Good Design & Specificity

Posted: August 27th, 2009 | Author: Chance Barnett | Filed under: Design, Marketing Strategy, Psychology, Random | Tags: | Comments

Some quick words and an important tip for you…

It’s something that came up the other day while working on copy and design around a critical conversion point in my new venture http://gig.fm (follow @gigfm)

Here it is…

The most successful business and marketing plans I’ve seen and watched grow have been those aimed not at a broad group of “everyone” but at a very specific type of person.

So specific, in fact, that it seemed in most of these cases that there wouldn’t be many people (a large market) who matched that description or would fit into that group that was the intended market.

But the incredible part is that, time and time again, it’s the very well-defined and targeted strategy that works.

This picture sums it up pretty nicely.

Specificity in Design

Attribution: this picture is from 101 Things I Learned in Architecture School by Matthew Frederick

A take away…

When you try and market and sell to everyone, you often get no one.

It’s not what EVERYONE will like about your product that will lead individuals to buy it. It’s what ONE INDIVIDUAL will light up when hearing that will create your success in marketing.

Many people forget that you aren’t communicating One-to-Many in todays world. Instead, you’re communicating One-to-One in almost every context… even when the One-to-One dynamic is spread across thousands or millions of users and you.

So think about it. This principle of Specificity is an important design principle, but it’s also VERY important in marketing and copywriting and most forms of communication. The more specific your communication, the more people can grab on to it.

Tip of the hat to John Weir for sending me the image and the design conversation and learnings shared.

  • Hey Chance,

    I completely agree with you. Reminds me of the old saying:

    "He who is good at everything is great at nothing".

    To achieve success in today's world, we must choose one thing to be great at.

    I'm looking forward to watching Gig.fm grow!

    Corey
  • James Mielnik
    Very counter intuitive principle. A mindset that has really helped me grasp it is asking what we really doing when specifying and communicating one-to-one vs. to the masses? We are FOCUSING. Focusing all our energy in this case on speaking to one very well defined person we can help and BLOCKING OUT the rest.

    When we look at word class people and the level of success they achieve the power of focusing becomes less counter intuitive and more obvious. To use a general example would Tiger Woods be the success he is if he tried to be the best all around sports player in the world and played a bit of squash, basketball and golf? There’s no way…. Focusing is one of the keys. He focuses on golf and blocks out the rest.

    Like Chance said the incredible thing is that time and time again it’s the very well-defined and targeted strategy that works and seemingly not only in marketing but life in general.

    Thanks for sharing!
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