“It’s pretty ugly,” my dad said.
I nodded and shrugged. “Yep… I agree.”
My dad and his wife and their two friends were visiting me in Barcelona over the past few days. Today was their last day.
Before leaving, they decided to go see the Sagrada Familia, Barcelona’s best-known landmark, the many-spired church designed by the Catalan architect Antoni Gaudi.
My dad, a devoted atheist, is also a connoisseur of churches. He loves to travel the world and visit all kinds of churches with their beautiful architecture and their ancient frescoes and their sculptures of bleeding martyrs.
Earlier on this trip, my dad whimpered a little when we walked by the 14th-century Gothic cathedral in the old town of Barcelona, and the rest of the group decided that it wasn’t the right time to go in.
And yet, when faced with the Sagrada Familia, my dad was not impressed.
I agree. The Sagrada is pretty ugly to me too. It’s kitschy and garish, at least from up close.
And yet, every year, some 20M tourists come and see the creation. They look up, they marvel, and they take literally hundreds of millions of selfies with the church in the background.
I’m not sure what my point is. Maybe it’s just to share the following quote by filmmaker Pedro Almodovar.
Almodovar’s movies have been accused of being kitschy and garish. And yet Almodovar has built an incredible career and has become Spain’s most successful director. About that, Almodovar once said:
“When a film has only one or two defects, it is considered an imperfect film. But when there is a profusion of technical flaws, it is called style.”
Of course, you don’t care about style, at least not when reading this newsletter.
This newsletter is about making sales.
But Almodovar’s quote applies just as well to personal positioning, which makes selling so much easier.
So apply the lesson and confidently pile on the defects. The stupid opinions. The violations of industry norms. The flat-out typos, contradictions, and ugly design.
What you get is something that in time sells itself, because it stands out in people’s minds. And that can lead to millions in your future — and not counted in visitors, but in sales.
I nodded and shrugged. “Yep… I agree.”
My dad and his wife and their two friends were visiting me in Barcelona over the past few days. Today was their last day.
Before leaving, they decided to go see the Sagrada Familia, Barcelona’s best-known landmark, the many-spired church designed by the Catalan architect Antoni Gaudi.
My dad, a devoted atheist, is also a connoisseur of churches. He loves to travel the world and visit all kinds of churches with their beautiful architecture and their ancient frescoes and their sculptures of bleeding martyrs.
Earlier on this trip, my dad whimpered a little when we walked by the 14th-century Gothic cathedral in the old town of Barcelona, and the rest of the group decided that it wasn’t the right time to go in.
And yet, when faced with the Sagrada Familia, my dad was not impressed.
I agree. The Sagrada is pretty ugly to me too. It’s kitschy and garish, at least from up close.
And yet, every year, some 20M tourists come and see the creation. They look up, they marvel, and they take literally hundreds of millions of selfies with the church in the background.
I’m not sure what my point is. Maybe it’s just to share the following quote by filmmaker Pedro Almodovar.
Almodovar’s movies have been accused of being kitschy and garish. And yet Almodovar has built an incredible career and has become Spain’s most successful director. About that, Almodovar once said:
“When a film has only one or two defects, it is considered an imperfect film. But when there is a profusion of technical flaws, it is called style.”
Of course, you don’t care about style, at least not when reading this newsletter.
This newsletter is about making sales.
But Almodovar’s quote applies just as well to personal positioning, which makes selling so much easier.
So apply the lesson and confidently pile on the defects. The stupid opinions. The violations of industry norms. The flat-out typos, contradictions, and ugly design.
What you get is something that in time sells itself, because it stands out in people’s minds. And that can lead to millions in your future — and not counted in visitors, but in sales.