It came from a PR person who was pitching me a new product – A shirt. Yes, a shirt. Nothing special about the shirt, it was simply a new style from a new designer. But here’s what gets me: The subject line of the email was: “Hi! Can I borrow your audience?”

(Insert blogging-car-skidding-to-a-halt sound here…)

Can you borrow my… Hold up… WHAT?

Can you “BORROW MY AUDIENCE?”

Are you serious?

OK. Not even taking into account the fact that my audience… IS AN AUDIENCE, and not, say, A SPATULA, no, you can’t “borrow my audience.”

Let’s understand something – My audience is the most important thing to me in my world, next to my wife and cat. I’ve spent YEARS and YEARS cultivating my audience. I’ve spent countless nights figuring out what my audience wants, how they want it, and what they’re going to want next. I’d take a bullet for my audience.

Without my audience, I have no business, I have no revenue, I have nothing.

My audience is my life. And you want to come over and “borrow it?” I don’t know you! Why don’t l let  Michael Milken “borrow” my AmEx while I’m at it? I’m sure it’ll be fine.

You can’t borrow my audience – But you CAN build one of your own. Here’s how:

1) Understand that having an audience is a privilege, not a right. I say this all the time, and I’m saying it again – It’s like wearing spandex. That too, is a privilege, not a right. We’re born as free people with certain unalienable rights, but guess what – Having a bunch of people who will listen to you and buy from you is NOT one of them. You have to EARN that. Once you accept that you don’t just “get” an audience, like Jewish kids get a Bar-Mitzvah when they turn 13, the quicker you’ll start to understand how to get one.

2) An audience is built over time, and on one simple premise: Give them what they want. Audiences today are mobile. They can go anywhere, anytime, by clicking a mouse or scrolling off your site. Want them to listen to you, or even more, buy from you? Give them what they want, how they want it. They on Facebook? Reach out to them there. They like emailing you? Email them back. And for God’s sake, do it from an email that’s real – Like yours. Not “donotreply@I’manidiot.com”

3) How do you find out where the audience is? ASK THEM. You have their information! Try this! Go to your fan page and ask the question – “Hey – How do you like to be contacted by us when we have a special for you?” Then actually read the answers and act accordingly! This isn’t rocket science.

4) Have content that your audience actually WANTS. You know what would happen if I let every journalist “borrow” my audience to promote their crap? I wouldn’t have an audience! Why? Because audiences like people to STAY ON TOPIC. Imagine going to see Bon Jovi, and Jon Bon Jovi comes out and talks about tax shelters all night, and never plays “Living on a Prayer.” Not really what I paid for. Stay on topic – Had you, dear PR person, pitched me on topic about something relevant to my audience, I might have talked about it!

5) Finally, for all that’s good and holy, know what I talk about. That you pitched me on fashion is like pitching Britney Spears on child-safety. The simple act of knowing your audience will get you 5x the good attention you’d otherwise not get. Simply do some homework. There’s no excuse not to.

My audience? No. You can’t borrow it. Go get your own.

8) Know your audience. This is one of the easiest, yet most forgotten things in customer service. Imagine being able to talk to your audience about things that relate directly to them when they walk into your store, or contact you for an order? It’s not hard. With the level of sharing we’re all subjected to on a daily basis, a simple Google alert on your best customers, or a perusal of a Twitter account should give you a basic insight into what’s up in their world. Mind you, I said a quick perusal. There’s a fine line between “taking an interest,” and “being the creepy stalker who works at Staples.”

7) Being early is a trait of those who excel in customer service. I had a car for 8am this morning. At 7:26am, I get a text that my Groundlink car is on the way, and at 7:39, I get another text that it’s downstairs waiting for me. 20 minutes early, just chilling. When I get downstairs at 7:50, the car is there, I’m calm, relaxed, without that “where the hell is he, I’m going to miss my flight” stress that we get when the time comes and there’s no car. Can you do the same? Can you deliver a project before deadline? Can you auto-upgrade shipping for your customers without charging them extra? Zappos does… Focus on ways to make things happen quicker.

