Turn Up The Volume or Change The Channel

I’m a big believer in targeted marketing: figuring out who you can bring the most value to and then making sure they know it.

This process explicitly involves excluding certain people from the process: those people to whom your offering or your message does not resonate or bring value.

And that’s the rub.

Many business owners cannot tolerate the thought of “leaving money on the table” by explicitly excluding anyone from becoming a customer. They try to please everyone and often end up pleasing no one.

One company that never had that problem is the Hooters restaurant chain. Their sexually suggestive name and scantily-clad waitresses polarize much of the public into lovers and haters.

But that’s just fine with Hooters. The haters have had limited impact on their image and the lovers have allowed them to grow to over $1 billion in projected 2007 sales. Not bad for a company that started with just a single location in Clearwater, Florida in 1983.

While you don’t have to adopt a brand as controversial as Hooters, the same lesson applies. As Internet marketing guru Alex Mandossian says, every business should boldly ask the people they are targeting to “either turn up the volume or change the channel.” Your brand should speak boldly and your business act decisively. Those who agree will want more and those who don’t will turn away. And that’s okay. It’s a big country.

Food for thought.