gapingvoid: "cartoons drawn on the back of business cards": the edges Archives

so what’s a crazy-ass cartoonist in alpine, texas going to do about dell, anyway?

["Edges 6". Part of The Edges Series. Click on image to enlarge etc.]

I've spent a lot of time in the last few days thinking about Dell Computers, a tech hardware company from Round Rock, Texas. Here are some notes:

1. When I developed The Blue Monster idea for Microsoft, a wee voice told me there was a business model in there somewhere. Some kind of post-advertising, Purpose-Idea, social-object, marketing-disruption kind of thing. Something that would scale, something one could turn into a little cottage industry, creating TONS of value for the fraction of the cost of the traditional advertising agency model. Dell liked the idea, and let me have a meeting with them. Since then I've been having this little back-and-forth with them, trying to get know the company better, trying to figure out an "Angle of Alignment" with them that would hopefully allow me to create something interesting.

2. So far it's been a great experience. Working mostly with Richard and Lionel, they've been introducing me to tons of people, while I've been trying to get my head around the company- what they do and why they do it.

3.Though I find it a bit simplistic [nor do I agree with much of it], I love this article from Fake Steve Jobs, "Why Dell Won't Bounce Back"

Bottom line is this: the only innovations worth making are the ones involving product ideas and product design. I mean, Duh. Right? It's pretty obvious. What's amazing to me is how few companies actually seem to realize it. To sustain an edge in any market you must make better products than your competitors, consistently, over and over and over again. Just making the same products as everyone else but taking a little friction out of the system can give you an advantage, but only a temporary one.

The article basically lines up all the most obvious challenges Dell faces. Like I said a while ago, I see Dell's challenges fall into four main categories:

i. Evolution of customer service. Sure, they have a ways to go. Then again, don't we all etc. They've certainly come a long way since Jeff Jarvis and the whole "Dell Hell" episode, which gives me reasons to be cheerful.

ii. Design. Ten years ago, I didn't own a computer. I really didn't. The company I worked for gave me one- a Mac desktop. The internet was still relatively still in its infancy back then, so besides using Word to do my job, sending emails, and surfing the net occasionally, I didn't really have a lot of use for it. Now I can't imagine life without my laptop.

To use a Real Estate allegory: When your company sets you up with a temporary accommodation in a new town, you don't really mind too much that it's Embassy Suites. It serves a function. But let's say you're looking for a new house for you and your spouse and young children to move into, your needs become A LOT more exacting. Not to mention, a lot more expensive in terms of both square footage and decor. There's a reason why commercial real estate tends to be cheaper than residential etc.

More and more people are using their own computers to do their work. Their "Own Homes" for their data, as it were. Dell has long been been in the "Temporary Accommodation" business, for other people's data. And now as the market changes, they're having to make the move from building "Embassy Suites", to building actual "Private Dwellings". There's a contextual headshift to work through. And it won't happen overnight- it's a big company.

iii. India & China. In 2007 for the first time, Dell made more money from outside the USA than from inside it. 50.2% vs 49.8%, I believe are the figures. The question is not about how one get more business from the West Coast, Mac-using hipster crowd. The big question is, how do you get technology into the hands of people who THIS SIMPLY WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN AN OPTION FOR, even a couple of years ago?

iv. Culture. To me this is the biggest issue of the four. You can't thrill your customers until you thrill yourself first. Let's face it, a big part of the Dell schtick is built around processes- sales, manufacturing, controlling costs and all that lovely, corporate back-office stuff. That's fair enough, most big companies operate like this. I would very much like to know, what percentage of Dell employees feel "This is just a paycheck", versus how many feel, "Dammit, we're frickin' changing the world here"...?

4. Somebody at Dell once described his employer as "Ordinary people doing extraordinary things." Though my granny always told me that it's good to remain humble, and to a large extent, I do agree with that sentiment, I did scratch my head a wee bit at that one. Does Microsoft see themselves as "ordinary"? Does Apple? I doubt that they do.

5. Though it's still early days, I think Michael Dell coming back from retirement to captain the company [like Steve Jobs did at Apple] is a big deal. I think the effects are only just beginning to show themselves. Personally, I'm glad to have him there.

6. Part of my motivation for working with Dell is simple patriotism. For 20 million Texans to prosper long-term, we need large, world-class creative powerhouses. Same as every other state in the Union, same with every other nation on Earth. We've done the efficiency thing for three hundred years, and have gotten quite good at it. Like I said in my talk at StartupEmpire the other day, the future of wealth is now all about "Creativity". Embrace it, or die.

7. They're called PCs, they're not called BCs. They're called personal computers, not business computers. That being said, the demands of an affluent, creative American are different from the needs of an IT manager in a large widget factory. As the lines that separate business and personal get ever more blurry, I see all major computer companies [including Gosh! Yes! Apple!] struggle to bridge the gap.

8. I asked somebody at Dell what she thought made the company so special, what separated it from the others. "Basically, we're tenacious sons-of-bitches," she said. Good answer! As I spoke to more and more Dell folk during my many visits to their Round Rock campus in the last 6 months, this "tenacity" started to become easier and easier to sense. I find that encouraging.

