heart and drives away the darkness.

But there is also such a thing as negative hope. It promises salvation but delivers only hubris, which is desperation disguised as confidence.

Negative hope is attractive, addictive, and cruel.

Gamblers sitting around a poker table are the perfect portrait of negative hope. They ride a rollercoaster of elation and despair but tell themselves they have a system.

A second portrait of negative hope is a lottery ticket, a receipt issued by the government to citizens who pay a voluntary tax because they believe in lucky numbers and are extremely bad at math.

Bernie Madoff was a salesman of negative hope. He wore the mask of a self-made billionaire, but behind that mask was a desperate little con man who stole money from innocent people who believed they had been admitted into the inner circle of a genius who had a secret system.

The world is full of elegant and attractive people who sell negative hope. One of them will sell you a worthless education by promising you a better-paying job. Another will sell you a garage full of crap by convincing you of the miracle of multilevel marketing. A third will sell you the promise of inner peace by convincing you they have it, and that it can be transferred to you for money.

Negative hope is attractive, but you can easily recognize it now that you know what to look for.

I’m really glad we got that out of the way because now I’ve got some great news for you: inner peace is real.

And here’s some even better news: you can have it for free, no strings attached.

Inner peace is honesty, openness, forgiveness, acceptance, optimism, loyalty and love. All of these can be yours for free. But first you have to give them away.

It is a simple but fascinating system. The more you give these 7 things to others, the more richly they accumulate in you.

Five hundred and eleven Christmases have come and gone since Giovanni Giocondo sent his Christmas letter to a friend in 1513. It said, “No peace lies in the future that is not hidden in this present little instant. Take peace!”

Likewise, I say to you, inner peace is hidden in this present little instant.

Reach out and take it. It’s yours.

Roy H. Williams

When roving reporter Rotbart was a financial columnist with The Wall Street Journal, he met a young man named Steve Jobs who left a lasting impression on him. “When I spoke with Jason Schappert,” Rotbart says, “it felt like I was talking with Steve Jobs again.” Jason Schappert recently launched an AI-powered investment platform for middle-class consumers, providing the same insights and tools typically reserved for the ultra-rich. Today you have an opportunity to learn from Jason Schappert about how to identify opportunities, make bold decisions, and leverage your passion as roving reporter Rotbart meets with him at MondayMorningRadio.com

Fifty years ago, I was a teenager with an unreliable automobile. But that’s never a problem for an Oklahoma boy who has knowledge, tools, and daylight.

My knowledge and tools were always with me, but the daylight disappeared at the worst possible time, no matter how badly I needed it.

Cell phones had not yet been invented.

When the batteries in my flashlight died, nothing could be seen but the desperation, defeat, and despair of a boy at the side of the road trying to repair a car in the darkness.

Any person who stopped to help me with a bright beam of light seemed like an angel sent from God.

People who are lost, lonely and frightened are all around us but we seldom see them because fear, sadness, and despair look exactly like preoccupation, concentration, and distraction. This is how people in pain disappear into the scenery around us.

But sometimes the beam of light within you will reveal a person directly in front of you who needs your help. Will you pass by on the other side of the road, or will you stop and share your light?

I’m not just talking about random strangers. I’m talking about people whose names you know, people who are already in your life; coworkers, colleagues and employees who are walking with an invisible limp, people whose sunlight has receded below the horizon.

You can shine some light into their darkness:

Find a moment when it is just the two of you.Look at them and say their name.Say, “Do you know what I’ve always admired about you?”Describe specific moments that quietly impressed you.Tell them the truth about themselves. Remind them of who they are, and how much they matter, and why they belong.

This is often all it takes to recharge a person’s batteries and help them get their motor running again. When you shine your light into their heart, you elevate their hope and brighten their future.

The mark of a strong leader who is deeply loved is that they lift up the people around them by speaking the encouraging truth into their lives, regardless of whether a person needs it or not.

It is a gift that is always welcome.

Roy H. Williams

“Leadership is not a static trait but an evolving journey,” says Bob Kaplan, a high-level management expert with over three decades of experience. “Even ‘born leaders,’ need training, desire, and experience to achieve real greatness,” he says, and then he adds, “The most challenging people to manage are always the leaders themselves.” Bob Kaplan believes CEOs and other C-suite executives should continually invite feedback — good and bad — and then concentrate on eliminating their shortcomings as they continually refine their skills. Hey! Do you want to run with the big dogs or stay on the porch? Roving reporter Rotbart says he will begin his interview of Bob Kaplan the moment you arrive at MondayMorningRadio.com. Aroo!

Her name was Lillian Millicent Entwistle, “Peg” to her friends. She was born in 1908.

At the age of 19, Peg married Robert Keith, 10 years older than she. Then she discovered that he had been married before and had a 6 year-old son. The couple was soon divorced.

“I’ll move to a new place and get a new start,” she thought. “Goodbye, New York. Hello, L.A. I’m going to become an actress.”

But hopes and dreams are fragile things and hearts are easily broken.

