💰 The secrets of undercover billionaires 💰

Putting the customer first. View in browser Hi, Did you ever watch the show Undercover Billionaire? It's a kind of hokey reality show with a kind of corny premise: a billionaire is randomly dropped into a small rustbelt city with just $100 in their pocket, and they have 90 days to build a business worth a million dollars – armed only with a cell phone and an old pick-up truck. Reader, I was enthralled. Ever wanted to watch a billionaire clean a toilet? Sleep in a car? Go without food? Desperately scour a scrapyard for anything to sell online like some modern-day mudlark? It truly is a show for our times. Just be ready for that aforementioned hokeyness because the aim of the show, and its titular billionaire, was to prove the American Dream is still A Thing. As part of the set-up, our billionaire couldn't reveal his true identity or tap into his contacts, wealth, or clout. All he had going for him was his finely honed business instincts, and a never-ending supply of good 'ol American gumption. But in fairness to the protagonist, he wasn't just doing this for kicks and seemed sincere about the show's central conceit – to the point that he made a million-dollar bet on the outcome. Glenn Stearns was the businessman in question and the inconvenient truth was that he wasn't quite a billionaire – your first clue that this wasn't exactly a scientific experiment. He also wasn't quite undercover either, given he had a camera crew following him around, but I guess Half Undercover Half Billionaire wasn't quite as snappy. The show was fun though. And aside from all the careful editing and contrived story arcs that are a given with the "reality" genre, there were some genuinely interesting business insights along the way. One of my favorites surrounded a very holistic view of marketing that really made me chew the cud. Watching Stearns lay out his thought process as he cycled through potential business ideas was fascinating. He quickly determined he would need three separate businesses if he was to reach a million-dollar valuation in such a short period of time, each a stepping-stone to the next. First, he needed to generate some quick cash from selling used tires so he could stop sleeping in his car and have enough left over to buy a rundown property. Second, he needed to renovate that property as quickly as possible so that he could flip it in time to have the seed money to set up his final business. And third, he had to choose a money-making endeavor which had the potential to scale quickly and grow to a million-dollar valuation in less than 90 days. What was especially interesting was that while he was engaged with the first steps of this plan, he had literally no idea what that million dollar business was going to be but was utterly confident he could build… something… once he had the seed money. Stearns had a very simple process for determining what that business should be. He started with the customer. And it truly opened my eyes to the meaning of "putting the customer first." It doesn't just mean "the customer is always right" or that you are just agreeing to whatever a customer says or wants so you can avoid a PR disaster, a social media pile-on, a one-star review on Yelp, or being badmouthed in the community. It's really not a reactive or defensive or disingenuous philosophy. Instead it's about making the customer the heart of everything. At one point in Undercover Billionaire Stearns talks directly about his business philosophy. He says that most businesses fail – it's just a fact – and most of them fail for obvious reasons: they run out of money. And that might not be because their product is poor; it's often a marketing problem. But Stearns said that most companies approach marketing in the wrong way: they build a product, and then they try and find customers for it. "What's wrong with that?" you might reasonably ask. Well, according to Stearns, you have it backwards. You should start with the customer. Figure out what they want and then sell it to them! If you take that approach instead, you don't have to go hunting for your market after you build your product, you don't have to figure out who your customers are. You already know. This is the exact approach of another businessman whose billionaire status is certainly not under question. Jeff Bezos has a famous, and some would say relentless, customer focus, one which had a multiplying effect on his business as each new customer acted as an evangelist for Amazon, luring further customers there by raving about low prices/huge selection/one-click purchasing (take your pick). One of the core beliefs of Amazon via Bezos is that you should think about what customers want… and then work backwards from there. It sounds so simple, but it really is the exact opposite of how most businesses are run where someone conceives of a product or service, and then tries to figure out how to sell it, or who to sell it to. People with the mindset of Stearns and Bezos start with the result they want and work backwards. Look at what is already selling and sell something like that. Build a better mousetrap, in other words. In Undercover Billionaire, Stearns availed of some free services in the town aimed at new businesses, and did some market research on the local population, quickly determining that his most likely route to quick profits was in craft beer and BBQ, and that's the business he threw himself into, even though he knew absolutely nothing about craft beer and BBQ (he hired hardworking locals who were experts instead). He started with the customer and worked backwards. Instead of coming up with his own business idea or leaning on his own experience (Stearns made his money as a mortgage lender). What does this mean for authors? Should we all start writing knock-offs of Ready Player One or Girl on A Train or Game of Thrones or Fifty Shades? Perhaps not, although it's certainly worth noting that you'll have a far easier time if you work in a genre which already has readers, rather than trying to plow a new furrow or convince readers to experiment outside their comfort zone. How much you want to write to market is your call, but there's no doubt you'll have an easier time finding readers if you write a series, and do it in a commercially viable genre. As Seth Godin says (and I continually repeat), the best marketing is baked into a product. In other words, marketing isn't something which should be exclusively performed as some kind of final stage in getting a product into a customer's hands, like some task quickly performed in between production and shipping. Good marketers start much earlier than that, and not in the sense of building buzz before your book launch. Rather, your understanding of your customer – your Ideal Reader – should inform the writing of your book, the cover you select, the title you choose, the price you attach, and the blurb you write. It should be baked into the product. The fonts on your website, the voice in your emails, the images in your BookBub Ads, the ad copy on Facebook – all of it should be designed with a strong sense of your Ideal Reader. Instead of thinking "how do I get readers to sign up to my list?" you should be thinking "how can I design the most enticing reader magnet possible?" It's the difference between hoping to sell something to customers… and building something you already know they will love. That's the secret behind marketing campaigns which look effortless: the hard work was done already. Putting the customer first doesn't mean putting up with brattishness on the shop floor and bitching about them in the breakroom afterwards, or giving away the farm either, for that matter. It means taking a holistic view of marketing – starting with the customer and working backwards – and it means giving people what they want rather than trying to convince them through fair means or foul that they actually want something else. And you do that through knowing your customer inside out. I talk about this a lot in my book Strangers to Superfans, but your key takeaway is this: think deeply about your Ideal Reader and get to know her as well as you can. Let this sense of your Ideal Reader inform everything that you do. And if you always keep your Ideal Reader front-and-center, you won't go far wrong. Dave P.S. Cud-chewing music this week is Hank Williams with I'll Never Get Out of This World Alive. DavidGaughran.com Broomfield Business Park, Malahide, Co. Dublin, Ireland You received this email because you signed up at DavidGaughran.com. Unsubscribe