6) Something unexpected. You know what was in my car when I got in this morning? A bottle of water. Simplest thing in the world. They probably buy them in bulk for $5 for 20 bottles. But it was there, and it was available to me, no charge. That little bottle of water made me so happy. I hydrated ,and felt just a little bit better when I arrived at JFK. Good luck getting a bottle of water in a taxi. What little things can you do? I bought a Keurig machine for my office/apartment, and some funky flavored coffees. People actually ask to have meetings at my apartment because they never know what kind of cool coffee they’re going to get. I once knew a CEO who went to Africa each year to bring back 30 pounds of a specific type of coffee bean, but he never told anyone where they could get it. His reasoning? “Maybe they remember where they had the great coffee, and maybe they come back for more, and maybe we do some business.” (Say that in a Yiddish accent, it sounds much funnier.) But he was right. What unexpected things can you do?

5) Stop nickel and diming. Airlines are terrible at this. They quote you a fare of like, $99 dollars to go somewhere, right? But then, that’s each way, and that doesn’t include taxes, tariffs, boarding fees, baggage fees, lubrication fees (for the TSA Anal Probes) and other fees. Total on a $198 round trip? $445.50. How is that good customer service? It’s not. What can you include for no additional cost? Batteries? Ink? Toner? Spare parts? Free transfers? What can you include and call it “a good karma inclusion” or something like that?

4) Can you help someone in a way that’s out of the ordinary? We all know what Morton’s did for me last summer… But what else can you do? I’ve heard stories of restaurants picking people up and driving them to their establishment when a customers’ car died. I’ve heard other stories of companies doing things completely random – A hotel in San Francisco called a hotel in NYC to get the bellman there to deliver flowers to a San Francisco guest’s wife who wasn’t feeling well in NYC. Remember: Simple things are expected. Amazing things get remembered.

3) Don’t be afraid to do something truly incredible! I once heard of a company that makes metal pipes – One of their corporate customers had come in to discuss a new order. While they were there, they mentioned to the owner that they had to take a trip overseas because their plant was having some kind of problem. Turns out, the metal pipe company also had a plant overseas, pretty close to the customer’s plant. The owner of the metal pipe company was able to send his technicians over to the customer’s company and fix the problem, saving the customer a $10,000 trip and a week of his life. How loyal do you think that customer is now?

2) Give your customers the tools to tell your story! There’s a restaurant in the mid-west that has an iPad attached to the bar by the take-out order station. When someone comes in to wait for their food, they’re offered a chance to play with the iPad for free. They’re also told that if they log onto Facebook and “like” the restaurant’s page, they’ll get a free appetizer, right then and there. The company then thanks each and every customer on Facebook, and asks how they like their appetizer. It’s a no-brainer, works so easily, and, perhaps most importantly, as Facebook starts to ramp up “Places” and “Offers,” Facebook will become the de facto standard for customer experience stories – Why wouldn’t you want to help facilitate growth and excitement when the customer is there, in your store, and willing to be talked to? Easiest thing in the world.

1) It has to start from the top down. CEOs can’t run a company from a corner office. It simply doesn’t work. For a company to truly embrace radical ways of handling customer service, the entire corporation has to get in on it. I’ve heard stories of CEOs driving to a customer’s home with a part or an order, because it came in after hours. I once heard of a CEO who happened to be in the building on a Saturday, and answered the phone – The call was a random customer complaining about something. The CEO took the call, and got a resolution in 20 minutes – On a Saturday! You know the customer told the world about that.

What can you do that’s different, over the top, and inexpensive? Let me know in the comments, and as always, thanks for reading. :)

In other news, I’m going to write an article about the coming age of jet travel.

Are you kidding me? The Instagram deal has NOTHING to do with “the age of mobile,” it has EVERYTHING to do with the age of CUSTOMER CHOICE.

Mobile isn’t new. You think that just because we now have the ability to take crappy sepia toned pictures of crap, 24 hours a day, that “all of a sudden, we want to be a mobile society?” We’ve ALWAYS wanted to be a mobile society.

The only difference is that now, for the first time, we have the technology to allow us to choose to that. Understand – We’ve been a mobile society since before the invention of the automobile.

