- Let's just talk about this four-hour work week.
It was a great hook for a book title, but
nobody that could work a four-hour work week
to build the infrastructure, to build a business and
support a life, I think would work a four-hour work week.
(upbeat music)
Drafting on growth strategies.
In this video, I'm gonna share with you guys ways to think
about your market to find opportunities of growth
so that you could essentially insert your product.
or your idea, or your service in there and get a bunch
of benefit of an existing market and where it's going.
I really think that most entrepreneurs work way too hard
trying to build a product that's a me too thing.
It's not unique, it's not differentiated, it isn't
focused on a niche, and essentially because of that,
they have to work so much harder, sometimes a factor
of three or four, to finally make their business work.
You know the other day I was in New York shooting
a Facebook Live video, and I was just talking about
this trend that I saw with some of these software products
that choose a niche, but they do it strategically
where the other platform itself is growing, and
because they're in that platform, that they get to grow.
So like, early Facebook products.
If you think about, the one that
I was seeing was Stripe Payments.
Like, there's a lot of companies out there that
are saying, "We're integrating with Stripe,
"we're using their product as the hook,"
the product hook is what I call it,
and then that way anybody that uses Stripe, as they grow,
they're going to be introduced to our product.
So you see this with integrations,
FreshBooks integrations, Shopify integrations,
and I think that is such an important way
to think about deploying or integrating your product.
So, that's what I want to share with you, because
right after I shared that video, Mike, this guy
from the UK, followed up and recommended a book
by Richard Koch who created, I knew the name
because he wrote The 80/20 Principle,
but it's called The Rising Star.
So the first principle I want to share with you guys
to help you draft off of growth, is one that comes
straight from his book called Rising Stars.
Now, I used to call this transcending vehicles
because of my buddy Gair, but it's the idea that
if you can attach yourself to a market
that's growing, that you'll do really well.
I mean, to me it's the idea of high tides rise all boats.
One of my mentors, Ken, said this to me once,
he's like, "Hey, you just gotta pick the right market
"to get into, and if you can be mediocre,
"because it's growing 20, 30, 50% a year, then
"you'll actually build a business."
And I mean, that is probably some of the best advice
I've ever gotten, is choose the right market.
You know, I see this with lululemon and yoga.
Yoga was a growing industry, lululemon was an apparel
company, they essentially tied themselves to that,
they grew, and now they're in other categories.
One that I've seen recently on software is a product
called Zen Planner that's used by CrossFit gyms.
And what's cool is, obviously CrossFit's this crazy
phenomenal fitness program that's grown to like,
now I think it's like 16,000 affiliates across the world,
and they are, most of them, are using Zen Planner.
I met with the founders at the CrossFit games this year
and I asked them, "How did you start?
"Did you focus on CrossFit?"
And they said "No, we focused on martial arts studios.
"We discovered CrossFit because one of our customers
"was also a CrossFit affiliate owner,
"and then we decided to double down."
The company is doing incredible.
I mean, if you're a software SaaS founder
and you haven't niched into a growth market,
another industry or another technology platform
product that's raised a bunch of money, then you're
really working harder than you need to.
So that's number one, is find a rising star.
Second is, feed a starving crowd.
Starving crowd, I borrowed that one from my buddy Rob.
But Gary Halbert once told the story,
it's a really great one to understand.
He asked a group of students, and he said,
"If we were starting a burger joint, and you had
"to pick one competitive advantage in this burger,
"what would it be?"
Some people said, "Well, I would want the best meat,
"I want sesame seed buns, I wanna make sure it's
"in the right location," they had all these different
characteristics of what they considered
a competitive advantage.
He said, "Cool, I'll give you all of those
"competitive advantages, whatever you want,
"you can have them," to these students.
He said, "The only one that I want is a starving crowd."
Pretty interesting concept.
I mean, to me, that really means that
there needs to be a need, right?
In the market there needs to be a need.
And if you can find that for your product,
then you will draft off of the growth of
just the need in the market that's not being filled.
And as a founder, that is your responsibility,
to be creative and go deep, and continue asking
the questions to finally figure it out.
Even if you're not there today, you can reposition
the product to find that crowd that's starving.
So that's number two.
Three, is really about fishing where the fish are.
This one is such an important part, because especially
with platforms like Facebook, where you can be
super-strategic and focus on who your customers are,
there's a lot of power in understanding
where your ideal customers are.
Yesterday I had a lunch with a friend of mine,
and he was talking about his tiny homes company.
I was like, "Man, tiny homes, I never thought about that."
But yeah, and then this other guy that was with us,
another founder, said, "You know what, I've been
"thinking of building one, that's really interesting
"that we're having lunch, give me your card."
And I was like, "You know what, I'm kind of maybe
"interested in building one."
And then he goes, "Yeah, I've got this piece of land
"and I don't know what to do with, and I thought
"that would be a perfect solution."
And I said, "I have a piece of land,
"I wanted the same thing."
It was like, either you get a trailer, motor home,
because it's like a camp, you're never there.
And then I thought to myself, when I was talking to
the entrepreneur, I said, "Look at...
"there's two people out of six that are interested
"in buying your product, what do we have in common?"
And he was like, "I don't know."
And I said, "We both have land that's not being used."
Now, if that's a potential avenue you could go down,
fish where the fish are, could you get a list of
everybody in this state or province, depending on
what country you live in, that has land that doesn't
have a building on it, can you get that list?
The answer is yes.
That is your potential customer base.
So that is the concept that I want to share with you
in regards to fish where the fish are.
So number one, just to recap, rising stars.
Pick a market, or category, or an industry, that's
growing, and insert yourself in the product hook, is what
I call it, to make sure you can grow with that market.
Number two, is feed a starving crowd.
Make sure that that market has the need for your
solution, so that they want that more than the features
and the benefits and all these other bells and whistles,
they just have the need, because that will be
the easiest sale you every make.
And then finally, find a place where the fish are.
Make sure that you are actually fishing in the
right pond, and ask yourself, "Out of my top customers,
"what are the characteristics, both in their personal
"life, the way they make decisions, maybe their
"financial status, that might mean that that's why
"they are my ideal customer, and how can I go
"find more like them?"
So, my question to you and the comment I would ask you
to leave below is, what market do you want to serve?
Not where you're at today, but if you can
think back and ask that question, where do you
think you might want to go next?
And you don't have to tell your company or product idea,
because you might feel like that's competitive,
but I would love to hear from you below in the comments
on your market you wanna serve.
Where's the starving crowd?
Where's the fish?
What's your rising star?
Hook onto it, grow your business.
As per usual, I want to challenge you to live a bigger
life and a bigger business, and I'll see you next Monday.
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Have an incredible day, so blessed to have you here,
and I'll see you next week.