I just got saw this post for the very first time, because I’m a new subscriber, but I had to comment to say “HEAR HEAR!”

I also had to comment because this post made me snort Diet Coke out of my nose. Thank for you being ballsy enough to say this things that need to be said, in the way they need to be said. I LOVE your work and find your message highly motivating in a get-off-my-ass kind of way. Thank you!

Best, Wendy

“If he was himself, he would have no brand because he is boring. How do we know he’s boring? Because everybody is boring. It’s like fiction writing. You don’t write everything about a character, a setting, a dialog… you just write the interesting bits.”

helps it click with me. Fiction writing? Now that’s something I know.

Alfred Hitchcock once said, “Drama is life with the dull bits cut out.”

So…Branding is you with the dull bits cut out?

(Hi, btw. First contact here, although I’ve been reading for a while. Guess I’m an Ittybiz virgin. Be gentle with me.)

I guess I could leave it there, with the fawning, but instead I’ll waste a few more characters on *why* I love it – because you just made me realise that something I thought was a disadvantage is actually an advantage for me. No shit.

All this time, I’ve been thinking that the art I produce is doomed to never sell because it’s so different from what’s ‘normal’ out there in my medium. I’ve been telling myself that no one would even look at it because it doesn’t fit the mould of what everyone else is producing. It’s not what people expect to see. But that doesn’t mean it won’t be valued by the right people who are bored with the usual.

So, wow. Thank you. I think I’ll go spend the day clubbing more elephants.

1.) You can appeal to the smaller subset of a larger percentage by bringing more than one thing to the table. What you offer and how you offer it is the most common way this is done. Maybe everybody wants eco furniture, but you do eco beds. Maybe everybody does eco beds, but you do them with recycled car tires. True, these are not the most insightful examples, but they’re an idea.

2. The IttyBiz situation was an example of the answers in number one. I think there are a SHITLOAD of people who could succeed in my industry. Marketing for teeny businesses is the most unsaturated industries I’ve come across. Well, financially viable industries, anyway. (Same can be said for PR and, to a lesser extent, business coaching.)

We succeeded because we hit a market no-one else was hitting, and we did it in a way that was memorable and pleasing. The internet changed not only the way businesses are run, but also who was running the businesses. And IttyBiz people would gnaw their own arm off before they went with a firm that played the game the normal way.

3. Every business can’t. But you either have to have a hell of a lot of money (Marriott, Hilton et al) or a hell of a lot of ingenuity (that little hotel on the beach that nobody outside their circle has heard of but they’re booked six months in advance.) Since ittybiz owners don’t have the money, they need the ingenuity. And the most effective way, maybe the only way, of communicating that ingenuity is through branding.

We got a lot of questions along these lines during the Marketing 101 calls. People didn’t understand why “outstanding customer service” or “life coaching for women” was not an effective USP. It’s because they’re not unique. Everybody says their customer service is outstanding and we’re drowning in life coaches for woman. You need to find what’s really unique and brand it.

Or you need a hell of a lot of money. :)

I get what you’re saying about the elephant guy. And it’s true that there is a fellow who is going to be getting the 10% that no one is going after.

However, not every business can be (or has the desire to be) an elephant slayer. Nor do they want to serve the dead-elephant-slaying audience.

The other 90% of buyers are still a valid target audience.

So, I guess I have some questions:

1) How does a business appeal to a subsection within the larger percentage of buyers?

2) I don’t really understand your example answers the question “How did Ittybiz grow so quickly?” I’ve read your past blog entries about how you got started with the Problogger contest and the one introducing Online Business School. So is IttyBiz’s success because you offer marketing to one-person businesses and everyone else left them out? Or is because you have the red website with the lady in the camo skirt and the bald head and potty mouth? Or all of the above?

3) When you say “have a very consistent branding statement…that is the polar opposite of everyone else,” can you elaborate on what this means? I get it on the surface, but I am not understanding how every business can be the polar opposite of everyone else.

Let’s take hotels for example… most of them are variations on the same theme. And sure, there can be a few that have wildly different themes. But don’t most buyers of hotel services basically want a nice place to stay the night? Aren’t most hotels constrained simply by the desires of most buyers?

Thanks, Wendy

Very good point, but I couldn’t help but think of you squatting next to your laptop and a carseat in the kitchen, pissing into a jug as I read this.

I mean I wasn’t picturing it, I just couldn’t help but think of the story, not…

I’ll get my coat