The Human Network
If you read last week’s article, you were introduced to two very different startups in the performance marketing space. We nicknamed them brawn versus brains. The former didn’t have the fancy pedigree – no degrees from Ivy League schools or work experience at Tier 1 (or any tier) pre-MBA consulting or banking companies. If anything, the brawn group looks like a bunch of hooligans who wouldn’t know where to buy a suit if they had to. In other words, they sound like so many of the people we know and love in the performance marketing space who prefer t-shirts with fleur de lys prints over anything collared. Contrast that to the brain group, who in almost every descriptive sense looks and acts so very different – doing everything you hear you should do, from the Ivy League education to the right job out of school. If they weren’t so likable, I could see the looks of "What are you doing in our space" on people’s faces.
The brawn versus brains story wasn’t a story about education versus a lack of it. Despite their differences, both companies share some impressively similar traits, among them a true ability to hustle and perhaps the key one being a naivety to the challenges they might face. Both assumed that conquering this space would be easy, and they have gone strong into figuring out a business that makes money without really thinking about why entering the performance marketing space at this stage in the game might actually be difficult. I certainly can’t think of anyone in the network business today who would say to someone that running a network is easy or recommend it as the easiest path forward. Despite their naivety or because of it, both of these companies have scaled to a point that gives them some chance of making it in the world.
Brawn versus brains addresses more than just the benefits of naivety or that different types of people can succeed. It shows the two paths toward success – external vs. internal, people vs. technology. Is your business based off of your success as an extrovert or based off of your success as an introvert? Almost everyone can think of examples of both, but let’s start first with the introvert business. Anyone who has worked at a network knows this type. It’s the affiliate who appears almost out of nowhere, that one maybe two man operation with a surgeon’s precision at understanding a particular traffic source. They don’t come to you asking for the best rates initially. They just make it work, and before you know it, they have earned their place among the top. Their actions speak louder than their words, because for the most part this personality doesn’t speak, or they develop an attachment to one person at best. Their status grows quickly because every other affiliate is trying to triangulate who that person is, and not long after, so too is every other network and advertiser. This person is courted actively, and their strength often lies in their mystique.
Whether because of their own strengths or due to the strength of the relationships, in addition to monetary gains, something else happens to companies that became successful – their sphere of influence grows. It’s one thing to say you know a lot of people – to have 1000’s of friends on various networking sites. What really matters, is who knows you back. That’s what someone told us, and it’s surprising just how true a statement that is. You might have a person’s email address, but when you write them, do they reply? When you call do they make time to chat. Do they call you? Success in any space, but certainly ours, involves money, but a catalyst for real success comes with the expansion of your network. For as much as this is a technology business, it’s amazing how much it relies on human dynamics and factors that haven’t changed in probably thousands of years.
For lack of a better term, it’s the good ol’ boys network. The biggest difference in the online world, is that you can earn your way into it. Unlike more staid industries and societies, those today do not need the right pedigree from birth in order to ascend the ranks of the connected. Everyone will take Mark Zuckerberg’s call, but it’s not like he came from any special background. So many of the tech elite simply made their way. Now that they have made their way, though, the real fun begins. Just as those in our space make money by arbitraging clicks and actions, this group enjoys an information arbitrage. It can mean enjoying a tighter relationship with Google to be made aware of changes, being on Facebook’s inner circle and getting to test out their new feature, to meeting the next Twitter before they become the next Twitter.
The internet might offer just about anyone a chance at success, or better said it might allow a greater number of people a chance at success, but that doesn’t make it immune to human behavior. Like celebrity, those who have made it, whether they mean to or not, tend to hang out with other people who make it. They get access to information that those below them don’t, and they will enjoy access to information and opportunities that others will not. There is no good shortcut into that world. It doesn’t lead to a higher level of happiness. There simply is a relationship stratification that occurs, and you can move up to the next level by being a loner who succeeds or by being social from the start. In either case you have to be genuine, and not to sound like Google, but it’s all based on value. You can’t really fake your way, but you do have more than one way in, and it’s open to everyone. You’ve mastered arbitrage. Now, it’s time to master information arbitrage.
