On being unpredictable

Unique. Like Everyone Else

One of the attributes of most startups is that they are inventing a future. What you are trying to do has typically never been done before; at least in the form of your company. Yes, there are well-established attributes that help you win every time (like taking talent seriously and building great cultures), but there are many opportunities for you to be different and unique. 

And just like everybody else, that’s all we ever want; to be unique. 

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Growth Jamming

In May, for TechWeek, I had the privilege of hosting the inaugural Capital Growth Jam in Wellington (sponsored by WellingtonNZ and Movac). We invited seven founders and growth leaders to tell their best growth stories: Ralph Highnam (Volpara Health), Aaron Ward (AskNicely), Brooke Roberts (Sharesies), Joe Harris (Eucalyptus), Craig Piggott (Halter), Jo Blundell (Timely), and Ricky Sevta (SimPRO).‍

What occurred to me after the session wasn’t that these people are intelligent and driven (they are!) but that they succeeded by taking non-obvious paths. They did the unpredictable. It seems obvious when you say it, but we don’t talk about it enough.

There are many reasons why you might want to take the unpredictable path if you are in a startup:

• You don’t have much money, so you cannot hire the best salespeople, get a big booth at a conference, or deploy Google Ads like your competitors. You need to find cash-efficient ways of making an impact and sustaining traction.
• Your list of competitors is long, and many of them do the same or similar things as you. Whether you make shoes, B2B software, or creative services, your customers likely have many, many choices for solving their problems.
• You may be inventing a category – you solve a problem your customers don’t yet know they have or that they can address today. Educating a market at scale is hard, takes time and resources.
• The incumbents own the space you want to occupy. Maybe they are boring frequently-disliked companies like Oracle or SAP, but they are well-entrenched, and have fat, juicy margins they can deploy to keep you away.
• You are an interesting human; being boring is not your bag. This is a good enough reason for me!

This is not a mutually exclusive (nor exhaustive) list – I am sure more than one of these resonates with you, especially if you are starting your growth journey.

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Ten Types of Innovation

In the late 1990s, research firm Doblin (now owned by Deloitte) developed the “Ten Types of Innovation” (see summary table below). This was a real breakthrough in thinking – it provided a useful, actionable framework for determining how to differentiate yourself in your market, regardless of your industry or category. Succeeding requires you to differentiate in more than one of the ‘innovation types’.

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1. Profit Model - How you make money

2. Network - Connections with others to create value

3. Structure - Alignment of your talent and assets

4. Process - Signature of superior methods for doing your work

5. Product Performance - Distinguishing features and functionality

6. Product System - Complementary products and services

7. Service - Support and enhancements that surround your offerings

8. Channel - How your offerings are delivered to customers and users

9. Brand - Representation of your offerings and business

10. Customer Engagement - Distinctive interactions you foster

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Sustained, Competitive Advantage

When meeting startup founders and leadership teams, I often ask them about their ‘sustained competitive advantage’ – that is, how they will innovate in their market.

Most of their responses centre on features (which are typically easy to imitate, especially in digital experiences) or the commitment of their team (which is true of many other startup peers). This is predictable. And even if true, it is not really sustainable

Here are some practical ways I think can give clarity to this question in a startup context:

• Counter-positioning. Work through what your messaging and positioning might look like if you had to be different from everyone in your market. What are all the others saying about their proposition? Figure that out and stand for the opposite, providing justifications for it.
• Ask Customers. Your customers will also be fatigued with the status quo. Ask them: “If we were to totally disrupt this market AND get your business, what would we need to do?” They will know, and they will tell you. Life is predictable and boring for your customers, too.
• Experimentation. It’s a fallacy to think you must have solved every problem with your product before you understand how to stand out from the crowd. Nonsense. You can put up ads on Facebook before you have shoes to sell. You can run an event or a LinkedIn campaign before you write a single line of code on your B2B software product. Experiment; try novel things.
• Guerilla Marketing Plan. A thought experiment that often works is to consider what “your most obnoxious, violent and disruptive guerilla marketing plan” might look like if you had little concern for reputation or consequences. This serves as a useful ‘bookend’ to your options. Push hard in that direction.
• Write a Headline. You and your team could write a newspaper headline on how you became famous. It won’t read “ACME software gradually improves Paid Search to reduce acquisition cost”. It will likely be something more aspiration and provoking. Give it a go – you will be surprised by the audacity of the options in front of you.

Being less predictable is needed if your startup is to work. It also makes for a more intrepid expedition for you and the fellow mammals who have joined you on your startup mission.

It’s your company. Be bold. Be less predictable.