10,000 Hours. Or My Commitment to Doing Good Work.


on Jan 28, 2013

“That’s what separates the wheat from the chaff. That’s what makes a CEO a CEO.” - Gillian Muessig, SEOmoz

You would think Gillian Muessig, SEOmom – who was on a cycling and business tour to India and spent time in our office for the better part of a fortnight – would be talking about some esoteric and vague values such as vision, leadership. NO.

she's my mom 1She was talking about: blogging. She was referring to her son Rand Fishkin (@randfish), CEO and co-founder of SEOmoz who has been blogging every single day since the inception of the blog. No matter what happened during the day, a blog would be up at night. He blogs about what he knows best: "inbound marketing, SEO, startups & entrepreneurship". He shares all that he knows about his business and discusses all. He’s social in a true sense.

Sceptics questioned his policy of talking about business secrets out in the open which could lead to people siphoning off work. But he wasn’t worried. The response invariably was: “If they are going to do it themselves, they were never our customers; if they are our customers, they will come to us when they are going to see our expertise.”

Yes, this approach backfired sometimes. But this paid off more than it backfired. SEOmoz is one of the first, biggest and most successful online marketing communities in the world. The blog is visited by millions of viewers. If you can get published in their blog, you can coolly double the price of your services and people will be willing to pay.

And after a very public battle, they received a funding of $18 million last year.

This reminds me of my favourite blogger and a fellow libertarian Amit Varma (@amitvarma) who, unfortunately, doesn’t blog enough now and is on to bigger and better things such as writing novels and winning Poker championships. He wrote a column on 10,000 hours in 2010. He writes:

Natural talent alone isn’t enough to make you good. You have to work damn hard, and practice damn hard. Some researchers have even put a number to how many hours of practice you need to achieve excellence: 10,000 hours.

[…]

The part of the study that I find astonishing is that not only did all the top performers have over 10,000 hours of practice to their credit, but everyone who put in 10,000 hours was a top performer. The key to excellence was not natural talent, but hard work. (Caveat: this is not to say that talent doesn’t matter at all. Firstly, as the researchers pointed out, there was a minimum level of talent required to get into the Academy. Secondly, a completely untalented musician would probably not get the positive feedback for his work that would motivate him to put in 10,000 hours in the first place.)

This all leads me to conclude that, since I am in the business of communication, practice I must; specifically because, as Gillian put it: “you owe it not just to yourself but to your company to work hard and give it everything you can. Sometimes, just showing up is important.”

I promise to myself and to my company to start blogging at least once a week and increase the frequency gradually.

And since this is a meta-blog (a blog about blogging), it seems befitting to end with another blogger quote, Girish Shahane:

Film used to be a precious resource in India, to be used with care. This bred discipline among cinematographers. Once video became widely available, discipline often went out of the window. [...] I have this example before me as I inaugurate a blog -- which is free to publish and in which I can stuff endless random thoughts. I aim to bring some of [the] discipline into the inevitably looser, less formal structure of the blog.

Wish me luck. :)

Nimit Kathuria

Team OMLogic

Post a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

5064 comments

  • Author Images
    Jesseclusa
    1 week ago

    Рекламное агентство - это компания, которая занимается созданием и реализацией рекламных кампаний для различных клиентов. Рекламное агентство может предлагать следующие услуги: 1. Разработка рекламной стратегии: анализ аудиитории, определение целей и задач рекламной кампании, выбор каналов рекламы и бюджетирование. 2. Создание рекламного контента: разработка рекламных материалов, таких как видеоролики, баннеры, печатные объявления, тексты для социальных сетей и т.д. 3. Медиапланирование: выбор оптимальных каналов для размещения рекламы, закупка рекламного пространства, мониторинг эффективности кампании. 4. Социальные сети: создание и управление рекламными кампаниями в социальных сетях, таких как Facebook, Instagram, Twitter и т.д. 5. Оцифровка: преобразование традиционных рекламных форматов в цифровые, такие как email-рассылка, мобильная реклама и т.д. 6. Анализ и отчетность: отслеживание эффективности рекламной кампании, анализ результатов, предоставление отчетов клиенту. Рекламные агентства могут специализироваться на различных областях, таких как: 1. Digital-агентство:?ализируется на цифровой рекламе, включая поиск, социальные сети, email-рассылку и т.д. 2. Full-service-агентство: предлагает полный спектр услуг, включая разработку рекламной стратегии, создание контента и медиапланирование. 3. Брендинговое агентство: специализируется на разработке бренда, включая создание логотипа, упаковки и т.д. 4. Event-агентство: организует и продвигает мероприятия, такие как конференции, семинары, выставки и т.д. 5. PR-агентство: занимается по связям с общественностью, включая общение с СМИ, кризис-менеджмент и т.д. Также рекламные агентства могут иметь различные бизнес-модели, такие как: 1. Фиксированная плата: агентство получает фиксированную плату за свои услуги. 2. Комиссионная плата: агентство получает комиссию от рекламного бюджета клиента. 3. Результативная плата: агентство получает плату только в случае достижения определенных результатов, таких как увеличениеconversion rate или дохода. В целом, рекламное агентство играет важную роль в развитии бизнеса, помогая компаниям привлекать внимание целевой аудитории и достигать своих маркетинговых целей. мы предаставляем услуги такие как <a href=https://t.me/bazixrumer/>продвижение сайтов в топ google</a> мы работаем 24 на 7 обращайтесь поможем по разным вопроса по маркетингу присоединйтеся к нам можно по сылкам телеграмм=====> https://t.me/bazixrumer/ либо в скайпе https://join.skype.com/AnXAQ9LfhMi8 будем рады ответить на все интересующие вас вопросы мы работаем 27/7

  • Author Images
    Everettnak
    1 week ago

    посетить сайт https://bs2beast.cc

  • Author Images
    Brucenet
    1 week ago

    <a href=https://svetmsc.ru/>Гирлянда на дом</a> в Москве и области

  • Author Images
    kurzehaarefrauen
    1 week ago

    Excellent blog! Do you have any tips for aspiring writers? I'm planning to start my own site soon but I'm a little lost on everything. Would you propose starting with a free platform like Wordpress or go for a paid option? There are so many choices out there that I'm totally confused .. Any tips? Thank you!

  • Author Images
    WordPress GPL Theme And Plugin
    6 days ago

    Thank you for the auspicious writeup. It in fact was a amusement account it. Look advanced to more added agreeable from you! By the way, how could we communicate?