9. The Edges cartoon series came directly out of my talking with Dell. They spent the last 20 years "pushing the edges" of manufacturing, supply, distribution and pricing [and the world, frankly, would be a lot poorer had they not done so]. Where else can they push outwards? Design? Customer Service? I have no idea. Only they can answer that. [Note to Dell Employees: If you can shed any light on this question, I want to talk to you. Please feel free to ping me at gapingvoid@gmail.com, Thanks.]

10. "Live on the edges or not at all" are pretty empty words, unless you can actually live by them. Harder than it looks. Maybe "Live on The Edges" is the right choice of words to articulate Dell's Purpose-Idea, maybe it isn't. At the very least, it'll start a conversation internally, maybe externally as well. I don't really care at the moment. All I'm trying to do is get my head one step closer to understanding the collective drive of the company. And I don't mind failing a few times in order to get there.

11. Trying to create a "Blue Monster" for any company, be it Microsoft, Dell, or whoever, is basically an act of futility. That's what makes it interesting. That's what makes it potentially powerful. That's what makes me love doing it.

[Backstory: "Blue Monster: Why Social Objects Are The Future Of Marketing"]

[Written at Harry's Tinaja, Alpine, Texas.]

Posted by hugh macleod at 4:46 PM | Comments (22) | TrackBack

the "digital nomads" thing heats up for hugh macleod

["Edges 5". Part of "The Edges" Series. Click on image to enlarge etc.]

Reading this piece about Dell's new mini-computer, halfway through the PR schpiel I YET AGAIN came across them using the term, "Digital Nomad".

With a starting weight of 2.28 lbs.[i], digital nomads will value the Inspiron Mini’s durable design, with sealed keyboard and reliable solid state drive (SSD) memory storage. A bright 8.9‑inch glossy LED display (1024x600) presents most web pages with no left-right scrolling, and the keypads are large and easy to navigate.

About the same time that I first started seeing this term being used a lot from them, their Digital Nomads blog appeared on the scene. So I guessed something was up. I figured the blog is not just some crazy side project from some renegade Dell employees, this fits in to a much larger corporate strategy. Like I said in a recent blog post:

The Digital Nomads blog is what I call "indirect marketing". People aren't supposed to read it and go, "My, what a lovely blog. I think I'll go out and buy me a couple of brand new Dell laptops". This is more of an "Alignment" play. In other words, by "aligning" themselves more with the digital-nomad crowd, they hope it'll help them in time to create products that are more compelling and relevant to them. If you were in the computer business, you'd want to have the same alignment. "The Porous Membrane" etc. The good news is, Alignment plays can be extremely effective. The bad news is, they take FOREVER to gather momentum.

So the last time I was in Round Rock visiting their bright & shiny offices, I asked around. My hunch seems to have been proved correct. This is the alignment they're going after. I was also delightfully surprised to learn that they have no intention of trademarking, or attempting to trademark the phrase, "Digital Nomad". They want to be aligned with it; they don't want to "own" it. A small distinction, but a noteworthy one. To try to own it would rob the idea of all its meaning and power.

Yeah, I know, "Digital Nomad" is not the only term one can use to describe a web-enabled worker. There are others. There are also differences of opinion as to what "Digital Nomad" actually means. Are we talking mere tele-commuters, or is there some even bigger sociological trend going on? Depends who you ask. I've been a blogger and a digital nomad long enough to know how blurry the edges get sometimes. Rather than worry about THE definitive semantics, frankly, I'd rather worry about how to use this brave new world in order to make money, more quickly and easily than the generation before me.

In conclusion: Dell wants to align itself with the "Digital Nomad" crowd. Groovy. If I were them I'd do the same.

OK, fine. So now the next question is, what needs to happen to make all this more likely? Do they carry on doing what they've always done, or is there some FUNDAMENTAL change in their culture going to be required? And if so, how costly and painful will that be for their people, their customers and their shareholders? I'm not saying they're necessarily doing anything wrong so far, I'm just curious, that's all. Change is the only constant etc.

[ON A MORE PERSONAL NOTE:] Over the last few weeks I've been having a grand ol' time getting to know the company better. So far it's been an interesting experience. I've met some really smart, passionate people. The only problem for me initially has been, they're a big company; it's hard for somebody new on the scene to know where to look to find the interesting stories going on. Design? Tech? Marketing? Operations? Finance? Who's making the secret sauce?

But then again, I've been a digital nomad for most of the last decade. So suddenly, with their Digital-Nomad-Alignment schtick, I see a glaringly obvious fit between my interests and theirs. Problem solved. Easy. Rock on.

Posted by hugh macleod at 1:34 PM | Comments (23) | TrackBack

desert rats

["Edges 4". Part of "The Edges" Series. Click on image to enlarge etc. Yes, I was thinking about Microsoft when I drew that etc etc.]

Out here in West Texas, we have a certain type of individual, who are affectionately referred to as "Desert Rats".

