The 14 Commandments of Creating a "Wealth Pulling" Niche!

The person who finds or creates a special niche, gets the cream of our societies financial rewards. Whether you're Bill Gates or Joe Average.

To out-niche your competitors you must focus on these "14 commandments" of niche creation at all times. Observe the ones you apply to your business, product, or service - and watch your sales soar.

1."The Principle of Adaptation" - The simplest way to create a new idea is to do what others in another business or industry are doing. Next, see if you can adapt it to your own business, product, or service.

2. "The Principle of Addition" - Can you add something extra to your product or service that your competition doesn't have or isn't doing?

3. "The Principle of Combination" - "What positive elements can you combine from another product or service to make yours better?" A candy bar did it with simple peanut butter and chocolate, and made a successful new product. So can you.

4. "The Principle of Customization" - Can you find little ways to personalize a part of your product or service? That's a quick, easy, and cheap way to create niches. Can you make your product or service more personal and less cookie cutter?

5. "The Principle of Ease and Convenience" - Can you find more ways to make your product or service easier and more convenient to buy, use, or own? Then you'll have a strong niche.

6. "The Principle of Elimination" - What negative or inconvenience can you eliminate for your customer, with your product or service. People not only pay for more they'll pay for less. Less irritations, less waiting, less inconveniences.

7. "The Principle of Enlargement" - Do people like your service or product? Then it's a sure-fire bet there is a segment of your market that would like even more of it. Can you super-size something?

8. "The Principle of Entertainment" - From cradle to grave, we all have this inner urge to be entertained, amused, or fascinated - especially before we spend our money. A relaxed customer spends more. Find little ways to amuse customers before, while, or after they buy your product or service.

9. "The Principle of Longevity" - It's making some feature of your product or service last longer. It can also include making a positive experience or feeling last longer. If you can do either, you will have a niche that's hard to match.

10. "The Principle of Portability" - People hate to be tied down. So, if your product allows people the freedom to use your product or service in more than one place, that's a powerful niche.

11. "The Principle of Reduction" - If you sell a product or service, is there any way to reduce a certain feature to make it more convenient? More portable? Or easier to use? Can you reduce it and make it more affordable for another type of customer?

12. "The Principle of Reversal" - Look at what features or services your competition is offering or not offering and reverse them. If they close on weekends, can you be open? If they cater to seniors, target more young people. Or if they cater to high-end customers, target more low-end volume customers etc? The list is endless.

13. "The Principle of Safety" - If you can show others how your product or service can add safety or reduce risk, you'd have a powerful niche. People hate to experience loss, feel insecure, or waste money. Try to think of little ways you can help people avoid the above with your product or service.

14. "The Principle of Speed" - You should always be thinking, "What can I do faster than my competitors-without reducing quality?" Can you fill your orders faster? Can you give faster service? Can your product get faster results? Can you resolve customer issues faster? Think speed!

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REFERENCE: Business Know-How

Failure is the Mother of Innovation

"Failure is our most important product. "
R.W. JOHNSON, FORMER CEO, JOHNSON & JOHNSON

It is amazing how many innovative and visionary companies have grown, not out of detailed strategic planning, but rather by trail and error. By stumbling onto a great opportunity by accident.

Johnson & Johnson started their business back in 1890 as a supplier of antiseptic gauze. Because of complaints that this gauze caused skin irritation with some patients, they started sending a small packet of Italian talc with their medicated plasters to apply to the skin. To their surprise, customers started asking to buy the talc directly. J&J responded by creating a separate product called "Johnson's Toilet and Baby Powder". And as they say in the classics, the rest is history!

In the 1940's J Willard Marriott was running a successful group of restaurants, and was opening up new restaurants across the country following a strategy that clearly worked. But then a strange thing started to happen at his restaurant located at Hoover Airport (now Reagan National) in Washington DC. Their customers were not behaving in the same way as customers at other restaurants. Many of the customers at this airport restaurant were buying meals and snacks, and stuffing them into pockets, paper bags and carry on luggage - and taking the food onto the plane with them. Marriott was smart enough to recognise the opportunity and within a short time, had negotiated a deal with the airlines to supply pre-packaged food to passengers on the tarmac. This service soon grew to other airports and became a major business for Marriott Corporation.

Jim Collins and Jerry Porras write about companies that "Try a lot of stuff and keep what works" in their book "Built to Last". As J&J, Marriott and many other successful companies have shown, growth is not driven purely by good strategy. Bill Hewlett of HP stated that he "never planned more than two of three years out". Companies follow an evolutionary process that allows them to grow through learning from what works and what does not work for them.

But, how do you formalize this "evolutionary process" to ensure that you DO learn from your mistakes, and that you do not miss opportunities that may be off your strategy radar? The answer is through making innovation part of your business.

You make innovation part of your business by having the your ear to the ground! This means having the capability to capture business intelligence, and then to review that information that may be off your strategy radar to find those variations in your business that will lead to opportunities that you may not have thought of. The greatest source of this information is your people! How are you tapping into this wealth of information, ideas, and creative energy; and then translating this into your business plan? Are you staying fresh and ahead of the competition, or are you sticking to what you have done in the past? How do you know what works and what does not work in your business?

Imagine what Marriott Corporation would look like today, if they had ignored what was happening at that one restaurant at the Hoover Airport way back in the 1940s!