Encyclopedia of Intelligent Content Marketing

We're all human beings and I like to think that if I have a problem, I can go to somebody. The essence of me as a person will result in that person wanting to help me. We're all human beings. Seth Godin encapsulates that concept and he says, you should make art, you should be generous, you should seek to connect. You should seek to help people, answer their questions, solve their problems, allow them, empower them to achieve their objectives and help them attain their goals. The act of generosity is literally saying, what have I got that you haven't got that you need, and I'm gonna give it to you unconditionally. If you can find that in your proposition, you're on your way. But first, you have to know who your Tribe is. What we do is give away our know-how for free. I get paid people buy things from us. They buy the service that comes with asking somebody to do it for you because you want the peace of mind that goes with knowing that somebody like my firm is going to take care of it. We do make money, we do lots of money. But everything we do, otherwise we give away for free, everything. Because asking for money is just immediate financial gain, these are the tokens to the value associated with having deeper meaningful relationships based on generosity with the people that you want to have relationships with. Seth Godin says make art. When my business partner says to me, what are we spending our money in again next month, and I'll say it doesn't really matter. We're just making art. #innovation #immigrationinnovation #intelligentcontentmarketing

Because of the advent of the internet, and the increasing interconnection of everything that we do to the internet means that effectively, all the ways that we've done things historically, are coming to an end. Everything that we've done historically, has just been the modern evolutionary reality of the Industrial Economy getting more and more sophisticated. But the moment that we introduced connection into that mix, all of this started to fall into obsolescence. So it used to be before the Industrial Revolution, we lived in an agrarian society. The agrarian society, we came off the fields, and we came into the marketplace, to trade our goods, to gossip, to have relationships with people. It used to be that as humans, we were able to have relationships on in a very limited way around the marketplace, or within the village and your neighbors and your family. When the Industrial Revolution came along, all of that ended, and they all these people, so to go into the means of production, the factories. This is how schools were invented. Schools were designed to produce human beings with a certain intellect to be able to go and sit or stand in a place for eight or nine hours a day without a break, doing the same thing over and over again. So the whole Industrial Economy model is sputtering to an end. As we've introduced the connections into this, the whole facet of relationships now comes back into play. And this is why social media is so alluring for the human psyche is because it gives us an opportunity to connect. #innovation #immigrationinnovation #intelligentcontentmarketing

I'm going to take you back literally to the beginning of time. This is where I learned from Kevin Kelly. He wrote a book called ‘’What Technology Wants’’. The essential proposition was to try to understand effectively where humanity was going with technology. He came up with this proposition which makes perfect sense to me. He says that, basically, the technology that we're working with today all began with the Big Bang. But in time, after the Big Bang happened, we have gas which turned into heavenly bodies, which turned into planets and solar systems and all the rest of it, leading to the Earth, development of life on Earth. The development of sentient life from Earth, and then really intelligent life. And then the inevitable rise of a species that was going to be better than everybody else, because that's what will all evolution is all about. Along the way, humanity began to develop technologies, such as well, the first important one, which is how to speak, because when language evolved, finally, the human intellect was not in a silo locked in. It could now in interchange, and with those interchange become opportunities, and from those opportunities, comes development and growth. And that continued through, you know, the realm of human evolution through to writing, and then printing. Then we went from printing into some very large computers, and then to smaller computers, and then locally owned network computers, and then ultimately into the internet. As we have evolved, throughout all of this time, we've begun to converge the biological into the digital. Now we've effectively arrived at the point where we can grow artificial limbs and skin grafts. It's you don't have to literally have to be a rocket scientist to understand where this is going to take us. So, as a result of all of this, there is this huge machine that's being built. It's all the computers, and all the mobiles and everything else that's connected as nodes in that machine. And that machine is the summation of all human knowledge and endeavor. We are all going to operate in a digital realm at some stage or another. It's just a question of when, and the Law of Evolution effectively speaks to this reality. If we understand this, we can then orchestrate ourselves to what's about to happen and get in early if you will, and position ourselves in an interesting way, as hopefully, I'll reveal as I go through the rest of the presentation. #innovation #immigrationinnovation #intelligentcontentmarketing

I went to law school and I can't remember any of the laws that I learned back then. The one thing they do teach you at law school is how to find stuff, and how to think. Now, back in 2009, I was living in Western Australia. My other businesses had gone South, global financial crisis was upon us. I had a million and a half Australian dollars invested in a software company that was just starting to turn revenue. Then the GFC hit, and then nobody was going to buy it and represented seven years of financial and intellectual endeavor. So effectively, time was running out for me, and I needed to do something. So understanding that everything else that I had ventured into that never made me any money was probably a strategy I ought not to follow. I remember the advice that somebody gave me and has been ultimately confirmed by one of my intellectual heroes, Charlie Munger, that if you want to be successful in life, you should stick to your knitting, find one thing that you're good at, and do it better than everybody else. And it's so true. So along this journey, I've found stuff all available freely on the internet, and listen to what smart people have to say about what's really going on. Then having enough experience in business over the years to put two and two together, pretty quickly realized that the world is changing. You can do things today that are just unparalleled from an opportunity perspective. I mean, if I can come from really underwater with everything, everything at risk, and have barely any capital and just understand that I've got an expertise in a particular thing. Then go on the internet and look for the smart way to parlay that into something profitable and big. And, as we'll see, ultimately generous. If I can do that anybody can do it. That's the truth. #innovation #immigrationinnovation #intelligentcontentmarketing

