The Shortlist Episode 87: The Short(er) List: ASMR for AEC Marketers

Close your eyes. Breathe. Relax your shoulders. The RFP document is only five pages long. The Project Manager won't be on vacation during the interview. The entire team agrees on the deadline for content. There is no page limit. No one cares about margins.

This is ASMR for AEC Marketers.

In this episode of The Short(er) List, Becky and Katy are whispering reassuring sweet nothings into your headphones with a topic that's both absurd and (oddly?) therapeutic. Your hosts are talking smooth and soft. The music is calm and non-descript. Are you in a spa? Did you fall asleep at your desk? What does ASMR even stand for anyway?

None of that matters. Because we see you, AEC marketers, and we're leaning all the way in. So put in your earbuds, turn down the lights, and let the soothing sounds of stress-free marketing wash over you.

Podcast Transcript

Welcome to The Shorter List. Hi, I'm Becky Ellison from The Short List Podcast, and I'm going rogue, because apparently some things are just too silly, weird or extra to fit into our regular Short List episodes.

So we're bringing those conversations, rants and other fun stuff that was too spicy for TV to you in bite-sized little podcast treats hosted by me and featuring all of your favorite Middle of Sixers.

Today, we're bringing you a very special minisode. As AEC marketers, it's crucial when the pressure is on, that we can tune out the noise and the fear and find the inner calm to make miracles happen, with sometimes minutes or even seconds to go.

I'm here with Katie Byers today, one of the calmest people under pressure that I know, and we are going to take you on a short meditative journey to help you make it through your next deadline without losing your mind. Welcome to ASMR for Marketers.

If you don't know what ASMR is, it's actually kind of hard to explain. There's people on YouTube and other streaming services who make sounds or they tap things or they say stuff and it makes your brain tingle and helps you relax.

We are not high and this is a real thing. Ready, Katy?

I am ready, Becky.

ASMR stands for, I think, autonomous sensory meridian response. Is that important to know? Not sure.

What it means is sounds and words and situations make your brain tingle and or relax. Again, I want to reiterate that we are not intoxicated in any way, and this is a real thing.

Okay, listeners, close your eyes, relax your shoulders, take a deep breath, and visualize everything going exactly right.

That doesn't ever happen.

We're visualizing. This is pretend. Fake it till you make it.

Keep on faking it.

Okay, you're opening the RFP document, and it's only five pages long.

Yeah, there's no way that's a public PDB proposal. There's only 10 questions, and they're all project-specific.

There's no font size requirement, no page limit. They don't care about margins. No one cares about margins.

They don't want printed copies.

This isn't 1993. They want you to email the response to a nice lady named Linda in procurement, and they trust you to write your own email subject line. Maybe you can put, Linda is the best as the subject line.

Up to you.

It's really clear who should take on each question and what they're looking for. No new made up questions that cross reference other documents and don't make sense. These were written by humans who want to build a project.

Wait a minute.

Four of the ten questions are costs and fees. Ooh, not my problem. That's only five real questions.

Um, that would make six real questions.

This is exactly why I don't do the costs and fees questions.

Everybody makes it to the kickoff meeting.

The project manager won't be on vacation during the interview. People volunteered to write sections, and they could look you in the eyes when you agreed on the deadline for content.

There's only six people on the team, and you've already made so many resumes for each one of them that you know by heart which school they went to and what shirt they wore in the headshots, which all match.

All the content comes in on time. They all answered the question, and nobody went over a thousand words.

The final draft is done, with two pages to spare. You only get 20 edits. They all make sense, and they're easy to see, because the team used Adobe Share for review.

Bluebeam review.

Adobe.

Everybody in the AEC industry uses Bluebeam.

Everybody who lives in reality on planet Earth uses Adobe.

Anyway, you made all the edits and you didn't have to add any pages, break any threaded text boxes, or change the team at all.

There weren't any changes to the org chart, which has been hierarchical, minimal, straightforward, and not in any kind of circular shape the whole time.

And now, it's deadline day.

You got eight hours of sleep. You're caffeinated. There's free snacks in the kitchen.

Some of us work from home, and there's always snacks in the kitchen.

Yeah, well, they're not free, are they?

The proposal is due by five, but the project manager has to leave by noon.

Looks like they're gonna make sure it gets finished early.

Early.

Early.

You export the final file. No problems. And somehow, it's already under 10 megabytes.

You got your email all ready, and after a thorough preflight check, you hit send.

It goes through immediately.

Sent. Then you immediately get a personal confirmation email from the client.

Oh, that's so nice. You're the best. Proposal received.

Have a great day, Linda.

Linda's the best.

She is.

You did it.

You're such a winner.

And maybe check out some of those free snacks.

They're good ones too, like fridge stuff. Perishable foods with protein and stuff like that. String cheese.

Hard-boiled eggs.

Yeah, charcuterie.

Snack mix.

Moose munch.

Shrimp chips. Granola bars. Brand name.

Reese's Pieces.

Not from Costco.

Somebody invested in these.

Chobani yogurt.

That's it for this week's Minnesota. Let us know if we helped you relax, and if there's any other ASMR scenarios we can try next time. Hit us up on social media, rate, subscribe, and remember to share the love and make a friend.

Recommend the podcast to another AEC marketer who wants to feel seen. See you next time, where we will be a lot louder.

Bye.

Be well. Every time I drink from it in a teams meeting, I look like a moonshiner.

Tape measure.

I've seen videos like this on TikTok and quickly scrolled past them. Keyboard tapping might be good. I don't wanna tap, cause then I'll do a bunch of that.

I mean, I don't know. Yeah, here we go. Thank you, I like to know I'm doing something.

Was that insane, or? I had fun. Katy, you are a very good sport for doing this with zero preparation.

Oh, I prepped.

If you know me, you know I prepped.

I knew you'd be down for anything. It's autonomic, sensory. What does it stand for?

Produce, Kyle!

The Shortlist is a podcast that explores all things AEC marketing. Hosted by Middle of Six Principal, Wendy Simmons, each episode features members of the MOS team, where we take a deep dive on a wide range of topics related to AEC marketing including: proposal development, strategy, team building, business development, branding, digital marketing, and more. You can listen to our full archive of episodes here.