Kevin Kaiser

Most ideas never see the light of day because we wring our hands in the darkness wondering whether or not it’s good or will be successful or how others will see it. We wonder if it’s wise to release it or wait until the time is right.

Usually, all of this thinking leads nowhere. The time is never right. The idea will never be perfect. And, eventually, hours bleed into days and then months and then years.

Sometimes you just take a deep breath, put it out there, and see what happens. You’ll make mistakes. Sometimes you’ll be right, most times you won’t. Get over it. You’ll learn along the way, you’ll grow a little bit wiser, and your instincts will sharpen with each time. But you have to pull the trigger in order for anything to happen. It’s the only way.

“Good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from –well, bad judgment.” – A.A. Milne

In a world obsessed with innovation and creativity, it’s interesting how hypocritical society is about it. On the one hand, we stand skeptically on the sidelines, arms folded in disapproval, as someone defies the status quo:

…the thirty-something who quits Corporate America to become an entrepreneur

…the artist who works odd jobs and lives in near poverty just so he can paint

…the musician who chooses moving to Nashville over going to college

…the inventor who spends every spare moment toiling in her garage to find the Next Big Thing

These people don’t know better, society says, or maybe they’re crazy. They’ll never make it. The odds are against them. They are risking too much when they don’t have to. Look at the deviants and watch them crash and burn. Soon we’ll all say, “We told you so.”

But on the other hand, even as the words fall off our lips, we forget how we celebrate, even worship, those who come through to the other side and bring innovation and beauty with them. If they are successful, we point to their stories as inspiration for how life should be lived. We most want what we mock.

Keep this in mind as you pursue your art and decide to defy convention. Others will doubt you, misunderstand you, and criticize you for being a deviant. Consider it all an indication that you’re moving in the right direction. Mediocrity can never beget anything but itself. If you want to do anything worthwhile you must find a new way and tell a story in your unique voice. You must be a deviant because only a deviant can make something new. Just don’t expect anyone to understand until they want to know how you did it and made it look easy.

Everyone should make a point of flying occasionally even if they have nowhere specific to go. Sometimes, getting above the clouds is about nothing more than perspective and seeing things from where the sky fades to outer space and the world passes below in a way that the brainiacs at Google could never fully replicate.

I flew today, which I seem to be doing more of these days. That’s not necessarily a bad thing because travel time is thinking time for me, a sort of forced opportunity to reflect sans-technology. So high above the ground, and maybe as I flew over some of  you today, I was reminded of a few things that I jotted in my trusty Moleskine notebook.

I was reminded that the world is bigger than Brentwood, Tennessee, or the To Do list still sitting on my desk from yesterday. My mind wandered to random thoughts like how God came up with the idea for clouds or snow, both of which were pretty cool ideas (pun slightly intended), or what it would be like to get sucked out of a plane like they sometimes do in the movies. Would I end up on an island like Lost? Should I really have had that tall cup of coffee before getting on a two and half hour flight? All things I think about.

I also thought about how small I am in this world. When I got on the ground and rode into New York City it became even more evident. Small, but important somehow. Just like my cabbie or that guy I walked past in Times Square that I never knew existed until that moment. Small, but important. I imagine that he was an even a better idea than clouds or snow were. He’s probably God’s best idea and I wonder if he knows it. Probably not. It’s hard to see such things from ground level.

What’s all this have to do with marketing or social media? Not much and everything. But, hey, it’s my blog so I can write about whatever I want. The point is people, really. Stop and consider today that you were a pretty good idea and so was that guy over there and that woman and that snot nosed kid who lives on the corner. It’s all about them and their stories.

When you go about your business today remember that pixels can only connect us so much. Sometimes it takes a flight to remind me of that. Go figure.

I like marketing, but I’m in love with storytelling. I think we all are, which is why the intersection of the two fascinates me. And right now there’s an interesting trend, especially in book publishing, to fuse technology with narrative. Some people call it “transmedia”. It’s a term that will be short-lived, but the concept is one that every storyteller should be thinking about and tinkering with because it opens the world of possibility to us.

What is Transmedia Storytelling?

Transmedia is basically weaving a narrative through multiple forms of media where each piece individually contributes to the overall story in a different way. Done well, it frees the participant from the restrictions of one POV. It lets them engage the story from many angles.

Many people think the idea of transmedia is new, but it isn’t. As far as anyone can tell, the word first showed up in 1991 in a book by Marsha Kinder called Playing with Power in Movies, Television, and Video Games: From Muppet Babies to Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. If you want to read about that, Wikipedia has a short, but good, entry about her and transmedia.

Transmedia is about blurring lines.

The best stories are those that fade the line separating the world of ImagineNation and our own. They make us believe that fiction doesn’t always mean untrue. At the least, their use of smoke and mirrors thrills and fascinates us. Transmedia stories that work well either invade our world or pull us into another. They blur lines.

Transmedia is about doors and windows.

You’re able to enter and exit them in many places. Sometimes they begin in the pages of a book and lead you to a website. Sometimes they begin with a video or a QR code on a mysterious poster hanging in the city. How a storyteller can engage her audience is limited only by her imagination and access to the right tools and media to reel people in.

Transmedia is about the rabbit hole experience.

Alice didn’t get what she expected down the rabbit hole. Neither did Neo. But both journeys were unforgettable. Transmedia storytelling, when done well, is about that: the experience. It’s not about marketing (not really) or selling something. It’s about immersion into the story itself. This is the one area where most brands will miss it, but one that I hope you and I don’t screw up. The story is first. Do it well, thrill them, and the audience will come back. Let’s use all the tools available, but keep the story first.

Right now, if you want you can call that transmedia storytelling. But soon it will simply be storytelling, period.

Have you encountered any stories that you’d define as “transmedia” experiences?