I made the decision when I wanted to put together my next business in 2011 that I needed to produce something that was completely remarkable. When I started to rewrite a book that I had originally written in 1996, called The Hong Kong Visa Handbook. I knew that because of the experience at that time putting high-quality content on the internet that reflected my expertise in my niche would be successful. But come 2011, when we were looking at how the modern Internet worked, we were afforded an opportunity to start to think about how the audience for the material that I have particular expertise in would respond to that material in terms of the use that it was to them and its accessibility. Ultimately the value that they derived from it. When I understood this, I realized that I needed to configure my business on the internet, and in a specific way that didn't cost a great deal of money. Even though I have a business partner who's very adept at technology and didn't need particularly exotic technical skill sets, certainly, the skill sets that are available, Fivver or one of these other sourcing websites are another great expense. Effectively come up with a proposition that serves to answer people's questions, and helps them solve their problems. As a result of that, we turned into a publishing company. We've got three major websites, the Hong Kong Visa Geeza website is where I publish four to five times each week on my niche, where I invite members of the public to ask me questions. And they will then give them a Podcast Answer for free within 48 hours. #innovation #immigrationinnovation #intelligentcontentmarketing

So I'm now sitting in my favorite Starbucks in the whole wide world. It's a place I've been coming to for the last four years consistently. It's 50 meters away from the front door of my office building, and about 100 meters away from the front door of my apartment building. Try and hold as many meetings here as I possibly can. A Starbucks is a Starbucks is the Starbucks, of course. But you know, this is close to home, very comfortable. So I thought it quite relevant that I shoot at least one top 100 question that anybody ever asked me about Intelligent Content Marketing from my favorite little Starbucks spot in Wanchai. The question that I've got that I should say, I'm going to answer today is the, what's the core dynamic that underpins the Intelligent Content Marketing strategy? Well, I've discovered that it's all about answering questions, and solving problems. No more. No less. Help your customers achieve their goals, answer their questions, help them solve their problems, disaggregate value. We aggregate value, know what you're selling Intelligent Content Marketing. If you answer questions and solve problems, or come good for you. It came good for me. it's gonna be good for others that I'm sharing this strategy with, and there's no reason whatsoever I can come up with for you, as well. It's very late coming up from midnight, this place is going to close so me, Alex and Chirag making these videos with us. We're gonna put our feet up now. Well deserved a cup of coffee in my favorite Starbucks spot in Wanchai. #intelligentcontentmarketing #innovation #immigrationinnovation

I'm now standing on Queens Road East in front of the old post office, which was built in 1913. It's a declared monuments. It's an old building in Hong Kong that is few and far between, as the declared monuments is never going to get destroyed, thankfully. It's a lovely piece of Hong Kong's history. It's today used as a government facility for the environmental department. I'm not quite sure what role it plays in government administration. But again, this is about 400 meters away from my home, and it's a level of little spot. So the question next that people asked me in relation to Intelligent Content Marketing is, should you tell your business story, a personal story or both? If you look at our website, you'll see that not only I tell my personal story on the Hong Kong Visa Center, strategically, with both the Hong Kong Visa Center, Zzzzip and the Intelligent Content Marketing. We're telling the business story. For example, this talks Wanchai Walkabouts, it gives me an opportunity to share my knowledge and understanding of this thing called Intelligent Content Marketing. At the same time, basically describe two facets of the kind of daily life that I've got and how that intertwines with the way that I do my business too. You should tell your business story, and you should tell your personal story. You should make every effort to allow your story to demonstrate your vulnerability, your transparency, the authenticity, and ultimately somebody that you and your business are worth dealing with. #intelligentcontentmarketing #innovation #immigrationinnovation

