A few years ago, Bruce Smith experienced a downturn at his Salt Lake City-based travel agency. Airlines had eliminated its sales commissions. The recession and recent terrorist attacks have also taken their toll. And because the travel industry was ultra-competitive, he knew he had to find ways to distinguish his company from thousands of other travel agencies.

So, he had a lucky accident. His wife asked where they would celebrate his first wedding anniversary. When he gave her a blank look, she started to plan a trip, but she didn’t tell him what she was planning. Because he enjoyed the mystery leading up to the trip and the clues his wife gave him, he rebranded his travel service as The Veiled Voyage, selling “destination unknown” vacations to couples and others.

Smith’s clever branding strategy was a success. Not only did it help him create a unique and memorable brand, it also made him ‘slightly’ famous.

Now, most of Smith’s business comes from referrals from happy customers who tell their friends about The Veiled Voyage. He regularly appears in newspapers, magazines, and radio shows and was even invited to speak at a national travel conference. In addition, he has been able to expand his brand with a major supermarket chain through a lucrative co-branding relationship that has further expanded his business.

The ‘slightly’ famous you

Some business owners attract customers and clients like magic. They don’t cold call or rely on advertising. However, they regularly appear in newspapers and magazines and are invited to speak at conferences. Everybody knows his name and he gets all the business he can handle.

It’s almost like they’re famous.

Indeed, they are, but not in the way that movie stars and athletes are famous, they are just a little famous. Just famous enough that their names come to mind when people search for a particular product or service. They get more business, not just more, but the right kind of business, and they don’t have to work as hard to get it.

Do you want to join them and enjoy this ideal state of affairs, where customers come to you? It can, but it may require a new way of thinking and a new marketing strategy. Although their efforts take different forms, six basic principles underlie all of them.

1. Target the best prospects

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

Alex Fisenko is known in the coffee world as ‘the Dean of Beans’. The 60-something coffee connoisseur opened his first espresso shop in the 1960s. Since then, he has focused his energies and now sells his expertise in launching a successful coffee business to aspiring entrepreneurs. businessmen. Alex runs coffee shop seminars and sells a training course called ‘Success in the Espresso Business’.

His website, http://www.espressobusiness.com, generates thousands of dollars a month in product sales and consulting engagements in the United States, Thailand, South Korea, Belgium, Saudi Arabia, and Barbados. “By targeting the best prospects, I now make more money through book sales and consulting than when I was running coffee shops,” says Fisenko.

2. Develop 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 began writing books on skydiving and hang gliding more than thirty years ago. Although it might seem that his audience would be too small to generate significant sales, he knew his market and where to find them. Best of all, he has the market to himself!

Instead of trying to fight for attention in general bookstores, he sold books to skydiving clubs, parachute dealers, and the US Parachute Association. He developed a reputation in skydiving circles and has enjoyed steady sales of his books for more than three decades.

3. Position your business as the best solution

Positioning is about identifying a key attribute of your business that is not offered by competitors and 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 the same thing. To stand out, he mastered a popular accounting program and promoted himself as a ‘QuickBooks Software Training Consultant’.

Shepherd went from blending into a sea of ​​like-minded competitors to occupying a compelling market position. He charged higher rates and didn’t have to work as hard to get new clients. Word spread quickly among the accountants when they referred him to his clients. He even trained other bookkeepers in the use of accounting software.

4. Maintain your visibility

When was the last time your name appeared in print? Yesterday? In the past week? One month ago? Just because you remember doesn’t mean a potential customer will. To become ‘slightly’ famous, you need to spread your message, if not continuously, often enough to 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 shows to find out what kinds of guests were in demand, then looked for ways to match his professional skills to needs. specific. media. His strategy paid off.

At the height of the OJ Simpson trial, he sent out a press release about Simpson’s handwriting that resulted in several well-timed interviews with the media. He later appeared on Court TV to talk about Timothy McVey’s handwriting, and the director of that show recommended him to CNN. An article in Biography Magazine led to articles in the London Times, the Dallas Morning News, and others.

5. Improve your credibility

The surest way to gain credibility is by establishing yourself as a ‘recognized’ expert with intimate knowledge of your customers, clients and the industry. Experts outperform their competitors because they are recognized as knowing more than their competitors.

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

Tibbitts monitors global beverage trends daily while staying in touch with account managers at hotels and restaurants. It hosts a series of special events, ‘Fred Tibbitts Spring & Autumn Dinners with Special Friends’, in key markets including Hong Kong, Singapore and New York. Tibbitts also contributes a column to Hospitality International magazine and numerous industry publications.

6. Establish your brand and reputation

Slightly famous entrepreneurs use their smallness and specialness in ways that corporate giants can’t touch. They ensure their brands strike an emotional chord by bringing the ‘soul’ of their business to the forefront of their marketing.

When you meet Dave Hirschkop at a trade show, don’t expect to shake hands. That’s because she’ll be wearing a straitjacket while standing before a mock insane asylum to promote her popular line of ‘Insanity’ hot sauces.

Dave made his mark by making the hottest sauce possible. Instead of sensual pleasure, he promised pain, even danger. Now, Dave’s Gourmet, Inc. rises to the forefront of the crowded hot sauce category because it adopted a humorous brand strategy that resulted in fiercely loyal customers and massive media exposure.

When Dave introduced his Insanity Sauce at the National Fiery Foods Show in New Mexico, he had attendees sign a release form before tasting from a bottle that came in a coffin-like box wrapped in yellow police tape. His best publicity stunt, albeit an inadvertent one, occurred when a show promoter had a minor respiratory problem after tasting his sauce and banned him from the show.

To enjoy ‘slightly’ famous status, you don’t have to be crazy. But you must cultivate a brand identity that becomes the guiding star of your entire business. It will make sure that all of your marketing efforts are going in the same direction. You’ll waste less time, make fewer marketing mistakes, and stand out in an increasingly cluttered world.