At the age of 24 “She decided she’d failed,” says David Wallace, author of Hollywoodland. “She was very dejected and one day in 1932 she came up to the Hollywood sign, found a maintenance ladder by the ‘H,’ climbed up to the top and presumably took one last look over the city she had failed to conquer, and jumped.”

Her body was discovered two days later by a hiker.

A handwritten note was found in her purse. “I am afraid I am a coward. I am sorry for everything. If I had done this a long time ago, it would have saved a lot of pain.”

A letter arrived at her home on the same day her body was discovered. It was from The Beverly Hills Playhouse. They wanted her to star in their next production.

Are you ready for this? It was to be a play about a young girl who loses all hope and commits suicide in the final act.

Peg, if only you could’ve hung on. Things are never as bad as they seem. But now all we have left of you is a photograph and a note.

Remember that 6-year-old son of Robert Keith you heard about in the second paragraph?

That boy, Brian Keith, grew up to be a famous actor, best known for his role as “Uncle Bill” on the hit TV show, “Family Affair.” He also played the perfect Teddy Roosevelt opposite Sean Connery in “The Wind and the Lion,” (1975).

I have seen that movie 14 times. Brian Keith made Teddy Roosevelt come alive for me.

Brian Keith shot himself in 1997.

Yes, hopes and dreams are fragile things and hearts are easily broken.

Be gentle with the hearts that have been entrusted to you.

Roy H. Williams

Mike Frick started a side hustle as a way to help his college-student son earn extra cash. Today that business sells its products nationwide to construction sites, quarries, farms, mines, and the US military. “Our products are simple, durable, and cost effective,” Mike tells roving reporter Rotbart. In spite of heavy competition from Chinese knock-offs, Mike and his company continue to thrive by manufacturing their products only in America. It’s a story of focus, humility, and fantastic success. Because that’s how we roll at MondayMorningRadio.com.

I asked Google, “What are thoughts made of?”

Google said, “According to current scientific understanding, thoughts are essentially made up of electrical signals generated by the firing of neurons in the brain, which communicate with each other through chemical messengers called neurotransmitters; essentially, a thought is a complex pattern of neural activity within the brain, triggered by sensory input, memories, and other factors.”

Google’s answer to my question is true, but it isn’t useful. My goal is to place a thought into the mind of another person. I want to change what they are thinking and feeling.

In 2003 I proposed a theory that has come to be known as “The 12 Languages of the Mind.” It explains how thoughts are constructed from pre-thought particles.

Stay with me. This is about to get interesting.

A neuron is a nerve cell, the basic unit of the nervous system. It is responsible for sending and receiving electrical signals. A synapse is the tiny gap between two neurons. This is where information is transferred from one neuron to another through the release of chemical messengers called neurotransmitters. Essentially, a neuron is the cell itself, and a synapse is the connection point between two neurons where communication occurs.

Sounds a little bit like a computer, doesn’t it?

A computer is of little value without an operating system.

The 12 Languages of the Mind are the operating system of the brain.

Let’s look at it another way.

We know that all the matter in the universe is made from just 3 primaries: protons, neutrons, and electrons. These form atoms, the smallest units of matter.

Atoms of elements combine to create molecules of compounds; two atoms of hydrogen plus one atom of oxygen create a single molecule of water, H2O.

There are 118 different kinds of atoms organized in The Periodic Table of the Elements. We can create new substances because we now understand the constituent components that underlie all the matter in the universe.

Just as protons, neutrons, and electrons can be arranged to form matter, The 12 Languages of the Mind can be arranged to communicate thoughts and trigger the emotions, opinions, and reactions that follow those thoughts.

Symbols are one of The 12 languages of the Mind. Motion is another.

Hydrogen + Oxygen = Water.

Symbol + Motion = Ritual.

Our material universe is created from just 3 primaries.

Likewise, all the colors we see are created from just 3 primaries, red, yellow, and blue in subtractive color, red, yellow, and blue in subtractive color. But red, green, and blue in additive color. It depends on whether your eye is absorbing the light waves, which is additive, or whether you are seeing reflected light from a substance that has absorbed part of the light spectrum. That is called subtractive color.

Created from 12 primaries, how much bigger is the universe of your mind?

Your body contains about a 100 million sensory receptors that allow you to see, feel, taste, hear, and smell physical reality. But your brain contains about 10,000 billion synapses. This means you are approximately 100,000 times better equipped to experience a world that does not exist, than a world that does. It is these 10,000 billion synapses that allow us to imagine a better future, or a worse one. .

Created from 12 primaries, how much bigger is the universe of your mind!

Every form of human expression is created from the 12 Languages of the Mind.

Using them unconsciously is talent. Using them consciously is skill.

Communication is fun and persuasion is simple when you understand the building blocks of the mind.

I will spend 15 or 20 minutes explaining in some detail The 12 Languages of the Mind to the people in Tuscan Hall on March 17th, and I’m doing it for free. Altogether, it will be a 4-hour, free tutorial.

