For a while now, something has felt off.
You’re publishing consistently. You’re showing up on LinkedIn. The blog still gets written. The newsletter still goes out. On paper, everything looks fine.
And yet the returns feel thinner. Engagement feels flatter. Meaningful conversations feel harder to come by.
Most teams respond to this moment the same way: more content, more frequency, more volume. That instinct made sense once. It doesn’t anymore.
Because the problem isn’t that brands stopped publishing. It’s that publishing itself has lost meaning.
In this episode of Bullhorns and Bullseyes, Tom Nixon and Curtis Hays geek out (in the way that only true geeks dare!) on three powerful marketing models that shape how they plan campaigns, create content, and measure success.
If you’ve ever wondered why some campaigns flop while others convert like magic, this episode is your masterclass in doing it the Bullhorns and Bullseyes way—from the top of the funnel to the flip at the end.
That is the art of effective communication.
What I learned in sixth grade holds true today. If you’re using your marketing content and messaging to TELL people why they should engage with you, nobody will relate.
But if you SHOW them—through storytelling, testimonial, metaphorical allusions, emotional connection—your story will resonate. And be remembered.
Allow me to show you how…
If I told you my life story, would you care?
What if I asked you tell me your life story?
Eugene M. Schwartz’s The Brilliance Breakthrough: How to Talk and Write So That People Will Never Forget You should be (and often is) considered to be the “bible” of effective copywriting and storytelling. One of the many tenets Schwartz embraces is the notion of making the reader (or the customer) the hero of the story you’re trying to tell.
Too often, we put the capes on our own backs. And that’s where the writing falls short.
Adrian Lurssen tells the story of when he went to see Nelson Mandela deliver an address in his home country of South Africa. He still draws upon the experience today, but in the most unusual context.
As Adrian has recounted this tale to Jay Harrington and me on an episode of The Thought Leadership Project podcast, he likens this notion of a praise singer to how we considers thought leadership content to work on behalf of the expert that shares it.
See how…
“Where do you want to get to?”
Lewis Carroll posed this question in 1865, through a Cheshire Cat perched in a tree.
Alice, lost in Wonderland, asks which way she ought to go. The Cat's response is immediate: "That depends a good deal on where you want to get to." Alice says she doesn't care much where, as long as she gets somewhere. "Oh, you're sure to do that," the Cat says, "if you only walk long enough."
Or fast enough, I might add.
Marketing doesn’t fail overnight. It drifts.
“Gradually. Then suddenly.”
There are two kinds of drift happening right now. Both are dangerous, if left undiagnosed.
One happens when marketing execution drifts away from its own strategy.
The other happens when the real world drifts away from the theoretical strategy.
It’s natural for marketing to be tempted and compromised by drift.
Not because teams are careless.
Because entropy is inevitable.
"A guy falls in love with two women and ends up picking the wrong one."
My daughter hates the way I press her for details whenever she shares things about her day to me.
"Tell me about that," I might press.
"I just did," she'd reply.
No, you didn't, I press on (if I dare). You told me the outcome of what happened. What matters to me is how you got here from there. The storyarch.
Maybe that's just the storyteller in me. Details matter. Overcoming adversity matters. The hero's journey matters. I’m not just interested in the destination.
👉 Something to keep in mind as you formulate messaging and marketing for your business…
