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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
Aaron Ross
Read between
November 24 - December 12, 2022
And you know that lead generation is the #1 lever that drives revenue growth and can create hypergrowth. You've been trying to grow your leads, and thus sales, but it's been harder than you expected … maybe a lot harder.
Struggles often mean there's a niche problem, either at the company, marketing department, or salesperson level.
Clues You Aren't Ready to Grow (Regardless of What the CEO or Board Expects) You've grown mostly through referrals, word of mouth, and up-/cross-selling. Inbound or outbound lead generation has been disappointing … or abysmal. You realize, looking back, that you're dependent on preexisting relationships or a recognized brand to get in the door, even if your product or service is amazing. You're good at too many things, and struggle focusing on the one best opportunity to sell and deliver over and over again. Even when you get quality appointments, too few people buy.
If you can't predictably generate leads and opportunities where you're needed, win them, and do it profitably, you're gonna struggle.
One of the indicators that you've Nailed a Niche is that you're consistently able to find and sign up unaffiliated customers.
Since you have 10, you can definitely get 20… and then 100. If you can get 10 unaffiliated customers to pay you (no small feat), I guarantee you can get 20. And if you keep going at it, you will get at least to 100. And then 200, at least. At a minimum, you can keep doubling and doubling. I'm not saying it's easy, but it's possible.
The same core “goodness” that you've built attracts all of them. Of course, you're going to need to build tons more features, mature your product dramatically, and so forth. But the core will be the same goodness as customers 1–10 experienced.
Trust us. Ten customers may not pay the bills. But if you got them from scratch, you have the start of organic leadflow or of some leadgen process that you can replicate. That's really special, and something you can actually build on.
Niche here means focused. On a specific target customer with a specific pain. Regardless of how many types of customers you could help, or how many of their problems you could solve.
Hypergrowth doesn't come from selling many things to many markets, covering all your bases (really, dividing your energies). Hypergrowth comes from focusing on where you have the best chances of winning customers, making them successful, building a reputation of tangible results, and then growing from there.
Where's the easiest place for you to build momentum now? What's the path of least resistance to money for you? Focusing on specific industries or types of customers—like banks, software companies, or large businesses—is part, but not all of it. It also means focusing your unique strengths (not all your strengths) where they can create the most value (not any value), and: Solve a specific pain for An ideal target customer in A believable, repeatable way, With predictable methods to (a) find and (b) interest them.
If you focus on solving a single problem really well and can adapt as the market evolves, the sky's your limit.
There's a painful difference to evolve from selling to Early Adopters who trust you, to Mainstream Buyers who don't.
The more connection you have with them right away, the more leeway they'll give you. The less you have, the faster you lose them. Some sample (nonscientific) windows: A cold email or online ad: A 0.3- to 3-second window before they engage or move on A cold call: A 3- to 30-second window Walking door-to-door: A 3- to 60-second window Compare these to: A referral: 15 minutes–1 hour A best friend or parent: Unlimited (in fact, you may be the one who wants to limit the time!)
The whole point of Nailing a Niche is to help you cross the Trust Gap, moving from depending on buyers on the right side (trust) to being able to better market and sell to buyers on the left side (no trust). You have to either (a) find a way to fit your message into that slice of attention, or (b) expand the amount of attention they're willing to give you.
Your message has to be simple for them to both understand and easily act on, or else they'll move on before ever giving it a chance.
This is why short and sweet emails and videos tend to work better than long emails and videos as first touches with new people. People see a long email or video from someone they don't know, and they just aren't willing to invest in consuming it.
ARE YOU A NICE-TO-HAVE? Do you believe your intended buyers need what you're offering? Or are you a nice-to-have? One clear sign that you're a nice-to-have: Everyone you show your product to says “cool!,” but no one buys.
Consumers don't buy what they need; they buy what they want. How much do consumers spend on Porsches and ice cream compared to broccoli and psychotherapy? But businesses don't buy nice-to-haves. For example: Marketers want a beautiful website—but they need a website that converts visitors to outcomes such as leads or purchases. CEOs want happy employees—but they need people to show up and do their jobs, for products to be released on time, or for cash flow to be improved. VPs of Sales want increased sales productivity—but they need and buy what contributes to it, such as leads, accurate
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What problem is painful enough that a team of people will spend both their money and time to fix it? If you are solving a need, how can you describe what you do differently, so prospects also see it that way? What differentiates the customers who need you from the ones who don't? Where can you create the most financial value? Where can you get permission to create case studies or get references? (With some types of markets or customers these are almost impossible to get.) How can you “sell money”? How can you sell “things”?
“Sell money” means proving to customers that your product will help them make more money, spend less of it, reduce the risk of losing it, or stay compliant (avoiding fines and legal risk). Demonstrate how spending money with you will make them more money.
Make money by proving to customers that your product will help them make more money, spend less of it, reduce the risk of losing it, or stay compliant.