If you want to attend that 4-hour tutorial in Austin on March 17th, just go to powerselling.com and you’ll see a little RSVP invitation. Fill it out. Boom! You’re registered.

It will rock your world. It will make you money.

But perhaps you have something better to do.

Roy H. Williams

Terry Whalin is a rock star among book publishers. He has written more than 60 mainstream books, including a popular biography of Billy Graham, and now Terry serves as an acquisitions editor for a highly-regarded book publishing house, coaching business owners and entrepreneurs into becoming famous authors. This week, Terry reveals the naked truths — good and bad — that all would-be authors need to know before they sit down at their keyboards in search of fame and glory. Roving reporter Rotbart is at the wheel, and his deputy, Maxwell, is riding shotgun. Hang on tight. Things are about to get crazy at MondayMorningRadio.com.

The Wizard Academy tower sits on a plateau 900 feet above the city of Austin. The view from the stardeck is stunning.

When you attend our free public seminar on the afternoon of March 17, you will be in Tuscan Hall just 500 feet from the tower. If you have some extra time on campus, perhaps Dave Young will be willing to press the button that lifts you from the underground art gallery up to the stardeck so that you can look around.

This is what I will teach you in Tuscan Hall:

How to create a magnetic personality for your brand. It’s easier than you think.How to use personification to breathe life into all your corporate communications, beginning with your advertising.How to use character banter and magical thinking to help customers understand that your company has beliefs, values, motives, can make choices, and that it has life.How to gather these techniques into an operating plan that will integrate this magnetic new personality into every touchpoint of your business.How to measure the trajectory and momentum of your rejuvenated brand.

You’re going to have a good time. I will include lots of examples of PowerSelling ads that have lifted people to new heights.

Q: PowerSelling. What is it?

A: PowerSelling is an advertising technique that makes your name the one people think of first – and feel the best about – when they need what you sell.

Q: Does it work for B2B? (Business to Business)

A: Not really. B2B requires tight targeting and significantly more logic than is required to win the hearts of the public. [NOTE: If today’s memo feels different than the typical Monday Morning Memo, it is because this is probably the first example of B2B writing that you have ever seen me write. Are you noticing the additional logic? – RHW]

Q: Does it work for Direct Response offers?

A: No. Direct Response offers are built almost entirely on features and benefits, the so-called “value proposition,” enhanced by an urgent call-to-action, usually with a final bit of “added value” if you “act now.”

Q: So what’s it good for?

A: PowerSelling is for products and services that have a long purchase cycle and a relatively high price tag; things like diamond engagement rings, legal services, medical services, and home services like plumbing, air conditioning, roofing, and electrical. PowerSelling is strictly B2C (Business to Consumer) and it almost always employs mass media; television or radio, sometimes with billboards added.

Q: Will there be recordings made, or perhaps a livestream?

A: Sorry, but no. The Wizards of Ads® have little desire to debate – or educate – a world full of traditional ad writers that have been trained on the tripe that is taught in college.*

You are going to learn the explosive techniques that will make your advertising leap off the launchpad with fire and smoke as you begin your journey to the stars. You will feel your acceleration grow to the point where your cheeks are pulled back and your eyes become slits as the corners of your mouth touch your earlobes.

Or maybe you are just smiling.

If you are ready for the ride of your life, be in Austin on March 17th.

Roy H. Williams

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“Running a big company is like running a zoo, and that’s good news!” Terry Rich led the Des Moines Zoo from a $600,000 deficit to profitability. He did this by focusing on the visitor experience and creating innovative events to attract new customers. Rich was then asked to take over as CEO of the Iowa Lottery.

Soon, he was president of the North American Lottery Association and a Powerball board member. Listen and learn as Terry fascinates roving reporter Rotbart and deputy Maxwell with colorful anecdotes about how he discovered the hidden value in elephant poop. Turn up the volume when he talks about action plans that you can use. Find out how he cracked the largest lottery fraud in US history. Go to MondayMorningRadio.com

Your heart tells you who you are. Your heart contains all your beliefs.

PowerSelling radiates outward from the pulsating fact that people don’t bond with companies; people bond with people; personalities that share their beliefs.

Your company needs a personality if you want your customers to feel a connection to it. Does your company have a personality?

Are you communicating that personality in your advertising?

Personification puts the power in PowerSelling.

When you speak about something that cannot think as though it can think, you are using the art of personification.

“The shattered water made a misty din.

Great waves looked over others coming in

and thought of doing something to the shore

that water never did to land before.”

When you speak about something that cannot ask questions as though it can ask questions, you are using personification.

“My little horse must think it queer

to stop without a farmhouse near

between the woods and frozen lake

the darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake

to ask if there is some mistake.”

When you speak about something that cannot move as though it can move, you are using the art of personification.

“It rained endlessly and the forests wept.

The darkness fell and the trees moved closer.”

When you can breathe life into something that is not alive, you are a god.

