A Category of One

Expertise used to determine reputation. Your expertise became your personal brand. If consistently executed, you might have even become a known SME (subject matter expert). 

But what do you when expertise is a commodity? Thanks to the proliferation of information and the lower barrier to entry, it is virtually impossible to be the best expert in any field. 

Thought-leadership became the next level after SME. Thought-leadership is about getting attention and income for who you are not just what you know. So many SMEs decided to brand themselves. They wrote books, launched podcasts, created on-line courses and became thought-leaders.

When there were a few thought-leaders, they could use promotion and publicity to become known. But you no longer can promote your way to thought-leadership. Sure, you need a marketing machine for amplifying your ideas and products. But there are too many thought-leaders and too much noise. 

This leaves one solution … 

Become a category of One. 

Becoming a category of One transcends expertise and thought-leadership. It means becoming the queen or king of a space, field, idea. 

Brene Brown owns vulnerability.

Ellen DeGeneres owns kindness.

Tim Ferriss owns lifehacking.

James Clear owns habits.

Eckhart Tolle owns presence.

The biggest names of history were all categories of One: Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed, Abraham Lincoln, Amelia Earhart, Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr, Frida Kahlo, Elvis, Nelson Mandela, Mother Teresa and so many more. 

None of them got to category status because of their publicists.

They became categories of One because of doing truly epic things. They were unconcerned about being experts or even thought-leaders. They felt called to do mighty things, transformative things. And they did them - often at the expense of their freedom or lives.

Whether living or dead, globally famous or locally famous, categories of One have three things figured out ...

• Think and behave like an artist. Expertise is left-brain, problem-solving acumen. Becoming a category is far more about accessing the right brain; your creative side. This means viewing your brand as an ever-evolving practice. It means making words (spoken or written) your art. It means choosing to create something you want without knowing how the market will respond. And it means disciplined consistency with creating output to share with the world.
• Know who you are and what you believe. Expertise and thought-leadership are primarily extrinsic traits driven by experience and intellect. Becoming a category of One comes from the soul; the inner world. To do that, you have to be brave enough to go inward, touch your wounds, accept your gifts. You have to know your intrinsic beliefs; the things you’ve always known to be true. You have to reconcile past negative experiences and failures.
• Continuously innovate. The best categories of One are constantly iterating. They bring a beginner’s mind to their craft. They behave more like disciples and less like prophets. They are insatiably curious. They consume a ton of content. They sample, try, fail, learn. They are collaborative yet individualistic. They know the trends but are obsessive about originality.

"But Justin, I don’t want to be a category of one.”

Ok. Fine. 

But inside of you is a mission. You have been been given specific gifts. You’ve walked through dark valleys. You are alive at this time and in this place.

Do you really think all of that was to stay small and safely known?