kent cederström

It was a couple of months after that I’ve finished my studies in Varberg, Sweden as a sound engineer. I had lived with my parents and brother during this time. And it was hard to find employment. The times were rough.

So as a youth you had to reach out and take what you’ve got. So I was applying to a tele marketing company in Karlskoga (40 km west of Örebro). I was there on introduction for candidates and we were there the whole day, seeing what we were about to get started with.

The day ended and I was going back to Örebro in my parents car when my cell rang. It was the employer, the wanted me to start working the week after. There and then I knew I had to make a decision. I said no. I turned it down. I couldn’t see myself working there. It hade torn me down and I wouldn’t have the chance to get a job I really cared for. So I said no.

Looking in the back-mirror, it was a wise decision. A month later I had the chance to start working as a web developer, which lead to another emplyment, which led to where I am today.

I believe this “no” defined my future. It took me down another path which I love I took. Nothing wrong with tele-marketing, but it was surely not for me.

It was an early spring day, sometime in the late 90’s. We were on our way to ice hockey practice, I remember. This question had probably been discussed in the family for some time, but I hadn’t taken notice of it.

But my father asked me; “You know the apartments in Tybble. Do you mind living like that?”. The question was a bit sudden for me, but as I was closing in on being a teenager, and it was totally fine with me, I said. I wanted to try it and see what it was like. Probably an answer quite relieving for him, I don’t know, I hope so.

We were living on the country side. Me and my brother was born into this lifestyle. That was where my parents settled down just before I was born. We had an awesome childhood. I know I had, but I know my brother missed some of the great things about grewing up in the country side. 

The reasons were many, my mother had lost her job, and our economy was far from good. So by selling the house we secured our future.

But this answer is something I’m still very proud of. Most people don’t want unnecessary change. I had some extraordinary friends, the freedom of the country side and the best parents in the world. This answer was true and honest. And as I look back, it’s a defining moment of when I lost my nostalgic side and embraced the future as much as I could.

For me, I left almost everything behind. Joined a new class in school, quit playing ice hockey, picked up the guitar and drums, learned HTML, found friends, and the rest is history.

Sometimes I look back and try to find these defining moments that shapes you as a person. This is one of those for me.

There’s nothing that says creativity should be fun. But yeah, it’s fun to have reached true creativity.

When most of us think about creative people, we think they’re happy and joyful people. But really creative people, that comes up with new stuff isn’t happy while doing it.

Look at Kurt Cobain.

Was he happy all the time?

Does Don Draper of Mad Men look happy with his life?

I don’t mean that people should be miserable for being creative, but I think people need to realize that creativity is for real, and we need to take it seriously. Everybody can be creative, but there are just a few people who really can embrace creativity as a way of life.

If you didn’t know. Facebook is already charging you. But not with the old monetary system where your money is transfered from your account to theirs.

You pay with your information. Your data.

Every once in a while people start groups that state that “Facebook will start charging you!”. But that’s not a complete lie, because you’ve paid all along.

Facebook makes it’s living from ads. Ads that use anonymous data such as demographics and geographics. And most important, what you like and your interests. Being the biggest social network in the western world it’s easy to make a few bucks on information in your system.

Once upon a time, I ran a small community (that’s what you called it back then) which was quite popular within high-school students in the area where I lived. We could easily have made profit from the information we had. But we didn’t. We were never the Zuckerberg of our hometown so we burried it when it started to grow and consume too much time. (And as the web developed, we didn’t want to redo everything we did, yeah we used frames…).

“Platforms built for interaction between users to stimulate social behavior”

We’re talking so much about social media and the social web. But what we mean is that we have enablers, platforms and websites, for social behavior.

We often forget that it’s not about the platforms, it’s about communication between humans.

“But there’s only small talk and nonsens publish in all channels!” some might say. But through one day, how many conversations are really relevant to you? You interact with your colleauges, friends and family. Sometimes, someone brings up something relevant, and what do you do then? You talk about that also, because you, wait for it, *know* that person.

You never trust a stranger, but you trust your relations.

Marketing is about telling people why they should buy your product or service. Often we forget the Why when we tell the story. Or if we even tell the story. Remember to tell the truth and tell it good.

Doing is everything.

To do stuff you only need ideas. And someone who does it.

Only strategy that means something is a content strategy. Everything else is cosmetics.