Robert Frost and John Steinbeck were able to provide us with those examples of personification because they are Nobel Prize-winning writers. But we couldn’t write like that, could we?

“Your house will giggle with glee when it sees the smart thermostat you bought for it.”

Your logical mind tells you that your customers wouldn’t fall for that, but they’ve been falling for it all their lives. Superman is merely ink on a page or pixels on a screen, but your customers know that Superman can fly, squeeze a lump of coal into a diamond, and that he is in love with Lois Lane.

The book of Genesis tells us that God spoke our universe into existence, then it tells us that we are made in the image of God.

Did it ever occur to you that you speak new worlds into existence in the minds of others every time you describe a possible future?

Personification is powerful because it uses magical thinking to open a portal into that world of imagination where hope is alive and well and singing in the shower, where the glass slipper fits the foot of Cinderella, and a wooden puppet named Pinocchio becomes a real live human boy.

I am now going to shake you by the shoulders to wake you up. What I am about to say is hard to hear, but I am saying it because I love you: If you believe a brand is a logo, a color palette, a slogan, a visual style guide, and a company name that people have heard of, then your company is just another dreary, drab, and bland corporation in an ocean of bland corporations. Your company has no soul.

Remember: People don’t bond with companies; people bond with personalities that share their beliefs.

PowerSelling happens when you win the customer’s heart, knowing that their mind will follow. Their mind will always create logic to justify what their heart has already decided.

This is what you must learn to do if you want to create a bond with your customers:

Breathe life into your company through the skillful use of personification in all your corporate communications, beginning with your advertising.Employ magical thinking to deepen the public perception that your company has beliefs, values, motives, can make choices, and that it has life.Bond with customers who believe in the same things that your company believes in.Create a magnetic personality for your brand.(If you can name the highly conflicted defining characteristics that animate your brand and cause it to think, speak, act, and see the world the way it does, then you have studied under David Freeman or you learned it at Wizard Academy, where David taught it to the Wizards of Ads.)

If you are a business owner, I will show you how to do all 4 of these things for free.

Start the New Year right. Spend an afternoon with me.

Roy H. Williams

After 28 years as a cornerstone of Fox News and Fox Business, Neil Cavuto, 66, made headlines with his unexpected resignation. Roving reporter Rotbart has known Neil since the beginning; the whole 28 years. This week, hear the first-ever podcast airing of a 2020 conversation Rotbart had with Cavuto and hear about Neil’s blueprint for success — quick lessons in determination, adaptability, and excellence that you will be able to immediately apply. It’s a behind-the-scenes, friend-to-friend look at one of business journalism’s most iconic figures. Where else, but MondayMorningRadio.com?

Curiosity is a beagle running through the forest with its nose to the ground.

Curiosity is the cure for boredom. There is no cure for curiosity.

Curious, I asked, “How did the Kardashians become famous?” I wish I hadn’t.

“Through different ventures, several members of the family have assets of over $1 billion. Kim Kardashian became a celebrity in 2007, after selling a pornographic film featuring ex-boyfriend, singer Ray J, which enabled the family to rise to stardom.” – Google

The reason I asked Google, “How did the Kardashians become famous?” is because I was talking with a client last week when I said, “Vulnerability – letting people see you ‘real’ – is the only currency that can purchase real trust.” Then I spontaneously added, “You have to choose between being vulnerable or going full Kardashian.”

I thought I had invented a new phrase, but as it turns out, “going full Kardashian” was already a thing.

Google has its own definition of what it means to “go full Kardashian,” and Indy posted that list in the rabbit hole for you.

But this is my list:

If you believe, “Whoever dies with the most toys, wins,” you are in danger of going full Kardashian.

People are more important than possessions.

If you believe that looking good is more important than doing good, you are in danger of going full Kardashian.

Beauty, fame, and wealth are outside your skin. Kindness, generosity, and joy are within.

If you believe it’s okay to do things that are unethical, immoral, and destructive as long as you are doing nothing illegal, you are in danger of going full Kardashian.

A society grows great when old people plant trees under whose shade they will never sit.

I try to surround myself with tree planters. Jeremy Grigg is one of them.

In our weekly Friday gathering of like-minded men, Jeremy said,

“When a business is evaluating whether or not they can trust you, the attributes they are measuring are, 1. Ability, 2. Integrity, and 3. Benevolence. These are their unspoken questions: ‘Are you good at your job?’ ‘Will you tell me the truth?’ ‘Are you truly trying to help me?’ Most of us focus on ability to the exclusion of integrity and benevolence. After all, when you are petitioning to win work, you want to make sure that the person who can do it for you is actually competent at their job. But in the longer term, honoring your promises, which is integrity and most importantly, giving a damn about the success of what they’re trying to achieve is what really determines whether you are the sort of long-term partner that they’re looking for.”

Jeremy is an international consultant to multibillion-dollar IT services companies.

Natalie Doyle Oldfield studies the drivers of customer loyalty and business growth. She says that half of all customers are willing to pay more for the same product or service if the seller has earned their trust. According to Natalie, “Trust is the critical value that top companies rely on to secure their market dominance and drive their growth.”

