Hi Mike,

Thanks, great post!

My thoughts after reading it is the lotions company you talked about need to do something DIFFERENT. Something to make them "stand out from the crowd".

There are plenty of companies which make natural lotions - what makes them different?

When you do it differently, you get

ATTENTION!

And when something is different, people talk about it....

(Excuse the plug.) In The Great Ideas Letter, Michael Ross and I cover a number of businesses which are quite "different". It's often by being different that they get attention and streak ahead of the pack....

Of course, you still have to have something that people want. But that's not enough.... It has to get attention in some way too, by being different....

Surprise people!

I'll give an example I came across while doing research for The Great Ideas Letter....

There is a woman who sells a particular type of natural soap. "Another natural soap?" you might think. Aren't there enough natural soaps around already?

But she's doing well with hers. What makes it different?

In her natural soap, she puts in glacial silt. That's right, extremely fine silt left over from the movement of glaciers. She claims that the glacial silt in her soap helps to give you smoother skin.

Does it really give you smoother skin? I have no idea - and I bet her customers have no idea either. But glacial silt soap? Wow, what a difference! That's sure to get people talking!

- Dien Rice


More DIFFERENT ideas here....