I'm now standing in front of Ruttonjee Hospital, which is a public hospital. Right in the heart of Wanchai just adjacent to Wanchai Park in fact. Next to Queens Road East and about five minutes walk from my front door, and four minutes walk from the front door of my back office premises also on Queens Road East. Ruttonjee, as I say, is a public hospital. The hospitals in Hong Kong are absolutely fantastic. Two types of hospitals, you have a private and the public. Now the public hospitals are where you go for your accident in emergency and the private hospitals, you go away, you get pampered and stay overnight. But if ever you have any emergencies, it's the public hospitals that do the business and the quality of care is outstanding world renowned and do achieve for Hong Kong residents. It's an amazing service. I feel very privileged to have this superb facility literally on my front door. That said, what's the next question in the top 100 questions that anybody ever asks me about Intelligent Content Marketing? I've coined the phrase Strategic Generosity. People ask me, how does Strategic Generosity play out in the Hong Kong Visa Center as part of our Intelligent Content Marketing strategy? Well, Strategic Generosity is all about using generous as a strategy makes sense, right? Generosity, reaching out, answering questions, solving problems seeking to be of help to people. Understanding that you're going to use the generosity that's inherent in your strategy to generate the relationships to treat other people like yourself want to be treated. Giving them everything that they need, in order to help them progress their goals and at the same time, compete against non consumption and steal a march and your competitors because you can bet your bottom dollar your competitors who operate in the Industrial Economy are not thinking about strategic generosity and how they can take advantage of that as a concept in the Connection Economy. #intelligentcontentmarketing #innovation #immigrationinnovation

So now in Wanchai Park, which is just off Queens Road East right next to Ruttonjee Public Hospital, about 400 meters away from where I live and work. The beauty of this place as you can see Wanchai, this time of night, quarter to 11, on Tuesday evening. It's quiet, nobody around, it's peaceful, you can come and sort of, you know, hang out here and collect your thoughts and get some fresh air. I do it quite often. I love this spot. So I thought I'd share that with you. Not that many people know that it's a lovely place. So now you do. The next question that people are asking me about the top 100 questions that anyone ever asked me about Intelligent Content Marketing is, at what point did I realize that we had actually an Intelligent Content Marketing strategy? Well, of course, I started out with the confidence of knowing that I could be successful with content, having written the first version of the Hong Kong Visa Handbook between 1996 and 2000, on the Internet back then. But what I didn't understand at that time was how the Internet evolved, and that there were new and interesting ways to harness the essential power of the Internet. By having gone off and done all the reading that I've ever done, on my intellectual heroes, and far wider than that, even, and learning these ideas and taking stock of what was kind of emerging in the Connection Economy. Then trying out new concepts and seeing how well they're fared. In the final analysis, looking back, I realized goodness gracious me was taking all the best stuff that other people have had to offer. And we've included them into this business model. This business model is now becoming wildly successful for us. At that point, I thought, well, we're going to call this something and coined the phrase Intelligent Content Marketing, because, as you know, we use content to deliver final strategic messaging in to achieve our commercial goals predicated on all the facets of Intelligent Content Marketing business model. Using, of course, the Internet to publish, to showcase expertise, and to educate and help answer questions and help solve problems. So in hindsight, I came to understand that was something quite valuable, so emerging from all of us. That's where the interpretive Intelligent Content Marketing came in, and why we developed them and offered finally, because by using all our businesses, as a case study, living, eating, breathing on the web, not only are we able to market our businesses, through real storytelling. The best way to market it, which is through storytelling, but it also meant that you could see that when we're talking about Intelligent Content Marketing we are eating all the ideas, principles or theories and all the good stuff that my intellectual heroes have had to offer me and all been applied in our businesses, and they're all shelters for you to say. #intelligentcontentmarketing #innovation #immigrationinnovation

I'm here on Woods Street. It's about 10:15 on Tuesday evening. I wanted to choose this location to answer the next question, the top 100 questions that anybody ever asks about Intelligent Content Marketing. It's the road that takes you between Hennessy Road and Queens Road East, which is where one of my offices and indeed my apartment is. You'll see the steps behind me that have been painted, really for children. There is a hospital and other children's facilities in this area, which is why this is it is but it's very quiet, you probably won't hear much background traffic. So it's a good location right notwithstanding, given the time of the evening. For me, basically, to answer the question of why are ‘Kits’ so important in Intelligent Content Marketing strategy. Well, ‘Kits’ are important because it allows you to convert your intellectual property and know-how information into actionable stuff. Actionable stuff that your clients will sign up for against an email address, and then clearly apply normal email marketing, and permission marketing techniques to the list that you develop. And out of that, obviously springs relationships. We have several ‘Kits’ on the Hong Kong Visa Center website and did all our other websites for that matter. It's really a great tool to showcase your knowledge and your know–how in an applied sense, and then you can think about potentially selling stuff that could be services that hang off the back of a kit. We use kits to basically add value to the relationships with other customers and empower them to get on with making the Hong Kong visa applications for themselves without paying for any professional help and making it as easy for them in a scalable fashion for us to hold their hands in that respect. ‘Kits’ are really important in Intelligent Content Marketing strategy, and for no other reason than they will form allow you to form the basis of an ongoing email relationship and out of that, you know, good things will inevitably spring. #intelligentcontentmarketing #innovation #immigrationinnovation