I know for a fact that what Natalie is saying is true.

I’ve been helping people do it for more than 40 years.

Roy H. Williams

This week, roving reporter Rotbart and deputy Maxwell offer a holiday treat for Monday Morning Radio listeners: a reading of A Christmas Day Miracle, the true story of a man on death’s doorstep, and what happens to him next. This happy holiday story was discovered and written by Dean and Talya Rotbart, and the audio presentation of it will magically begin the moment you arrive at MondayMorningRadio.com.

Last week’s Monday Morning Memo included a photograph of a diamond pendant and the promise of a $1,000 cash prize to whoever could use AI to write the 60-second radio ad that would sell the largest number of that pendant for Valentine’s Day.

I was given that photo by a jewelry client. In a moment we will look at the 60-second radio ad I wrote for the client before I issued the AI prompter challenge. But first, here are 10 things I have learned from the advertising results (and lack of results) I have seen during my 40 years as an ad writer.

The most effective ads don’t sound like ads.Most jewelry ads are filled with cliches and schmaltz.The Large Language Models used by AI are educated by the most often used phrases.This is why jewelry ads written by AI are filled with cliches and schmaltz.Most of the ads written by AI are better than what the average citizen would write.The average citizen has not received specific data about the results delivered by each of the thousands of ads they have written during the past 40 years.My challenge to AI prompters included a photograph of the pendant, but none of the ads written by AI were specific to that pendant.Specifics are more persuasive than generalities.The non-specific ads written by AI sold only the idea of a diamond pendant; an idea that can be fulfilled by any diamond pendant sold by any jewelry store, anywhere.Advertisers who use these “generalized” ads are not advertising for their store alone, but for all their competitors as well.

Q: Would the AI radio ads “work”?

A: If what you mean is, “Would they generate a result?” Then yes, but that result would not be the highest and best use of your ad dollars. Not by a long shot.

AI is great at a lot of things, but effective ad writing is not among them.

Radio cannot reveal visual images except in the imagination. That’s what makes radio the perfect medium to deliver this ad. It is the radio ad I wrote to sell that specific pendant:

JACOB:  David, have you seen it?

DAVID:  Oh yes! I’ve seen it.

JACOB:  What did it say to you?

DAVID:  There is only one thing it CAN say.

JACOB: Sometimes an artist will say something incredibly specific without using any words at all.

DAVID:  We’ve all heard music that can tell a story without words.

JACOB: And we’ve all seen paintings that can tell a story without words.

DAVID:  But this time a jewelry designer did it.

JACOB: The moment you see it, you know what it is saying.

DAVID: I understood the message immediately.

JACOB: [slowly] “The long and the short of it is we’re in this together.”

DAVID:  “The long and the short of it is we’re in this together.”

JACOB:  It has wit, and whimsy, and humor, and warmth

DAVID: and commitment.

JACOB:  It made me smile when I saw it.

DAVID: Me, too.

MONICA: [SFX cell phone ring] Hello.

SARAH:  Did they see it?

MONICA:  Oh yes, they saw it.

SARAH: Did they understand it?

MONICA:  Even my little brother David saw the love in it.

DEVIN:  See the Life Partner diamond pendant at [name of client.com.]

MONICA:  Just 99 dollars. [SFX scream]

© 2024, Roy H. Williams

The secret of effective ads is to engage the imagination of the customer by enticing them to fill in what you have intentionally left out.

After hearing that 60-second radio ad, the curiosities of a huge number of listeners will drive them to my client’s website to see the pendant and solve the mystery of how the pendant “says” what it says.

To indicate that an inanimate object can speak is personification: the attribution of human abilities to an inanimate object. Personification instantly takes the mind of a reader, listener, or viewer into a world where anything is possible.

You are evesdropping on two conversations. Your imagination is called upon to figure out what these people are talking about. Two of the people say the pendant communicates a specific message without words. That message is, “The long and the short of it is we’re in this together.”

The pendant is called “The Life Partner Diamond Pendant.”

Do you remember observation number 8 on my list of 10 observations? “Specifics are more persuasive than generalities.” The specific message of that pendant is based upon specific elements in the design. Today’s AI isn’t going to extract that message by examining the symbolic elements of the pendant. It currently takes a human to do that.

Symbolic elements are the essence of great art, great literature, and great advertising. A symbolic phrase that is used often enough to come to the attention of AI is, by definition, a cliche.

Without the aid of an observant human who can see the symbolic meanings that a computer cannot detect, AI can give you little more than cute scenarios where you give a woman a piece of jewelry and it makes her happy because it shows her that you care. And if the subject matter is romantic, AI will cover your ad with cliches and schmaltz like a kid putting syrup on pancakes on Saturday morning. AI will do this because the public archives are full of jewelry ads that sound like they were extracted from a Hallmark movie.

