Are you willing to get arrested to ensure good PR?

We can discuss in the Snoop Dogg meeting room...

Hello Gobbledeers,

How’s it going? Every so often I like to give a little advice to parents with kids looking at colleges, and I learned a little something this week:

One of my children (Gobbledy reader Scarlett B.) attends a school where they had a wee snowstorm this week. In April.

For anyone who has a kid who swears that the weather doesn’t matter to them, please remind them that it snows in April in upstate New York, and they should go to school someplace else.

With that out of the way…

On the Gobbledy Podcast last week, I talked to startup guy Amit Shah about how raising money at a high valuation can end up with a founder to selling their business for hundreds of millions, but walking away with nothing. Also we talk through some of the things that you, someone who works for a startup, should know about options, equity, and how all of that works. Also, you should subscribe to the podcast wherever you listen to podcasts.

Lastly - I’m conducting a survey of my readers to understand a little bit more about them (which will, in turn, help me create content and - one day - events that will be appealing). If you have literally 2 minutes to take a 4-question survey, I would greatly appreciate it. Here’s a link to the survey.

(Really - filling out the survey will be enormously helpful…thank you!)

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I Scream, You Scream, We All Serve Ice Cream Melted in a Puddle…

Sometimes when your father sends you a submission for your newsletter, it is perfect for the newsletter and you should print it in the newsletter (“print”).

My father, who I thought only bought ice cream at Costco¹ in quantities that, when I visited my parents’ house, suggested that they are running an ice cream parlor they forgot to tell me about, sent me this picture of the top of a Trader Joe’s Coffee Bean Blast ice cream container. He was cracking up because of the “serving suggestion,” which was to make an ice cream cone, turn it upside down, dump it on a counter, then let it melt for a while. Ta da! Ice cream!

Keep in mind, though, that’s only a suggestion.

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What’s In a [Meeting Room] Name?

Back in my first job, the office I worked in had 2 meeting rooms, and if someone wanted to have a meeting with you, you might have had this conversation:

Person 1: “Hey, do you have a couple of minutes to meet?”

Me: “Sure. I can do that, because the Internet has just been invented and because there isn’t so much on it, it isn’t taking up too much of my time. Where would you like to meet?

Person 1: “I hear you on that Internet thing, but I think current president Bill Clinton thinks the Internet is important, so I bet there will be more good things on it soon. In fact, maybe you didn’t know, but the current Vice President who is the Vice President right now during this conversation, he invented the Internet.”

Me: “Far out, that’s really groovy, man. Say - which conference room did you want to meet in?”

Person 1: “How about the one downstairs, and not the one upstairs. We should do it soon because I’m headed to the sock hop for milkshakes in a little bit.”

Me: “That’s also groovy. Soon you then!”

So we had two conference rooms and the conference rooms were “the upstairs one” and “the downstairs one.”

But if you’ve worked in a company with a preponderance of younger folks, you’ve likely noticed that the conference rooms have amusing/brand-appropriate/confusing names attached to them.

For example, I worked at a company that had conference rooms named after locations or landmarks in New York City, which was great, except I could never remember which one was “Bowery” and during everyone’s first 6 months at the company they would be 5 minutes late to every meeting because they, too, couldn’t remember where “Bowery” was.

The Financial Times recently published a delightfully ridiculous article about meeting room names, that included several gems that I thought Gobbledy readers would appreciate:

“Beauty brand Glossier opted for “inspiring” women such as Dolly Parton. “Yes, we casually say, ‘We’re meeting in Oprah in 15,’ or, ‘Let’s go to Cher to talk.’” Sonny Bono also used to say “I’m meeting in Cher in 15 minutes.” [OK, I made that part up.]

“Design technology company Figma called a room Racoon Feet in reference to an icebreaker question asked of new joiners (“Would you rather have muffins for hands or raccoons for feet?”)”

I would rather eat raccoon muffins than work somewhere where I had to answer that icebreaker.

Micah Remley, chief executive of workplace management software company Robin [said], “Room names are such an important signal that [management] want people to feel comfortable leaving their homes and commuting to an office.”

That’s it! The reason you’re meeting in Sabrina Carpenter at 6:30pm is because they want you to feel comfortable leaving the house! I had no idea.

“And Uber swapped its “War Room” for a “Peace Room” amid allegations of a toxic culture, Bloomberg reported in 2017.”

