The Dog, the Hare, and the Power of a New Lens

Once, an old hound came across a hare and gave chase. The two raced over hills and fields until, finally, the hound became tired and gave up. 

As he trotted home, a neighbor who had seen the chase chided the hound, saying…

“That little hare is faster than you.”

The hound replied…

“Don’t you see the difference between us? I was only running for a dinner, but he was running for his life.”

Most marketing misses its target; it fails to create action, attract customers, or move the needle for the business it exists to serve. When confronted with this uncomfortable reality, most marketers either avoid it altogether or pour themselves into tweaking the tactics:

• "Maybe we just need better creative."
• "What keywords are we using?"
• Or worst of all - "what is our competition doing?"

Each of these questions is essential in developing a good marketing campaign. Good creative matters, using the right language matters, and understanding the competitive landscape is critical. The problem is that this is where most companies START planning their campaigns.

When most people think about marketing, they immediately pull forward a set of assumptions they have about their product and the larger market.

Great marketing begins by challenging these assumptions and finding a new lens to view the problems we solve.

Your Lens Matters

When you begin your marketing with tactics, you are almost sure to fail.

You'll fail because no matter what someone calling themself a "growth-hacker" tells you, marketing is not a sequenced list of activities that push our prospects through well-oiled funnels to sell them another widget. Marketing is the practice of building new lenses that enable our customers and our companies to see the world in a new way and improve their lives.

Clamoring over the latest industry share of voice reports is a losing proposition.

When we pursue tactics before creating new lenses, we confuse external activity with internal motivations; we fail to account for the stories our customers are playing on a loop in their minds. Those stories are everything.

Most of us in business make the fatal error of assuming that the first sale we need to make is that of our product or service—the one we are exchanging for money. The reality is that there is a different kind of sale that must occur first - a transaction that takes place in the minds of our target customers, providing them with a new lens - some new way to see the problems they face.

Winners Are Problem-Led

One of the biggest problems I see in agtech today is that companies are rushing to market with solutions before defining the problem. In other words, they sell their brand of "better" before telling the customer why an answer is necessary.

Companies often identify themselves as product-led, sales-led, or customer-led. Companies that succeed are problem-led.

The problem with product-led companies is that they create great stories within their own four walls. They're just like the online troll who lives in his mom's basement but considers himself a Maserati aficionado and a dating expert - their sense of grandeur is delusional. Our job as marketers is to study our customers and discover what interests them, uncover the questions keeping them up at night, and build products that answer those questions.

The problem with sales-led companies is that they end up spineless, telling whatever story is necessary to close the next deal. Eventually, they grow to a specific size, realize nothing is holding them together, and implode. Money is great; the right money is better.

The difference between customer-led and problem-led is that if you are going to be in business, your customer cannot have all the answers. Sure, they need you to understand what they are trying to do, but it is a mistake to be fully customer-led. The problem is that most people can’t imagine a future they are not actively experiencing, and asking customers what they want is a good way to lose your market position.

Our customers need us to have ideas about where we are taking them; they need us to build new products to support them on their journey. They need you to create new categories and new lenses on business. They need you to be problem-led.

• In the 1830s and 1840s, most people's lens told them that harvesting crops had to be done by hand… as it had always been done. Then Cyrus McCormick identified the inefficiencies of this system and introduced us to his solution: the mechanical reaper.
• In 1870 most people believed that farmers had to rely on animals for all significant on-farm activity…then a group of inventors constructed a lens that cast most animal labor as a thing of the past, and they popularized the tractor as the modern solution. 
• In 1970 most people viewed the computer as something they could only use in the offices of a Multinational’s headquarters…then a group of innovators showed us how being disconnected limited our growth and introduced us to the personal computer. 
• In 2005 most people clung to the lens that their phones needed more buttons...more buttons meant more functions. Then Steve Jobs and Apple showed us how unscaleable this was and sold us the modern smartphone with no physical buttons.

All of these were great products; they served customers and sold like crazy, but they did not assume that their customers were looking at the world through their lens. First, they sold the worldview - then they sold the product.

Quit focusing on product spec sheets and chest-thumping presentations about how great your company or product is. Start telling us about how big your problem is, then build a product that solves that problem.

Being a Problem-Led Company Means Designing Your Category

Many people tell me that the idea of category design is too complicated and too hard to understand.

That is nonsense...and in many cases, it's fear of doing something "new."

Category design is just providing a new lens to our customers so that we can help them view their problems in such a way that our products become the obvious solution.

Stop copying your competition, stop looking for quick-fix tactics, and stop trying to indoctrinate us into your delusional product cult. Instead, recognize that every observable action begins in your customer's mind. Start telling stories that change the way your customers see the world.

Want your product idea or company to grow? Start designing the category that drives the change you want to see in your customer’s world. 

1. Identify the gap. What problems do you solve? Make a list.
2. Define the vision. What does your customer’s life look like in 5 years?
3. Name it. Give your solution a real name that gives people a good idea of how you will solve this problem.  

Make something different. Make people care. Make fans, not followers.

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