If you want ads that sound like ads, just ask your favorite AI to spit some out for you. But if you want ads that are new, surprising, and different, you’re going to need more help than a computer can give you.

AI might be able to write exceptional ads in the future, but that future is not today.

I asked AI to look at all the AI-written ads that were submitted and choose a winner.

To see the radio ad that AI swears is the best, click the image of Alfie the Elf at the top of this page. The person who asked AI to write that ad will receive $1,000.

SUMMARY: If you are not an experienced, professional ad writer and cannot afford to hire one, AI can write ads for you that are equal to what you would get from a highly talented 19-year-old.

If you know a highly talented 20-year-old, perhaps you should give them a call instead.

Roy H. Williams

NOTE: Steve Huff got an email this week that will blow your mind. The wizard gave you enough information in today’s Monday Morning Memo to help you write significantly better AI prompts. But he did not tell you everything he knows. My name is Nonny Mouse and I am a member of the Tiny Tribe of Indy Beagle, emperor of the rabbit hole of the wizard’s Monday Morning Memo.

While most consultants focus on improving a company’s mechanics — sales, marketing, human resources, and the like — Charles Rose advises his clients on the best ways to unload the personal baggage that limits their bottom line and personal satisfaction. Charles Rose built an e-commerce company and sold it for 10 million dollars. He has since spent the past 20 years instructing CEOs and entrepreneurs on all the different ways ways to strike a productive balance between business success and life satisfaction. Listen in as Charles explains to roving reporter Rotbart, “On the path to business fulfillment, you must examine every aspect of your life, including physical health, mental health, and personal relationships.” MondayMorningRadio.com

The General Social Survey has been conducted every second year since 1972 and the most recent one contained both good and bad news about us. 

GOOD NEWS: Our bonds with our families and friends are as strong as ever.

BAD NEWS: The bridges we once extended to strangers have collapsed.

Jesus talks about a socially unacceptable “Samaritan” man who sacrificed his time, energy, and money to help an unconscious stranger who had been robbed and left to die at the side of the road. According to Jesus, two different religious people had already seen the wounded man, but crossed over to the other side of the road so they could pretend they hadn’t seen him.

They saw a stranger in need and felt nothing.

Empathy – feeling the pain of others – is the price we pay for being fully human.

The internet promised to bring us closer together through instantaneous, worldwide, one-on-one communication.

But then came the algorithms, those digital sheepdogs that segregate us into echo chambers where every voice we hear sounds exactly like our own.

The easiest way to build an online audience – or a church – is to criticize and demonize “them,” the people who are “not like you… not like us.” Algorithms will help you do this. All you have to do is craft a message that says, “All the world’s problems are caused by ‘them,’ and it is up to ‘us’ to save the future, and America, and the world, from ‘them.'”

You don’t build bridges to people that you believe are “getting what they deserve.”

Generosity and Inclusion are the tools of peacemakers.

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.” – Jesus

David Brooks recently posted a YouTube video that will make you feel wonderful and give you hope.

I hope you will invest the time to watch it. In fact, I challenge you to watch the first 3 minutes. The odds are extremely high that you will happily choose to watch the remaining 18 minutes.

That YouTube video is titled “David Brooks: Making People Feel Seen: How to Do It Right.”

I’m betting it will be your favorite 21 minutes of the week.

It will also be a signal to the algorithm that you are headed in a new direction.

Merry Christmas.

– Roy H. Williams

“If people looked at the stars each night, they’d live a lot differently. When you look into infinity, you realize that there are more important things than what people do all day.” – Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes 

John Steinbeck wrote a letter to Carlton Sheffield about a conversation he’d had with his wife, Elaine.

“Once I said to her, ‘I don’t want the barbarity of funeral for myself.’ And she said, ‘Don’t be silly. A funeral isn’t for the dead. You’ll simply be a stage set for a kind of festival, maybe. And besides, you won’t even be there.'”

– Steinbeck: A Life in Letters, p 829

Henry Fonda – one of the most famous actors of his generation – stood up at John Steinbeck’s funeral and recited a piece of a poem by Robert Louis Stevenson:

Bright is the ring of words

When the right man rings them,

Fair the fall of songs

When the singer sings them.

Still they are carolled and said –

On wings they are carried –

After the singer is dead

And the maker is buried.

– Robert Louis Stevenson

We know Henry Fonda spoke those words because Elaine Steinbeck, John’s wife, describes the scene in a letter to her friend, Jean Vounder-Davis.

What will people say when you are gone? Will memories of you ring like bells in the hearts you left behind?

How will you be remembered?

You cannot build a reputation on what you intend to do.

The saddest eulogy ever carved on a tombstone said, “He Had Potential.”

Will you be remembered for having a lot of money?

“You can have money stacked to the ceiling, but the size of your funeral will still depend on the weather.” – Chuck Tanner

Will you be remembered as a selfish person, or a generous one?

“We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give.” – Winston Churchill

I have never seen a hearse pulling a U-Haul trainer.

