“Conviction to a plan is a step beyond commitment. A conviction says, “I’m ready to die for my commitment.” When convicted, that commitment becomes THE passion in your life.” - Brian Fourman.
My three year old is mad about cars. Sports cars, dump trucks, police mustangs, fire engines – the lot.
If it’s got an engine and runs on four wheels, he can’t get enough of them.
He points them out in traffic, follows their trajectory on the highway wide-eyed, and talks about them morning, noon and night.
He’s parlayed his obsession into toys. He carries them around with him all day, every day.
He spends hours arranging his toy cars in very straight rows in the play area.
He builds them in Lego.
He draws them on his iPad.
Should you dare to put them away, his world collapses.
His favourite purple car is always next to him at bath time, at dinner and bedtime.
When it goes temporarily missing, as only a Hot Wheels car inevitably will, the child is relentless.
He hunts it down with the focus of a ravished predator stalking his prey.
If it can’t be found, he becomes inconsolable.
The entire family gets rallied around to find his ‘burble 'bortscar’.
No-one rests until the damn thing is found.
And when it is, the delight, celebration and parental relief is palpable.
The leaking tears dry up, the twisted sad face lights up and joy, peace and harmony is restored once more to the cosmos.
It’s obvious my son is committed to cars. He adores them.
It doesn’t stop there though. He acts like he literally cannot live without them.He lives and breathes his commitment.
This is the essence of conviction.
What if we lived with that same passionate conviction and distilled it into our brands and businesses?
I dare say we would rally people to our cause.
See how my son does it? He makes sure we understand that without his cars, it feels like doomsday for him. We become enamoured by his passion and willing to do whatever it takes to help him realise it.
Insight Inspiration
Your commitment to your brand, business, career and offering needs to have the same conviction.
You need to love and believe in them so much, that without them life would not be the same.
You need to communicate your passion, to rally people around your cause and to recruit audiences to help you hunt down and deliver on the brand promise.
When people sense, feel and experience the unwavering dedication within you, your brand conviction will begin to spread like wildfire.
That’s how firebrands get ignited.
