The Boss of You

Fast Company has a short, sweet, and awesome article on their site called “Polarize Me,” which is all about narrowing down your target audience by figuring out who you can safely ignore. The authors begin by discussing online personal ads and their general suckiness.

We examined more than 1,000 Match.com ads—from men and women, old and young. Our search yielded headlines like this one: “Hey.” Folks, if your opening line is “Hey,” you better be hot.

Another said “Looking for love.” Well, duh, you’re on Match.com. At least two-thirds of the headlines said nothing—and did it poorly.

Why do these headlines suck so much? Fear. Fear of saying too much. Fear of saying something clever that someone might think is stupid. Fear of saying something revealing that might turn someone off. The headlines try desperately not to exclude anyone. In doing so, they succeed at boring everyone.

So true. The most memorable marketing pitches we’ve seen aren’t trying to appeal to every single person on the planet. You can go a long way to finding your target market by determining who you don’t want to reach; forget about what those people might want to hear, because they’re completely beside the point. Alternately, you may want to actively exclude them. Lots of people like to feel like part of an exclusive group — perhaps because we live in a world that’s growing at a pace that makes us feel anonymous and unimportant.

One of my favourite examples of brilliant “exclusive” marketing comes by way of Hendrick’s gin. The first thing that made me stop and take notice of Hendrick’s was its squat, dark-brown, apothecary-like bottle (and the gorgeous, McSweeney’s-like typography on the label). Here’s a sample line of marketing copy from Hendrick’s: “Preferred by 1 out of 1,000 gin drinkers. (Fine by us, it’s not easy making this stuff.)”

This is a product whose creators have been brave enough to say right up front that this is perhaps not a gin the Queen Mum would enjoy. (Though maybe she would — surely the House of Windsor has fairly refined taste in gin.) Their gin, they happily declare, is a little odd. They recommend garnishing a Hendrick’s G&T with cucumber (and naturally, their website is festooned with odd little cucumber illustrations where you least expect them). They tell you their gin will be an acquired taste, but worth a bit of effort if you’re up to the task. The copy writing is assertive and ironic, challenging the potential buyer to see if they’re worthy — and very funny.

So who makes up their target market? Adventurers. Connoisseurs. Foodies who like a bit of a challenge vis-a-vis beverage and food pairings. Those who enjoy a cocktail with a twist of good humour, and a bit of nostalgia in the mix. And of course, people like me, who are suckers for fabulous packaging and clever, tongue-in-cheek marketing.

And I imagine that little niche is exactly where the people behind Hendrick’s want to be, because theirs is a niche product. (Shameless plug: For more on finding your niche, check out our book — we talk about niches a lot.) Small businesses need some kind of specialization in order to compete with the big-business players, so why not revel in the stuff that makes you different? Sure, you may lose a handful of people who prefer to stay in their safety zone, but you’ll develop far more genuine (and deep) relationships with your customers if you risk going beyond the “hey”. And that kind of customer loyalty is something The Gap can only dream of.