“We brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out.” – Paul’s letter to Timothy, ch. 6

Will you be remembered as a critical person, or as an encourager?

“People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” – Maya Angelou

There is nothing standing in the way of you being a different person today than you were yesterday. Do you remember what I wrote to you in last week’s Monday Morning Memo?

“Escaping the past is easy. The hard part is choosing to start over.”

If we make the right decision, we’ll have more to be thankful for next Thanksgiving than we did this year.

Ciao for Niao,

Roy H. Williams

Douglas Katz is a West Point graduate, a disabled Army veteran, and a culinary enthusiast (also known as a foodie.) Douglas, like many other people who suffer from limited mobility, struggled to use kitchen utensils that require upper extremity strength. Aided by an army of friends and military veterans, Doug retreated to his workshop to invent a new type of kitchen knife, the first in a series of “adaptive” kitchen products he plans to introduce. Doug is building a cutting-edge company (pun intended) dedicated to radical innovation and inclusive kitchen design. It’s happening and it’s happening right now, with roving reporter Rotbart and you at MondayMorningRadio.com.

The future is unknowable. The past is unrecoverable.

If you are anxious, you are living in the future.

Don’t live your life in an imaginary tomorrow. Find joy while it is still today.

If you are depressed, you are living in the past.

Escaping the past is easy. The hard part is choosing to start over.

Let me give you The Seven Secrets to Crystal Days:

Do not let the perfect become the enemy of the good.“Perfectionism may look good in his shiny shoes but he’s a little bit of an asshole and no one invites him to their pool parties.” – Ze FrankGood enough, by definition, is good enough.Learn to celebrate the ordinary.“Celebrate! Celebrate! Celebrate!” – Dewey JenkinsSuccess and failure are temporary conditions.“Do not let either of them define you.”The most precious thing you can find is a friend.“A friend is always loyal, a sibling that helps in times of trouble.”Hatred is the only luxury more costly than an enemy.“Hatred is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die.”All the little things in life add up to your life.“If you don’t get it right, nothing else matters.”

Autumn is upon us. Cold air sweeps summertime over the hilltop fast and sharp like an old woman sweeping dust out a doorway. The dust washes the landscape with brown and orange, speckled with rusty red, the colors of old cars whose enamel has been erased by the rain in the junkyard of time.

I suspect Solomon wrote the book of Ecclesiastes in the autumn. You remember what he wrote, don’t you?

“Everything has its moment.

There is a moment of ripening and a moment of falling away.

A moment of being born and a moment of dying.

A moment of planting and a moment of harvest.

A moment of killing and a moment of healing.

A moment of destroying and a moment of building.

A moment of weeping and a moment of laughter.

A moment of sorrow and a moment of dancing.

A moment of scattering and a moment of gathering.

A moment of togetherness and a moment of distance.

A moment of finding and a moment of losing.

A moments of grasping and a moment of release.

A moment of ripping and a moment of sewing back together.

A moment of silence and a moment of speech.

A moment of love and a moment of hate.

A moment of fighting and a moment of peace.”

Autumn walks among us, quiet and invisible, like a Mexican ghost on the Day of the Dead.

This is the time of year when I become reflective.

Perhaps you do, too.

Roy H. Williams

Andrew Matthews has inspired more than 1,000 global corporations, including Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, Honda, and Citibank. In addition to that, Andrew and his wife produce uplifting books that have sold over 8 million copies in 70 countries and 48 languages by presenting timeless wisdom in fresh, engaging ways. This week, Andrew reveals his creative process to roving reporter Rotbart and explains how anyone – even you – can use that process to connect, inspire, and succeed in every nation of the world. Wouldn’t this be a great day to stop and recharge your batteries at MondayMorningRadio.com?

My observation during the past 40+ years as an ad writer has been that television and radio professionals spend so much time trying to sell television and radio ads, they have no time to learn how to make those ads work.

When you know how to make ads work, and can prove it, television and radio are incredibly easy to sell.

Instead of asking a salesperson to help you with your ads, let me tell you everything you need to know.

“Q” represents your unspoken questions.

“A”  represents my answers to those questions.

Q: Who should I be targeting?

A: I’ve never seen a business fail because they were reaching the wrong people. But I have seen lots of businesses fail because they were saying the wrong things in their ads.

Q: Are you saying you don’t believe in targeting?

A: The most effective way to target is to write ad copy that speaks directly to the felt needs of your customer. Targeting isn’t accomplished by reaching the right address, but by demonstrating to people that you feel the way they feel, and that you believe the things they believe.

Q: Are you saying I can write ads that target specific types of people in mass media?

A: Yes, but you get a lot more than that. Mass media reaches not only your target; it reaches all the influencers of your target. Is there anyone that you don’t want to know you, like you, and say good things about you? Every person is an influencer, and decisions are never made in a vacuum.

Q: If targeting the right person is no longer my primary objective, what is?

A: You want to become the solution provider that people think of first and feel the best about. When you say the right things to the largest number of people you can afford to reach with sufficient repetition, you become a household word.