Think back on the last fifteen interesting, post-worthy things that happened to you. I’ll bet 14 of them happened outside your home. Most of the world happens outside your home, along with most of the excitement. The stuff that happens in your home either isn’t worth posting, or isn’t acceptable to post. You rarely read “Brian totally found my G-spot tonight, off to sleep.” Well, maybe you do. I don’t know what kind of friends you have. But my point stands: The majority of stuff that is worth sharing, usually happens outside the home. And for the first time, we finally have the technology to keep up with it. We can finally, if we want to, choose to be truly mobile, and share life events as they happen, in real time, as opposed to waiting for the film to develop. Turns out, AT&T was only 20 years off, even if they did think that faxing would still be here, and even if they used Tom Selleck to do their voiceovers. (Which is an awesome trivia question, by the way)

So this Instagram deal isn’t a whole “eye into how the world is going to change to a mobile society.” We already have. We choose to share, and we choose to use companies that let us share, that take advantage of the technology that now finally exists that lets us share when we want to., as things happen. Primarily, that’s going to be outside, away from a wired connection. (Hence the reason I’ve never had high hopes for GetGlue. Really? Sharing that you’re watching Glee?) Where are you reading this? On an iPad on the subway? On your Android? The technology now lets us do whatever we want, wherever we are, whenever want to do it. Hence the reason I’m writing this on the roof of the Four Seasons Hong Kong. I could be in a subway, or in the mountains of Capri. IT DOESN’T MATTER. The technology is finally starting to get good enough to let us live our lives the way we’ve always wanted to, but haven’t been able to. We can CHOOSE to share things from 600 feet under a lake in Perth, Australia, because the technology finally lets us.

No one purchase will ever encapsulate “where society is headed.” By the time the purchase happens, we’re probably there already. All we can do is hope we made the right choices leading up to it.

Remember this: We’re a society built on wanting to share what we’re doing. Offer your customers a better way to do that, and the product will sell itself.

But – Part of succeeding in business has to involve knowing when the bend, or even break the rules. There will never be a rule that can be designed for every single situation without fail. Every situation is different, and anyone in charge of enforcing the rules needs to understand that. No business will thrive (or even survive) if they don’t know when to bend or break a rule.

With that said, allow me to introduce you to The Helena. A gorgeous “green” rental building on 57th Street, with beautiful unobstructed views of the Hudson River, sunset, and New Jersey, it’s a place I called home for seven years prior to buying my new apartment near Times Square a few months ago. As anyone who ever visited me knows, it’s by all accounts, a stunning building, if not a little far west.

I moved in back when the building wasn’t even finished yet. I was the third tenant in the entire building, and the only tenant on my floor for close to eight months, because mine was the only apartment on the floor that was finished. I spent the first six months there listening to the wind rattle through the building, since my apartment was the only one on the floor to have windows installed.

I fell in love with the building, with the doormen and porters, with the garage attendants and the neighbors. Everything about the building was awesome, and I told anyone who would listen how great it was. I am personally responsible for bringing in at least six tenants over my time in the building.

When I bought my new apartment, I still had a few months left on my lease. I went to the management office to ask if I could be let out of my lease early, explaining that I was in one of the coveted two-bedroom apartments, that could be easily rented out, since every time my lease came up for renewal, I’d get a note from management asking if I was leaving, since they always have people ready to take a two-bedroom.

In no uncertain terms, I was told “no.” “Oh, those are really hard to rent,” said Jim Manning, the head of the leasing office. “Funny, I said – you always said you had people looking.” “Oh,” he said, “Well, that was before.” Before what, I don’t know, but whatever.

Here’s the funny part – Letting me out of my lease early is NOT the rule I’m talking about bending. I signed a lease, and I bought my new apartment knowing I still had a few months left. That’s fine – That’s my problem, not theirs.

At around the same time, one of my closest friends, Becca, came home to her place downtown after a business trip to find that a pipe had burst in a neighbors apartment, flooding her apartment, ruining most of her stuff, and making her place unlivable. Her landlord was unwilling to help her, and she needed a place to stay. I’ve known Becca forever, and immediately offered her my apartment for as long as she needed it, since I wasn’t living there anymore, but was still paying rent. She took me up on my offer, and paid me the same amount of rent she was paying in her old place each month. While I wasn’t breaking even, it was better than having to fork out the entire rent for an unused place, and I was able to help a friend. Win-win.

Management knew she was there, knew who she was, and had no problem with it whatsoever. Seemed to work out pretty well.

