Category — niche marketing

Would you like to earn more, even if you have fewer clients?

Get the details from my new ebook: Earn More Money with Niche Marketing.

The book will show you how to:

• earn more money with fewer clients
• select a “target” market and build a tribe
• estimate the size of your market
• determine if your market will support you (before you start)

It’s absolutely free. No sign-up or registration required. Feel free to read it, share it, and pass it along. Click here to download your copy.

By the way, my newsletter subscribers got the book last week. To get more free ebooks (and get them first), plus my 25-page ebook “Get More Business Now,” sign up for my Quick Tips monthly newsletter. No spam. Ever.

If you’re looking at a razor or a kitchen knife, an edge is important. A sharp edge will remove a beard or cut carrots. A dull one will cut you (because you push harder).

Having a sharp, clear edge is important in business too. It’s what makes you different, worth talking about. The knife in the picture is memorable because of the shape and the handle – it LOOKS sharp.

For example, the Shake Shack in New York City (expanding soon nationwide) is “fast food” with a difference. The beef is ground daily. the lettuce and tomatoes are local, and the beer is brewed just for them. Their edge: local and handmade.

Henry Ford’s edge was to use an assembly line to make cars quickly. They still do. Rolls Royce, on the other hand makes cars very slowly. A Ford takes hours to assemble. A Rolls requires about three months.

An edge can be faster, slower, much safer (Volvo’s edge), the most dangerous, special treatment, great service (Zappos), terrible service (the No-Name restaurant in Boston – where they make you wait a long time, crowd you in with strangers, and tell you what to eat).

What’s your edge?

Image thanks to: brenda starr

(i) by Seth Godin

Tomorrow:  cool tools!

A-list blogger and successful social media consultant Chris Brogan posted a logo design project on 99Designs a few days ago. Then, he tweeted about it.

All hell broke loose.

If you don’t know, 99Designs is a design contest site. Businesses post a project, with a budget, and entrants submit work. If they win, they get paid. If not, they worked for free.

The small business reaction

Judging from the comments, small businesses love it. It’s cheap! It’s fast! There are lots of options! They think, “Hey I can get something that looks nice and I don’t need a second mortgage on my house!”

What designers think

Experienced designers hate it. It’s spec work! It devalues my art! It looks like crap! Would you ask 50 contractors to build a new den on spec?  Or trust your operation to an amateur brain surgeon?  What about the story of your company? Or how the colors and fonts express your philosophy?

They insist that you can’t just get a logo in one format. You need different versions for larger/smaller or print/web uses.

All true.

However, railing and ranting (while immediately satisfying) won’t change anything.

How to charge more for your work

If you want to get higher prices for your work, you need to better communicate and to better educate your clients:

• why you are worth
• who your market is (and isn’t)
• why buy from you
• what  you offer that cheap designers can’t (in business terms)

Specialize - pick a specific market (a niche, more on this coming later). Focus on them. Ignore everyone else.

Brand - use some of those branding skills on yourself. Are you the Ferrari of designers? Or the Smart Car? Why do people choose you? What do you bring to the job that other designers (or that cheap designers) don’t have? How are you remarkable?

Extra value – why knowing the difference between EPS and and RGB matters. And why one logo format doesn’t work for all media (web, trade show banners, brochures, faxes). A logo that looks OK online might look like a mud pie printed out in black and white.

Copyright /Due Diligence - a designer logo is the client’s alone – not ripped off from someone else’s site or work (legal fights are scary and expensive).

Skip the “I’m a professional, I have years of experience.” You are, and you do. That’s not what matters to the client. What matters to the client is whether you give her what she wants – to feel better, look better, earn more, be more successful.  What are you really selling?

Here’s the thing. Lamborghini doesn’t really sell cars. They sell status, luxury, sex appeal, and VROOOOM.

Hyundai sells cheap, reliable, and super guarantee.

Are you Lamborghini or Hyundai? Does Hyundai care about Lamborghini’s buyers? No. Nor vice versa. They ignore each other.

Show them why a real designer is worth it. And try to understand when they want to make the logo bigger!

Share your thoughts

What do you think about this debate?   Does cheap or spec  work hurt designers?  Does it matter what the “cheap” people do? What other ways can you approach the problem?

Image thanks to omniNate

A friend has a large collection of campaign buttons, dating back to William Henry Harrison (US president for only 31 days in 1841).

When Antiques Roadshow came to town, she eagerly brought some of her collection in for appraisal, hoping to be told her treasured buttons were worth lots of money.

It turns out that they weren’t.

Why didn’t this work?

Because collectors want something very particular.  Not all campaign buttons, but campaign buttons for Republicans from Pennsylvania.  Or, buttons from Barack Obama’s campaign for president.

If you’re an Obama guy, Clinton buttons won’t do.  Certainly not George W. Bush buttons.

Her selection was too broad to interest avid collectors who want one thing and one thing only, and will buy anything and everything that fills that need.

How does this apply to marketing?

Be specific

Try aiming your marketing and your services toward  your own collectors: the people who want exactly what you do (accountants who need web sites, dry cleaners who want flyers designed, or musicians who want web videos).

Build anticipation

People are drawn to Antiques Roadshow by the possibility of finding great riches from something they bought at a yard sale for $5.  Give out little snippets about what you’re up to.  Make people curious.

Demonstrate success

Show other people succeeding after following your advice or  using your services.  Include testimonials and case studies.  Make a video or two showing happy clients.

Fill a void

I came across someone who collects old Burry’s cookie boxes (a company that went out of business years ago).  To a cookie box collector, the price doesn’t matter.  What does matter is filling any possible hole in his collection, or finding something really, really rare that other collectors can’t get.

Give people something they can’t get elsewhere; like idea generation consulting or a project progress dashboard.

What do you think?   Is there something you’re doing that nobody else does?  What is it?  Share your story.

Photo thanks to:  Cornell University

Not real fish, though this one is a lovely example (done on a computer). In marketing, your “fish” are your people – the ideal customers you want to reach.

Don’t try to please everybody

One of the hardest lessons for many solopreneurs (and even bigger companies) to learn is to not try to please everyone, only your own school of fish.

Apple doesn’t care what “everybody” thinks. Some people love the iPad. Some don’t care. Others hate it. Apple focuses only on the first group – and it’s a big enough tribe that they sold $150,000,000 worth of iPads in one day.

They know how to find a niche market, determine what they want, and how to deliver it.

Focus only on  your “fish”

Before you can sell anything, you need to know what your own “fish” look like, what information they need, and how you can help them get it.

Are they big fish (companies)? Small fish (solopreneurs)? Are they older fish (established businesses) or newly-hatched fry (baby fish)?

Actual fish want to know what’s for dinner and where to find it…the best sources for smaller fish, or plants, or flies.

Your clients probably don’t eat flies (at least I hope not), but they will want to know how to get their book published. Or how to set up a blog. Or an ebook on how to get more web site sales. Buy a copy (before the price goes up May 1), and help contribute to the “Jodi wants an iPad fund.”

Have you been able to find a market niche (or your fish)? Want some help figuring it out? Ask in the comments.

Image compliments of chefrandan