Q: Which media will work best for my business?

A: The media doesn’t make your ad work. Your ad makes the media work. The media is just a vehicle that delivers your message, your ad. The wrong message will fail in every media, and the right message will work in every media. It is the message, not the media, that either works or does not.

Q: Is there a proven way to create the right message?

A: Win the heart and the mind will follow. The mind will always create logic to justify what the heart has already decided.

Q: Can you give me some specific tips?

A: Sure. Here are 4 of them.

Talk to the customer about what the customer already cares about. Most ads answer questions that no one was asking. This is why people hate most advertising.Always say something new, surprising, and different. Never say what people expect you to say. Predictability is what makes ads sound like ads.Don’t just describe the process of what you do and how you do it. “We use only the freshest ingredients, and everything is made from scratch.” The process is informational. The outcome is motivational. Describe the outcome. “Food so good your head will explode.”Bad ads are about you and your company. Good ads are about your customer and their happiness. Ads filled with “me, my, we,” and “our,” are about you and your company. Ads filled with the words “you” and “your” are about the customer and the happiness you want to bring them.

Q: Should every ad have a call to action?

A: No, because if they did, your ads would be predictable.

Q: Are you saying that NO ad should have a call to action?

A: I’m saying that 60 percent of your ads should be written to cause people to feel like they know you, like you, and trust you. The other 40 percent of your ads should make specific offers at specific times to trigger sales activation.

Q: Can you tell me how to write sales activation ads?

A: Yes, the keys to short-term sales activation are

RELEVANCE: they have to want what you are selling.CREDIBILITY: they have to trust you and believe you.AUTHENTIC URGENCY: The time window must be limited, or the available number must be limited. Authentic urgency is the strongest possible call to action.

Q: Since you obviously know what you’re doing, wouldn’t it make more sense for me to just let you write all my ads?

A: Yes, and we would be happy to do it.

Roy H. Williams

PS – If you count the questions I have answered, you will find there are only eleven. I decided to keep the 12th answer to myself.

Renita Wolf is an expert on Exit Strategies. Whether you hope to execute “the transaction of a lifetime” in one year, a decade, or longer, there are steps you should take now to maximize the value of your company when the time arrives to sell. Renita describes how to identify potential buyers for your business, significant tax considerations you should know about, and how to recognize when the time is right to move on to the next stage of your life. “Don’t just exit — ex-cel!” MondayMorningRadio.com

Billy Sunday was born in 1862, the second year of America’s Civil War. He died in 1935, during the Great Depression. Billy was a wildly flamboyant and controversial preacher, but he made an interesting observation:

“More men fail through lack of purpose than lack of talent.”

We’ll talk more about purpose in just a minute, but first we need to talk about possibilities.

I will say it plainly:

What you see in the mirror isn’t you.Look inside yourself and take inventory of what you find there.Realize that this is all you have to work with.Make the best of it.

I will say it as Confucius might have said it:

Gilded paper and bright ribbons adorn an empty vessel while gold hides in a rough wooden box.You will not find what is not there. But what lies inside you is easy to see.Everything within you is all that you have.Therefore, it must be enough.

I will say it like an old warrior:

Fancy uniforms don’t win battles.It’s not the size of the dog in the fight that matters, it’s the size of fight in the dog.If you don’t have it in you, it doesn’t exist.Learn to use what you’ve got.

This is how Yoda would have said it:

Be invisible, you will.Inside yourself, you must look.Hmm. Flaws, you shall find.Magic, these are.

I will say it as someone who loves you:

You are the perfect you.No one else can be you as well as you can.You will be you for the rest of your life.It is time to discover what you can do.

And now it is time to talk about purpose again.

A sad voice inside you whispers: “Everyone talks about purpose, but no one can tell me what it is, or where to find it.”

Quit listening to that whiner. Purpose is given to you by what you care about. Is there anything you care about?

Of course there is.

Are you ready for the real mind-blower?

Purpose is given to you by everything you care about. You are overflowing with purpose. The problem is that you care about so many things that you are having a hard time choosing a purpose.

Here is the good and happy news: You can have more than one purpose!

In fact, you already do; and you have what it takes to make a difference.

How many differences do you want to make?

Pick two or three of them to get started. You can add other ones later, when you have taken these first ones as far as you choose to go. Sooner or later, you’ll choose a few that will sink deep roots in you.

Every oak tree begins as an acorn.

Now go. Get started.

Roy H. Williams

PS – “It is better to burn the candle at both ends, and in the middle, too, than to put it away in the closet and let the mice eat it.” – Henry van Dyke

David Sauers used to be a commercial banker, but today he runs a service business with 50 branches nationwide. It’s not the type of business that most people dream about owning. The nature of his business – and the powerful lessons you can learn from his success – will be revealed in this week’s story. But here’s an interesting twist: In a private note to Roy, roving reporter Rotbart wrote, “I love unusual guests and David Sauers definitely fits the bill.” The roving reporter is at it again! MondayMorningRadio.com