A few years ago, Bruce Smith experienced a slowdown in his Salt Lake City-based travel agency. Airlines had eliminated his sales commissions. The recession and recent terrorist attacks also took a toll. And because
travel industry was ultra-competitive, he knew he had to find ways to distinguish his company from thousands of other travel agencies.Then, he had a fortunate accident. His wife asked him where they would celebrate their first wedding anniversary. When he gave her a blank look, she set about planning a trip-but wouldn't tell him what she was planning. Because he enjoyed mystery leading up to trip, and hints his wife gave him, he repackaged his travel service as The Veiled Voyage, selling 'destination unknown' vacations to couples and others.
Smith's clever branding strategy was a hit. It not only helped him create a unique and memorable brand, but also made him 'slightly' famous.
Now, most of Smith's business comes through referrals from happy clients who eagerly tell their friends about The Veiled Voyage. He's regularly featured in newspapers, magazines and radio programs and was even invited to speak at a national travel conference. Moreover, he's been able to extend his brand with a major grocery store chain through a lucrative co-branding relationship that has further expanded his company.
The 'Slightly' Famous You
Some business owners attract clients and customers like magic. They do not cold call or rely on advertising. Yet they're regularly featured in newspapers and magazines and get invited to speak at conferences. Everyone knows their name, and they get all business they can handle.
It's almost as though they were famous.
In fact, they are, but not in way movie stars and athletes are famous--they're just slightly famous. Just famous enough to make their names come to mind when people are looking for a particular product or service. They get more business - not only more, but right kind of business - and they don't have to work so hard to get it.
Want to join them and enjoy this ideal state of affairs, where customers come to you? You can, but it may require a new way of thinking and a new marketing strategy. Although their efforts take different forms, underlying them all are six basic principles.
1. Targeting best prospects
Slightly famous entrepreneurs focus their marketing to target best prospects.
Alex Fisenko is known in world of coffee as 'the Dean of Beans.' The 60-something coffee expert started his first espresso shop in 1960s. Since then, he's focused his energies and now sells his expertise on launching a successful coffee business to aspiring entrepreneurs. Alex conducts coffee shop seminars and sells a training course called 'Espresso Business Success.'
His Web site, www.espressobusiness.com, generates thousands of dollars a month in products sales and consulting engagements in United States, Thailand, South Korea, Belgium, Saudi Arabia, and Barbados. 'By targeting best prospects, I now make more money through book sales and consultations than when I ran coffee shops,' says Fisenko.
2. Developing a unique market niche
Small businesses with a 'slightly famous' strategy establish themselves within a carefully selected market niche that they can realistically hope to dominate.
Dan Poynter, for example, is a successful self-publisher who started writing books about parachuting and hang-gliding over thirty years ago. Though it might sound as if his audience would be too small to generate significant sales, he knew his market and where to find them. Best of all, he has market all to himself!
Rather than try to fight for attention in general bookstores, he sold books to skydiving clubs, parachute dealers, and U.S. Parachute Association. He developed a reputation in skydiving circles, and has enjoyed steady sales of his books for more than three decades.
3. Positioning your business as best solution
Positioning is about identifying a key attribute of your company not offered by competitors and that is clearly valuable to your target market.
When Harry Shepherd started his bookkeeping service a few years ago, he realized that he was in competition with dozens of other bookkeepers selling essentially same thing. To stand out, he mastered a popular accounting program and marketed himself as a 'QuickBooks Software Training Consultant.'
