The good thing about the internet is that everyone gets to express their opinion. The bad thing about the internet is that everyone gets to express their opinion.
Those who have lots of opinions are often deemed experts when all they have really done is express an opinion that is relevant to you. If you’re like me – someone who likes to hear both sides before deciding what they think – this can be troublesome when opinions are so conflicted.
Take the concept of the hustle as it relates to business.
There are many out there who encourage hustling like this Instagram post from Ladies That Launch and this article by Jonathan Fields and then there are those, like Geoffrey Colon, author of Disruptive Marketing who in a recent podcast called hustling a lot of BS.
Which brings me to the question of whether there is still relevance to the concept of the hustle in the twenty-first century.
In my marketing class at NYU, my students are taught that the consumer path has been altered forever by the Internet. This means that we need to shift from traditional push methods of marketing to pulling our customers towards us, inbound marketing versus outbound.
The push or outbound methods require hustle. So if those methods are now considered “old school” does that mean we throw the concept of hustle out the window?
I think that depends on your definition of the word.
As one who would never have had a successful sales career without a good, healthy measure of hustle, I have never been one to sit on the sidelines and wait for things to happen.
But my definition of hustling is different than the New Oxford American Dictionary which includes such choice words as force, coerce, fraud, and swindle – the kind of words that make me cringe and not want to be associated with.
For me hustling means outreach.
It means asking for what you want. It means taking action and not waiting and hoping things will happen. It might even mean doing something old-fashioned and picking up the phone and making a call. It’s a careful combination of setting things up right, taking steps to create movement and trusting that in collaboration the Universe will deliver.
I can create a great course or service but if I just let it sit here on my website and don’t let anyone know it exists it won’t sell.
You can want a new job and create a strong and vibrant digital footprint and maybe the perfect new employer will search Google and find you, but it’s a lot more likely to happen when you do some footwork and point them in your direction. (Thats code for hustle.)
This blog could be relevant to many and maybe even go viral – but if I don’t hustle it along and let even one person know and ask them to share and another to share and another – no one might ever find it.
Hustling is still as relevant as ever.
Maybe even more so in an increasingly crowded and noisy marketplace. It’s just how you do the hustle that needs updating.
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