That fixed it!

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An Email Idea You Can Steal

We’ve talked before about one of my favorite sales strategies, called a “pullback,” where you tell someone you’re selling to that the product isn’t for them. I had shared a bit from a New Yorker article about door-to-door salesmen who employed this tactic with great success:

He employed a “pullback”—a door-to-door staple, based on the conviction that customers want a product more if they think they might be denied it. Your house may not qualify for solar panels—my engineers will have to check. Fear of loss drives more sales than hope for gain.

I wanted to share another great example of this technique I just saw in a piece of email marketing.

From: Matt McGarry
Subject: He asked for a refund...

That is a GREAT bit of copywriting. A surprising subject line that makes you wonder what the hell he’s talking about.

The “100% transparent” which is a phrase I generally associate with someone who is either in the process of lying to me, or about to lie to me.

Anyone can have a money back guarantee, but actually putting a number with it - “I’ve refunded 30+” people - shows that he’s serious.

“It’s not for everyone” is a pullback that makes you want it more.

I know that for software companies, email is often an afterthought. But great copywriting technique can have a huge impact…but maybe not for you.

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50 Shades of Gradiant

This is not a newsletter that is going to pass judgment on the dozens of gentlemen who have been entangled in what is being called “The Cambridge Brothel Hearings” focused a high-end prostitution ring outside of Boston.

But this is a newsletter that will pass judgment on the press announcements of a company whose CEO was ensnared in “The Cambridge Brothel Hearings” (or, more specifically, in the brothel, itself; and I guess even more specifically, in an employee in the brothel, itself) and put out this statement:

That, Gobbledy readers, is how you make a statement after your CEO finds himself in a prostitution situation:

1. They believe in the justice system.

2. “Unrelated to this” is the most incredible deflection I’ve seen in print in a long time.

3. They wrap up by SELLING HOW GREAT THE COMPANY IS! Just because their CEO was caught up in some silliness does not mean they will stop pursing excellence in technological innovation. And why should they, when they’re trying to ensure clean water for all society! Unrelated to this, the Bill Cosby Corporation will continue to strive towards its mission to find the humorous foibles in everyday life…Or whatever.

Now, I do not want to traffic in conspiracy theories. I really don’t. Well, I do a little bit.

And I am admitting there is literally no truth in this. None. None whatsoever.

But.

But.

What if - and hear me out here. What if you were a company who was struggling to get your message out there. And you’ve pitched the Wall Street Journal and the NY Times and I dunno, where do people get news nowadays? Call Her Daddy?, and you’ve gotten no response at all.

But you’re running marketing, and your CEO boss has been hounding you about what a poor job you’ve been doing getting the company’s messaging out there in major publications.

And maybe you knew a bit about your boss,’ hm, proclivities? And maybe you would tip off the police, and maybe then you use the opportunity, once your boss has been publicly tangled in this whole sordid deal, to call the Wall Street Journal, and alert them to your boss’ arrest while at the same time getting them to print your company’s self-proclaimed mission right then and there in the paper? Which would give you both the satisfaction of a job well done AND some comeuppance?

Nah, you wouldn’t do that.

Orrrrrrrr…

Maybe you’re the CEO. And maybe you’ve been frustrated with your CMO’s inability to get your brand message into major business publications. And maybe you’ve tried all the usual methods. How far would you be willing to go to make your communications strategy a success? Would you, for example, get yourself entwined in a prostitution scandal, with the hopes of getting arrested so that you could put that amazing statement into the Wall Street Journal? How devoted are you, exactly, to your marketing strategy?

Nah.

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Thanks for reading to the end - it’s the best part.

Again - it would be TREMENDOUSLY helpful if you take a minute to fill out the reader survey here.

And if you want to chat about marketing, tariffs, or melting ice cream, here’s my Calendly link. It’s free! Cheaper than therapy.

And of course, if your company is struggling with their messaging, I can help you fix it. Shoot me an email at jared@sagelett.com

1. Can someone explain to me the phenomenon whereby a parent’s Costco consumption increases as the children get older, then decreases dramatically (in our case, to zero), as the kids entered high school and left the house, then suddenly I see that my parents in the past few years, when they eat less than ever, are purchasing absolutely massive quantities of food products at Costco once again. Like a family with 7 teenage boys buys the same amount of food at Costco as couples in their 80s. Here is a graphic representation: