A friend jogs me to write

I've neglected this blog for 8 months.

My excuse? I've been chasing tigers.

Or rather, they've been devouring me, deep in the murky start-up scene.

I tried a branding experiment. You could call it a classic marketing mistake.

For a while I called myself a 'Positioning Guy', sometimes 'Marketing Consultant'. For those of a literary bent, I'd lean in and whisper, with drama, 'I'm a Storyteller'.

Here in Israel, where it's all 'tachles' (straightforward), they often shrug their shoulders. 'Very fancy. What's in it for me?'

So, for the fun, I tried on the uniform 'Copywriter'. Kind of 90's kitsch, right?

Suddenly, for a certain type of small company, I was a movie star. Maybe more Steve Buscemi than Ben Affleck, but still, someone.

I've been inundated. Literally, I could work all day and night. Even Shabbat. What a difference a word makes! Copywriting! Who'd of thunk it?

Of course, there's a catch.

Surely it's the exact same work - only focused on output, not process - right?

Turns out, when you enter by a small door, clients peer down from a great height.

Rather than chasing my words of wisdom, I chased them, begging for flakes of time. My questions - so sought out as a consultant - became a nag, a fly in their soup, a waste of their lunchtime. I should simply produce outputs - marketing collateral - the better to pepper unsuspecting customers, clients, investors. Rat-a-tat.

That's tricky - how can a copywriter deliver a morsel without first learning the firm, checking versions of the story, selecting the choicest meats to carve up?

It's amazing to study this behaviour - let's call it output orientation - close up in the wild. There's a certain brutal sense to it. And a certain colour blindness.

Yesterday, on call to yet another 'start up guy with an app', I was joined by my friend Yaara. She made the introduction, then sat in quietly.

I told the guy 'I can of course help you with this technical output [script for a corporate video] but it won't address your real need. No use having a great video that nobody watches. Let's get the strategy right, first. Then, we'll deal with technical stuff.'

He didn't get it. But Yaara did.

She urged me to write up the call. It was an 'interesting story'. My response was a harrumph. Why catalogue failures?

Yaara dropped the penny for me.

Here: a problem of my own creation. Call a spade a spade, fine. Don't be surprised when you're asked to dig in the garden. A messy metaphor. Still, I'm keeping it.

Deep breath. I'm calling myself a Storyteller, again. Even if I sound like a bearded jolly hippy by the campfire, wearing an ankle bangle. Heck, that's pretty much accurate.

So here we go. Switching on the night light. Time to ink my quill.

Stay tuned.