I’m not a big fan of diary-style blogging (“so today my cat Tibbles did the cutest thing…”), but this anecdote from my vacation is a pretty good example of Cluetrain in action, so bear with me.

One afternoon, I wake up from my midday power nap and decide to head out to the local coffee shop before embarking on an afternoon of zoning by the pool. Or maybe the bay.

It’s a small coffee shop in a small beach town. There were five customers other than myself in there: two women with a young girl about six years old, the guy in front of me and the guy relaxing in the chair.

One of women notices the words on my T-shirt — “I’m not dead yet” — and chuckles. I ask if she knows the Spamalot reference. She didn’t, but loved watching Python back in the day. We get to chatting. Turns out they live just minutes from me in Pennsylvania.

The coffee’s taking a while, so we chat some more. No, I didn’t grow up in Pennsylvania, I grew up on Long Island. I name the town, and the ears of the guy in front of me perk up. He grew up in that town, too. Mentions his last name, Helou. Paul Helou? I ask, which undoubtedly spooked him. But I’d heard my brother-in-law mention the name often: They go way back, and played guitars together in the basement many moons ago.

Paul was in town to perform a youth concert down the road from the hotel where I was staying. He has a CD of music appropriate in age for the girl who was with the two women. He went to his car to grab a bunch of them. Each of the women bought one. I did, too.

Three CDs sold after about five minutes of friendly conversation. Not too bad. Oh, and the guy relaxing in the chair? A musician, too. He and Paul were trading phone numbers when I left the coffee shop.

Cluetrain gets it so right: Markets are conversations, and each of us has experienced stories just like this one. Had Paul walked into the coffee shop, interrupted everyone and started advertising himself and his CD (“Hey, I’m playing a show down the road tonight, anyone wanna buy a CD?”), he’d probably have left the coffee shop with mutterings of “what a fool” in his wake. Instead, he engaged in conversation — and made three sales.

As humans, we know Cluetrain is right … so as marketers, why do we insist on constantly interrupting people?

Takeaway for marketers: Are you interrupting your potential customers or engaging in conversations with them? Will they think you’re a fool, or will they want to buy your product?

This entry was posted on Sunday, August 20th, 2006 at 6:00 am and is filed under Marketing Stuff, Marketing Takeaways.