What is Love?
Our Annual Sales Kick-off (ASKO) for Sprinklr is next week, and I couldn’t be more excited. Last year I got to roll out new branding, a new product line-up, new positioning, and new selling assets. Over the last year we’ve done a rev on our “Gold Deck” and updated the Web site, all while building the business by a wickedly massive percentage. All in all, it’s been a rewarding year professionally. And personally, well that’s the subject of another post in the nearish future.
For this year’s ASKO I’ll be focusing on the “X” in my title—specifically the “Experience” part of Chief Experience & Marketing Officer. As we talk about experience I’ll be touching on the concept of great customer experience (CX) as something that gives customers CONTROL (I posted on this earlier this week: link).
At the end of the day, the purpose of providing great customer experiences is to love your customers (and have them love you back). So, since love is on my mind, I thought it’d be fun to wax poetic on the concept of love.
What is Love? Philosophers, poets, and priests have been attempting to answer this question for millennia. I’m going to give it a try in the next 350 words (because nothing ventured, nothing gained). But I’ll have help. Let’s defer to a group of experts—the sages, songwriters, and scribes easily found with a quick Google search.
Well, for starters, we know that love makes the world go round (W. S. Gilbert), which cannot be underestimated. Love is inexhaustible (Antoine de Saint-Exupery), supreme and unconditional (Duke Ellington), and the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend (Martin Luther King, Jr.).
It’s for real (Aretha Franklin) and dangerous (Madonna), but apparently, not real dangerous. Love is suffering (Woody Allen), silent (T.S. Elliot), and a smoke made with the fume of sighs (Shakespeare). It’s either all you need (Paul McCartney) the thing you need (The Jackson 5), or a thing that we need to learn (Alain de Botton).
It’s a shiny car, a steel guitar (Emmylou Harris), a beautiful flower (Helen Keller), a runaway train (Randy Travis).
Love is the answer (John Lennon), although if that’s the case Lily Tomlin has asked that we rephrase the question.
For the pragmatist, love is cleaning up a room or hanging up a coat before you’re asked to do it (Mr. Rogers). For the romantic it’s the silent saying and saying of a single name (Mignon McLaughlin). Love is big (Alice walker). Love is blind (Nietzsche). Love is like oxygen (Sweet).
Love is a friendship caught on fire (Bruce Lee). It’s the force that ignites the spirit and binds teams together (Phil Jackson), the triumph of imagination over intelligence (H. L. Mencken). Love is the greatest thing in the world, except for a nice mutton, lettuce and tomato sandwich (Miracle Max).
Love always perseveres, never fails (St. Paul). It’s a perky elf dancing a merry little jig and then suddenly he turns on you with a miniature machine gun (Matt Groening).
And finally, love is of all passions the strongest, for it attacks simultaneously the head, the heart and the senses (Lao Tzu).
So, what do you think? Does anything in this labor of love ring true for you? What’s your favorite quote about love?
