Why marketers should swipe Bill Belichick's boring playbook

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What Makes a Business Successful?

One thing I always wondered about was what made the legendary sports teams legendary.

Tracing the NFL back to its beginning, you can’t say one team had any specific advantage over another. They all started at zero. But something made the Packers better and winners of the first two Super Bowls.

What was it? 

Unlike today’s gurus with easy fixes and “that one thing that will explode your business,” I’ve no clue. Too many variables. But I will tell you what nobody wants to hear.

You Can’t Go Wrong Working on the Little Things

Football’s a game of inches. So is business. Little things add up to equal success or failure. Sometimes, they add up to a business that never quite finds success but never quite collapses either.

Bill Belichick is the greatest football coach in history. Sure – without Tom Brady, he isn’t. Same goes for Brady, despite him winning a Super Bowl without Belichick. Brady never gets a chance to develop into the best QB ever if not for his coach. 

Without Belichick-built defenses that kept Patriots games close, the young version of Brady would’ve been blitzed in blowouts, pounded, and would’ve lost confidence like 95% of young NFL quarterbacks. Also, Brady got to see opposing defenses through the eyes of one of the best defensive minds in football history…

Those Insights Came from the Trenches

Bill Belichick didn’t watch a 40-minute webinar on how to become a legendary coach. And he didn’t learn ALL the Xs and Os in a week after being fired up by a Gary Vee rant.

Nope. Belichick began in the tedious trenches of a film room, working for free as an intern breaking down game film many decades ago. Even the most hardcore football fan wouldn’t be able to stomach football plays on a loop for 14 hours a day.

All those hours this coach invested in staring at game film added up to him being as high-level an expert as one can become. 

There was no:

• Mr. Beast template for him to follow

• Social media hack to 10x his knowledge

• Case study that convinced him to stick to one strategy

There was a trench for him to descend into. One filled with boredom, repetition, and a thousand insights that proved useless once put into action. That trench was also filled with wisdom that could be gained by no other means. Inch by inch. 

All I know is there are tactics that help. Lady Luck plays her part too. But the path to success is rarely easy or glamorous and can’t be mapped out. 

More on this “trench-work” philosophy with The Education of a Coach. 

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Thanks for reading,

Shane McLendon - Copy Kingpin of Inbox Hacking