You live in a bubble.
I live in a bubble too.
Today I really got a reminder of this…
I’ve been planning a marketing experiment for my company.
The short version of this plan is to go after larger clients.
Right now our positioning is focused on the entrepreneur, leader, CEO or expert.
We help this one very busy person get time back by placing two executive assistants from North America to support them.
The new experiment is going to position an offer at a hiring manager or workforce executive in a company.
The client in this case is a larger organization and the person we sell to is solving HR problems for the entire company or a department in the company.
For example, we could roll out 10 assistants to support 20 people in one department.
Or 100 to support 500 people (provided we can scale our hiring and processes).
With this new offer our deliverables remain the same – we give people time back. We’d just be doing it for more people at once.
However, in this case the marketing is different. The person we sell to is different.
This is nothing new of course. It’s common for companies to target larger contracts as a way to grow.
Expanding Your Bubble
The reason I saw the bubble I operate in today is because I did some research.
I wanted to know more about the staffing solutions industry.
Our company operates in this industry (a sub-segment), so I was curious who are the really big players.
My ‘bubble’ up to this point was made up of the 30 or so companies that we compete against who all offer remote assistants of some kind.
I see these companies advertising for the same keywords we do in Google.
I get targeted by their ads on social media.
I know these companies because they come up on sales calls as options potential clients are considering along with us.
I also know these companies from my own research to see how they present their offers, pricing, points of difference, etc.
I’ve even done a few competitor deep dives, listening to podcast interviews with their founders to see if I can learn a key tactic they used to grow.
The biggest player in this group, based on my research, does around $30 Million a year, probably more since I heard this number a few years ago.
I’m almost certain none of these competing companies do over $100 Million a year.
Today I learned about a staffing solutions company that does $25 BILLION per year in revenue.
I expected to find larger companies when I expanded into the more broad staffing solutions market, but I had no idea the numbers could get this big.
Since then I’ve spent hours discovering more staffing solutions companies, reviewing their service offerings and exploring their websites.
It’s been eye-opening — and exciting, demonstrating that there is a lot more money being spent than I previously thought.
Bubbles Are Dangerous
The thing with bubbles is that you stay in them by default.
You visit the same websites. The social algorithms feed you similar content from the same or similar sources.
It’s all an echo chamber until you deliberately step out.
What’s especially dangerous about being in a bubble is you follow what you see and set your expectations to match what others do.
You think you have to advertise in the same way a company or person you compete against or follow does.
The problem is you don’t know about what you are not seeing.
Take for example the staffing solutions companies I learned about today.
I’ve never been exposed to their marketing before.
I didn’t even know they existed.
Their marketing doesn’t target me. They may not even do any advertising using media channels.
Companies can get very big from direct outreach and interpersonal relationships.
These methods are not ‘broadcasted’.
You won’t hear about these companies unless you are directly targeted by them, in which case you are probably working for a large company yourself.
Media doesn’t pay any attention to them because they are in ‘boring’ industries.
We hear all day about tech companies and tech founders.
We see ads from a segment of mostly mass-market consumables, like food, entertainment, electronics, cars, homeware, fashion and other items we use every day.
Staffing solutions is not mass market.
Yet everyone needs a job. And every company needs to hire staff.
It’s a global need, but it’s not something that is in the public eye.
There are so many companies and industries like this that operate within bubbles you never see.
As an entrepreneur and marketer I find this FASCINATING.
There are billions of dollars in transactions happening and these companies are following different marketing playbooks.
I get excited because it shows how big industries really are and how limited our marketing has been.
There’s always more you can do and more people to reach.
Yet so many give up because the few things they do are not working.
The world is vast and if you have something of value there are more buyers out there.
You just need to keep reaching new people with new messages.
Don’t stop, keep growing!
Yaro