If you say you'll “increase revenue” or “decrease costs,” you sound just like everyone else. What's equivalent to money in their mind—leads? Close rates? Social activity? Collections?
Any kind of paid or nonorganic lead generation (like marketing or prospecting) can be a forcing function that makes you confront the reality of whether you've nailed a niche or not. If it doesn't work, you need to rethink your target customer … and possibly your solution.
How do you make it all about them, not all about you?
It's hard to resist going on and on and on … to buyers about all the wonderful ways you can help them. But if you keep doing that rather than specializing, you're more likely to confuse buyers than excite them.
It's hard to think about much else when you're struggling to pay the bills.
I'd been denying or ignoring the skills that made me the most marketable.
Once I specialized in serving business-to-business companies with at least $1 million in revenue, who needed to grow, who wanted predictable lead generation, but who weren't doing outbound prospecting yet (see? being specific!), business picked up. My rates went up by 10×, too, when I specialized. I mean, who do you think earns more, a general practice doctor or a neurosurgeon?
Here's why picking One Thing is better than trying to pick the Best Thing: You can't predict where your big opportunity or $100 million exit will come from. So pick One Thing and figure out how to win at that. Where can you be a big fish in a small pond? Get momentum winning in that small pond, then expand into the next bigger pond, and so on. If you learn how to win at One Thing, you'll know how to win at the Next Thing. If your One Thing struggles, then learn and pivot, until you learn how/where to win. Let go of knowing what the answer is ahead of time—just get to the next step. And
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From: “What's your problem? We can solve it. Whatever your problems are, we have many capabilities. There's something we can do for you if we look hard enough.” You end up solving different problems in different ways, making it virtually impossible to scale. To: “Here's the problem we are the best at solving … with our repeatable solution we have delivered 100 times. Do you have it? No, you don't have it? Do you know anyone else who might be interested?” We're not saying you don't find out about the specific situation and pains of a customer, but there's a difference between understanding
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Be willing to lose the people who want all colors of pens, because ultimately you'll sell more pens, at higher prices, to the right people—the ones who value those special orange ones.
WHERE CAN YOU BE A BIG FISH IN A SMALL POND? It's better to pick a focused market that's “too small,” but where you can find and win deals, than it is to stick to defining your target market so broadly that you get lost in it. Why is this? It's easier to make the pond smaller than make the fish bigger: It's easier to retarget, refocus, and reframe yourself than to change your products and offerings. To grow past word-of-mouth marketing, you have to stand out. It's easier to stand out and win deals in a smaller pond. When you share too many things that you excel at (too many ponds), it's more
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You know that a pain is common when you see that people are willing to pay money to solve it, repeatedly.
Specialize in a specific pain you solve, but don't get so narrow that you can't find anyone that has it.
Tangible Results: Where can you show concrete or detailed results? How can you answer the question “What do I get?” For example, if the answer is “Peace of mind or a better night's sleep,” how do you make that tangible? “Grow leads 217%” or “Shorten month-end closing to 12 hours” are much more concrete offers. If you struggle with hard numbers, you can use visual examples or detailed customer stories and testimonials.
To find or be found, to close deals, to avoid commoditization—you must be different or unique.
Who are the people you aim to help, and who have the most power over buying your stuff?
Proof: To charge based on value, or to market and sell to Mainstream Buyers, your lead generation and sales teams need proof. If you don't have proof, you can still sell to people, but this will require more relationship-building, or sticking only to Early Adopters. Examples of proof: Free trials Case studies with details Testimonials, especially in video Lists of logos or brand names Stories Demonstrations It's always better to “show” rather than “tell” (stop talking and prove it).
It's always better to “show” rather than “tell” (stop talking and prove it).
It's not the leads here that are important—yet. It's the learning. The faster you learn how to generate leads, the faster you can get ready to grow. Give yourself 90 days as the learning or beta-test period before counting your growth chickens. Essentially, what you're doing here is four things: Define a target list, usually of prospects, partners, or marketing outlets. Decide on how you want to reach out, that is, cold emailing, calling, referrals, social, mail, blogging, and so on—and what you'll say and ask for. Remember to write from the reader's point of view: What's in it for them?
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Speed of learning creates speed to growth.
The learnings are more important than the results in this step. If you get 10 sales right away but you don't know why, you can't repeat them. If you get two sales, but know how to replicate them, you're golden and can ramp things up.
Platform startups often struggle to nail niche markets because customers can do so many things with it.
When debriefing salespeople, also ask “Why is the customer doing this?” If they don't know, or throw out assumptions, make sure they go and ask.
How can you get product feedback before you build it?
It's impossible to research your way to certain success.
Get your stuff into the hands of customers and watch what happens. And if nothing happens, that's not a failure if you see it as useful information, too.
If nothing happens, that's not a failure if you see it as useful information, too.
