Notes

6 Steps TO OBTAIN Slightly Famous
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 as the travel industry was ultra-competitive, he knew he previously to find methods to distinguish his company from thousands of other travel agencies.

Then, he previously a fortunate accident. His wife asked him where they might celebrate their first wedding anniversary. When he gave her a blank look, she set about planning a trip-but wouldn't simply tell him what she was planning. Because he enjoyed the mystery leading up to the trip, and the hints his wife gave him, he repackaged his travel service as The Veiled Voyage, selling 'destination unknown' vacations to couples among others.

Smith's clever branding strategy was a hit. It not only helped him create a unique and memorable brand, but additionally made him 'slightly' famous.

Now, the majority 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 increase 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, plus they get all of the business they are able to handle.

It's almost as if they were famous.

In fact, they're, but not in the way movie stars and athletes are famous--they're just slightly famous. Just famous enough to create their names one thinks of when people are searching for a particular service or product. They get more business - not merely more, but the right type of business - plus they don't have to work so hard to obtain it.

Want to join them and enjoy this ideal situation, where customers come to you? You can, nonetheless it may require a fresh thought process and a new marketing strategy. Although their efforts take different forms, underlying them all are six basic principles.

1. Targeting the very best prospects

Slightly famous entrepreneurs focus their marketing to focus on the best prospects.

Alex Fisenko is known in the wonderful world of coffee as 'the Dean of Beans.' The 60-something coffee expert started his first espresso shop in the 1960s. Since that time, he's focused his energies and now sells his expertise on launching a successful coffee business to aspiring entrepreneurs. Alex conducts restaurant seminars and sells a training course called 'Espresso Business Success.'

His Web site, http://www.espressobusiness.com, generates thousands of dollars per month in products sales and consulting engagements in america, Thailand, South Korea, Belgium, Saudi Arabia, and Barbados. 'By targeting the very best prospects, I now earn more income 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 inside a carefully selected market niche they can realistically hope to dominate.

Dan Poynter, for example, is really a successful self-publisher who started writing books about parachuting and hang-gliding over thirty years ago. Though it might sound as though his audience will be too small to create significant sales, he knew his market and where to find them. Best of all, he has the marketplace all to himself!

Rather than make an effort to fight for attention generally bookstores, he sold books to skydiving clubs, parachute dealers, and the U.S. Parachute Association. He developed a reputation in skydiving circles, and contains enjoyed steady sales of his books for a lot more than three decades.

3. Positioning your business because the best solution

Positioning is about identifying an integral attribute of your company not provided by competitors and that is clearly valuable to your target market.

When Harry Shepherd started his bookkeeping service a few years ago, he realized he was in competition with a large number of other bookkeepers selling essentially the same thing. To stand out, he mastered a favorite accounting program and marketed himself as a 'QuickBooks Software Training Consultant.'

Shepherd went from blending right into a sea of look-alike competitors to occupying a compelling market position. He charged higher fees, and he didn't have to work as hard to get new customers. Word spread fast among accountants as they referred him to their clients. He even trained other bookkeepers to utilize accounting software.

4. Maintaining your visibility

When was the last time your name appeared on the net? Yesterday? Last week? A month ago? Just because you remember doesn't mean a possible client will. To become 'slightly' famous, you need to have your message on the market, if not continuously, then often enough to help keep your name alive in customers' minds.

When Bart Baggett decided to make handwriting analysis his career, he embraced the media, and studied newspapers, magazines, and radio and television programs to discover what types of guests were in demand, and looked for ways to tie his professional abilities to specific media. His strategy paid.

At the height of the O.J. Simpson trial, he sent out a news release about Simpson's handwriting that led to several timely media interviews. He later appeared on Court TV to discuss Timothy McVey's handwriting, and was recommended by the director of this program to CNN. An attribute in Biography Magazine resulted in stories in the London Times, the Dallas Morning News, and others.

5. Enhancing your credibility

The surest solution to earn credibility is by establishing yourself as a 'recognized' expert with intimate knowledge of your clients, customers and industry. Experts out-position their competitors because they're recognized as knowing a lot more than their competitors.

Fred Tibbitts, Jr. founded Fred Tibbitts & Associates to help food and beverage companies reach global markets. He strategically cultivated a reputation in his industry as a well-connected and knowledgeable global beverage-marketing expert who is fluent in all the details of his business.

Tibbitts monitors global beverage trends every day while staying in contact with account managers at hotels and restaurants. He hosts a number of special events, 'Fred Tibbitts Spring & Autumn Dinners with Special Friends,' in key markets, including Hong Kong, Singapore, and NY. Tibbitts also contributes a column to Hospitality International Magazine and numerous industry publications.

6. Establishing your brand and reputation

Slightly famous entrepreneurs use their smallness and specialty with techniques that corporate giants can't touch. They make certain their brands strike an emotional chord by bringing their business 'soul' to the forefront of these marketing.

Once you meet Dave Hirschkop at a trade show, don't be prepared to shake his hand. That's because he'll be wearing a straitjacket while standing before a simulated insane asylum to market his popular type of 'Insanity' hot sauces.

Dave established his brand by making the hottest sauce possible. Instead of sensual pleasure, he promised pain, even danger. Now, Dave's Gourmet, Inc. steps to the front of the crowded hot sauce category because he embraced a humorous branding strategy that led to fiercely loyal customers and great media exposure.

When Dave introduced his Insanity Sauce at the National Fiery Foods Show in New Mexico, he made attendees sign a release form before tasting from the bottle that came in a coffin-like box wrapped with yellow police tape. His best, if unintended, publicity coup happened whenever a show promoter had a minor respiratory problem after tasting his sauce, and banned him from the show.

To take more info from 'slightly' famous status, you don't have to be insane. But, you need to cultivate a brandname identity that will become the guiding star of one's entire business. It will ensure that all your marketing efforts pull in exactly the same direction. You'll waste less time, make fewer marketing mistakes, and stand out in an increasing cluttered world.

Steven Van Yoder is author of Get Slightly FamousT: Become a Celebrity in Your Field and Attract More Business with Less Effort. Visit http://www.getslightlyfamous.com to read the book and find out about 'slightly' famous teleclasses, workshops, and marketing materials to greatly help smaller businesses and solo professionals attract more business.
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