Desert Rats are basically people who choose to live a spartan, alternative, self-sufficient existence out in the desert. Probably the most famous cluster of them around these parts can be found down in Terlingua Ghost Town, in the Chiquaqua Desert, about 100 miles South of where I live, close to Big Bend National Park and the Mexican border. Somebody just made documentary about them.

Terlingua Ghost Town used to be a small mercury mining town of about 2,000 people. Then in the 1940s the ore ran out, and the work dried up overnight. So people left. It became a ghost town, just like hundreds of other former mining towns here in the Southwest. A few decades later people looking to escape the rat-race in the most extreme way possible started moving down there. The utter harshness of the landscape somehow inspired them.

When talking about Terlingua, you never go very long without someone mentioning "The Porch". They'd be talking about the porch of the Terlingua General Store, the place where people gather daily at sunset to drink beer, play guitar and tell stories. I've hung out there a few times. Got chatting to Doctor Doug, one of the local characters. Nice guy. He's been living in a rusty, yellow, dilapidated school bus for 20 years or so [He gets a mention in the documentary, so click on the link above to see more].

But not all Desert Rats live just in Terlingua- they're pretty much everywhere round these parts. I've met lots of them here in Alpine, for instance.

What you notice is that, their unconventional lifestyle notwithstanding, they're quite different to the usual alternative Woodstock-college-student-hippie-drippie stereotype. They own guns and hunting knives, and will use them if they have to. Try trespassing on their land with bad intent one day, if you don't believe me.

The other thing you notice is JUST HOW LITTLE MONEY some of them live on. Heck, I thought I was cutting back when I moved out here, but some of these people are off the scale. It's not uncommon to see them living on $5-10 thousand per year. Lord knows how they do it; except that barter is a huge part of the equation.

Sure, by mainstream American standards you could argue the Desert Rats are an eccentric, "out there" bunch. But there's something compelling about them, too. That great American ideal, "Rugged Individualism" is clear to see in their faces. Their lives somehow seem a lot closer to the 19th-Century Western pioneers, than to say, the present-day, Blackberry-addicted commuters of New York and San Francisco.

And you always ask yourself, Why? What makes them take this particular path?

Short Answer: Because they can. They wanted to do it, sometimes for good reasons, sometimes for bad. And so they did, for better or for worse. And yes, though parts of their lives seem incredibly rewarding- especially from a distance- they've also paid an equally incredibly high price for the privilege, which isn't always so obvious at first glance . This incredibly high price is no different than anywhere else, whether we're talking here in West Texas, or we're talking a big tech company in Silicon Valley, a startup in Chicago, a Wall Street bank. "Living on The Edges" is invariably a damn expensive business.

Posted by hugh macleod at 10:18 AM | Comments (15) | TrackBack

the farmer's market

["Edges 3". Part of "The Edges" Series. Click on image to enlarge etc.]

Alpine, Texas. A lot of my friends in this town work in the construction business; a lot of former big-city people are moving into the area these days, mostly trying to get away from the urban sprawl. So that's where a lot of the local well-paid jobs are. As a result, knowing what I know, a lot of my friends end up picking my brains for marketing advice, which I'm happy to give them.

What I usually do is start out by telling them about the local Alpine farmer's market, which happens here every Saturday.

Our farmer's market has one main problem: This isn't farming country. This is high mountain desert. This is ranching country. People harvest cattle and oil round these parts; they don't do so well with legumes.

The people selling the produce for the most part are local amateur gardeners, who primarily grow what they need for themselves, then sell on whatever surplus they have to folk like me, for a little extra cash.

What does this mean? It means you have to get there early, because the market opens at 8.30 in the morning and is COMPLETELY sold out within 45 minutes.

Whole Foods? Forget it. You really have to drive to Midland, 150 miles away to get anything closely resembling what you're used to in the big cities. The local supermarkets do what they can, I'm told they're a hell of a lot better than they used to be, but... there's still a long way to go.

There's something so interesting to me, that in this modern, over-supplied world, the supply for something most of us educated, blog-reading types take for granted- high quality food- falls so short of actual demand. There's plenty of people in this town who'd gladly spend more money on quality food if some enterprising person would set them up, so why isn't it happening?

I'm optimistic. I believe it's just matter of time before the aforementioned enterprising person spots the glaringly obvious gap in the market, and actually does something about it. This is Texas, after all. Sitting on your ass doesn't get you too far in these parts. Stuff tends to happen if there's enough people willing to pay for it.

So I tell my construction friends, well, what's true in the local food market is also true in the construction market. There's a lot of people from the big cities moving in with a lot of money in their pockets, compared to what the locals are used to making. And they're used to a certain level of service which a lot of the time, THEY ARE SIMPLY NOT GETTING. The construction person who can ACTUALLY understand and ACTUALLY cater to their ACTUAL needs will win. The construction person who still wants to do it same-old-same-old will have a much harder time of things.

Then knowing this, the only question that remains is, which construction person are you going to be? The Trailblazer, or the Same-Old-Same-Old? Only you can answer that.

Posted by hugh macleod at 1:00 AM | Comments (14) | TrackBack