No Risk, No Reward

II. Playing It Safe, Part 1: The God Gamble

Here are the stakes -- the most staggering ones conceivable: On one hand, eternal happiness. On the other, infinite damnation. The question: "God is, or He is not. But to which side shall we incline?"

Blaise Pascal, the 17th-century French intellectual, religious zealot, and intermittent party animal, proposed that wager sometime around 1660. Besides being the first apparent attempt to combine theology and mathematics, contends Ian Hacking, a professor of philosophy at the University of Toronto, Pascal's dilemma arguably represented the birth of what we now consider to be decision theory.

In 1664, Pascal experienced one of his periodic mystical revelations and retired to the convent of Port-Royal in Paris. There, he devised his wager as an inducement for men to follow the ways of Christianity.

"A game is being played at the extremity of this infinite distance where heads or tails will turn up," he wrote. "What will you wager?" If it turns out that God does not exist, then you are marginally better off having lived a life of as much earthly pleasure as possible. That is, it pays to have behaved badly. But if you choose that course and God does exist, then you are doomed for all time. Ugly downside.

If, on the other hand, you have pursued a pious life leading to faith, then "there is here an infinity of an infinitely happy life to gain" if God does exist. And if He doesn't, you may have frittered away 50 years when you could have been drinking and carousing. However, that's a modest sacrifice set against the prospect of unending salvation. As Pascal frames the dilemma, betting on the side of God's existence is unquestionably the better choice.

According to Hacking, Pascal's musings contain valid decision-theory arguments "of a sort properly classified and characterized only in this century." As a result, Pascal also may have made the first scientifically grounded argument in support of playing it safe: If one outcome seems overwhelmingly preferable, take it -- even if it is not certain.

III. Marketing: "To not take a risk is to risk being ignored."

Hot babes in leather! That's it -- hot babes in leather, full-body suits, and stiletto heels. They'll spank and scream and shackle each other. We'll have bondage! And Grace Jones! And -- oh yeah -- we'll pitch some wristwatches.

Drew Neisser grins at the thought of that coup. He is not, on the face of it, a hot-babes-in-leather guy. He is 45, clean-cut, and clothed in sensible garments. But the Casio "Time Me Up, Time Me Down" party -- that was his baby. He's still surprised that Casio bought in. "That was the last idea I ever expected a client to buy," he says.

Renegade Marketing's Rules for Guerrilla Warfare I
1. Seek this response from customers: "Wow, I never expected that from your company!"
2. Seek this response internally: "How the heck did they get that one approved?"

Renegade Marketing Group, lodged four floors up in Manhattan's Chelsea Market, is a guerrilla-marketing firm. No, wait -- they hate the term "guerrilla marketing." To them, guerrilla marketing involves high-school kids hassling you with flyers on street corners. What Renegade does, it claims, is promote "unconventional relationship building." What it really does is push clients toward the marketing edge.

Renegade Rules II
1. Don't discuss "risk-factor details" with your boss until moments before the launch.
2. Videotape your stuff and only show it if it works.

"If you launch your marketing strategy with the goal of minimizing risk, you're starting from a point of weakness," Neisser argues. "Look at what Nike has done over the years. The company is not without failures. But most of its work has succeeded, because Nike recognizes that unless it takes risks, it's not going to be the brand of choice.

"You have to be prepared to step out of your brand. Brands are evolving life-forms, and being safe with your brand is the biggest risk. If things go wrong, consumers will forgive you. To not take a risk is to risk being ignored."

Renegade Rules III
1. Focus on a well-defined target group.
2. Gain genuine insight into that target's idiosyncrasies.

There was the "Geek Olympics" that Renegade staged in Seattle for IBM's developerWorks initiative. The idea was to boost IBM's reputation among the notoriously quirky, inbred software-developer community -- whose members actually like being called geeks. During the evening, guests negotiated an obstacle course of mind games and computer problems. The value-added bonus: a full-sized cutout of Star Wars character Jar Jar Binks -- widely reviled in geek circles -- set up for target practice.