Fast forward to a month left on my lease. Becca tells me she wouldn’t mind taking the lease over from me when I leave. I figure this to be a win for The Helena – Becca’s already proven herself to be a trustworthy tenant, all that would be necessary would be to transfer the lease, or even have her fill out a new one for her. Everyone wins.

I mention this to the leasing office at the Helena, and they start the paperwork. Here’s where it gets insane: Her former landlord, who she’s suing because he failed to fix the apartment she was in, refuses to sign one piece of paper saying she lived there. Legally, he wasn’t even allowed to do that – if someone lived somewhere, that’s a fact. That you’re being sued by that tenant shouldn’t matter. But he didn’t. Becca had all the other paperwork done, has excellent credit, and explained to management why that piece of paper wasn’t turned in. I even called and let them know that I trusted her, that I’d been there for years without a problem, that she was there for several months without a problem.

The result from The Helena: “Sorry, the rules require us to have that document.”

*Blank stare.*

So let’s understand: In an effort to follow the “rules,” The Helena did the following:

1) They lost a trusted tenant who already had a good history with the building.
2) They angered one of their oldest tenants, who continues to have the ability to recommend that apartment building.
3) They fostered bad-will (as opposed to goodwill) by adhering to a rule that didn’t benefit anyone.
4) They did nothing to help an already damaged leasing office reputation. (See screenshot below)

So Becca’s credit was flawless. I vouched for her (as a seven-year tenant with no negative issues in seven years.) She had already become friends with the doormen and porters, and everyone knew her. She was an asset to the building. The Helena decided none of this mattered, because they “had to follow the rules.”

Bad move, Helena. Bad move.

When to Bend the Rules

Bend the rules when the only benefit of following the rule is to say “I followed the rules.” As I said earlier, no rule can be right for every situation. In this case, there was no downside in bending that one rule. The Helena chose not to, and it cost them a ton more than they gained. Know the reasons why you’re following rules, and know when to bend them.

Bend the rules when the benefit outweighs the negatives. I would have continued to say great things about The Helena, and I would have continued to recommend it to people. Becca would have done the same. Instead, the opposite happened.

Bend the rules when you have the opportunity to foster goodwill, and even remove some negativity about your brand. Check out the two comments on FourSquare about The Helena (neither left by me:)

So they already had this against them. A simple act of goodwill, that wouldn’t have cost them anything could have gone far to void these comments. If you see “Wow, leasing office went out of their way to help me, can’t recommend them enough,” that would neutralize, if not invalidate the comments above. By not doing that, you’ve only reinforced the comments above.

Finally, bend the rules just to be a good human being. You’re the manager of the leasing office. One of the ways you become manager is by demonstrating you have the ability to think critically, not just to act like a robot. You’re in charge because you can make decisions that benefit the company, not just decisions that go “by the book.”

In the end, it comes down to common sense. Know when to be a machine, and know when to be a human being. Leaning one way or another can have ripples for years to come. In this case, the ripples are negative. I get asked by people all the time where to live in Manhattan. There are lots of luxury rental buildings I could recommend. Sadly, The Helena will no longer be one of them.

That will be almost 16 hours of uninterrupted writing. Blog posts, my new book (due out in January, being published by Palgrave/MacMillan), emails for my newsletter… Heck, perhaps even a note to my future child (not that there’s anything in the works yet, calm down, mom…)

But there will be writing. It seems that planes are the only place lately where I can write uninterrupted, without the real world, or the Internet, or my mobile phone, or my cat distracting me. (Squirrel!) Planes are my last bastion of creativity. I’ve got a handful of new blog posts to write, including…

• A true story of how a six year relationship with a corporation ended in one hour because they chose to not bend a rule
• How I manage to eat healthy/stay somewhat fit/get my workouts in while traveling 250,000+ miles a year
• What I’ve learned from my first four months of being married, and how I can apply that to business
• Race report on Ironman 70.3 Galveston
• And a bunch of other fun pieces.

So apologies for falling down on the blog of late, but stay tuned – I’ve got some good stuff coming up! If you have any ideas for what you’d like me to write about on the return trip, leave them here – I’m happy to do it!

PS: Are you watching the Two Minute Rundown? Each weekday, Bob Knorpp and I analyze the latest in marketing, advertising, and branding, and how it impacts you, all within two minutes. Here’s the latest episode from this morning: