Things, and how they keep happening

It’s been a while since the last post in the style of the good old days, back when I could celebrate having a working gas stove or an MOT. Things used to be so tangible in those days,so full of gosh-darn fixability. There was a problem, and we would tackle it with whatever means necessary until it was fixed, I would get to write a blog post that sang of achievement and general story-telling goodness.

Now the van starts, the pitches are lining up and we have almost everything sorted for the wedding. Actually that’s not true, we have loads left to do for the damn wedding, but we don’t have to cater for it, so it’s really not that difficult. In fact I literally just have to say two words in the right place and I can sign off for the day.

Unfortunately, while from a business point of view this all feels like cracking news, from a blog point of view it lacks narrative. The large green problems from last year have been wrestled into submission, leaving behind problems of a much more annoying and altogether less tangible kind. These days the problems are about marketing.

It’s mostly a dirty word, full of evil jargon-busting-new-speak like blue sky thinking, envisioneering and misson critical strategic brand management. On the other hand, no one ever sold anything by waiting for the customers to find it. The sad fact is that unless you spew marketing like sparkling rainbows of yummy care-cake, no one will even know you exist.

So without the international financial backing that people will, no doubt, one day queue up to pile upon us we have to attack in different ways. Specifically the free ones, all of which are hidden within the ad-infested bowels of the internet; where everyone will sell you anything and you innocents, you people who just pass through for ten minutes of entertainment, are nothing more than a product.

I have been trying to tap into this natural resource of humanity as it floats on the internet, and syphon some of it off onto the Jabberwocky, in the vague hope that these people might want to make a TV programme about street food or hire some excellent Warwickshire catering for their next party. It’s interesting to do, but the results seem a little lame because I’m still thinking like an internet grockle*.

As a grockle we like to see the funny cat pictures, but we hate the adverts. Most notably when people try and advertise to you on the sly, slipping a link in the comments or recommending you see their site for more details. Trying to get something for nothing. I will shamelessly dislike these people and not buy their products, but a part of the internet will follow that link, and thus the cycle continues.

The alternatives to this are far more time consuming, and involve trying to make people actually want to view your content and think that you are fun people to hang with. Luckily they’ve never met me before first-cup-of-tea or right after I’ve stubbed my toe, so all we need is interestingness, and all that takes is time. Endless, infinite and physically unrewarding – until you get a link or like or retweet or upvote or share or pin. Then suddenly it’s all worth while.

Our next festival, the Alcester Food Festival, is on the 19th of May – tangible problems are just around the corner again at last.

*grockle – as defined by my Dorset buddy Abby when she first taught me the word: Anyone “not from round these parts”. In this case I mean internet consumers, as opposed to folks who forage into the online world and stake a claim of their own.