Why You Should Strive To Be Great at Two or Three Things, Instead of Mediocre at Five or Six
By Scott Goldberg
Published June 2021
No matter what industry you're in, there's almost always going to be opportunities or temptations to expand your business to diversify and increase your revenue streams. Whether you’re a consumer products manufacturer that's considering expanding from one core target audience/user to another or an enterprise software company that has a technology that solves one problem but could solve many others, as a decision maker in the business it's important to make the decision for the right reason and simply “more business” is not always the right decision.
Case in point, we specialize in earned media relations, and often receive requests and inquiries from current and prospective clients to take on other marketing responsibilities ranging from managing social media channels and building out a campaign for the latest social media channels such as Tik Tok, Triller and Clubhouse to running SEO efforts, building out custom websites and more. While we believe each of those has a role in the marketing mix and can make some great introductions to experts in their respective fields, there are many so-called 360 agencies in the world, and while there’s nothing wrong with that, we are not one of them and believe in the end our clients appreciate that fact.
In fact, we decided years ago that we’d rather be great at two or three things instead of mediocre at 5-6-7+.
As a PR agency of course our number one service offering or area of expertise is media relations which falls under the category of “Awareness” here at Carve. We have a proven track record and know how to take a product, service or company, identify the narrative we want to tell and make it newsworthy. That said, when it comes to marketing, there’s always a new fad clients (or potential clients) are hearing about, reading about or even experiencing in their everyday lives. In this situation as marketers we often think there’s only two options; either jump on board, learn the newest fad as quickly as possible and figure out what/if you can charge for it OR step aside and move on. I'm here to tell you while that may work sometimes, there's always another option. Instead of risking that hard earned reputation, consider strategic partners that specialize in those areas and instead stick to what you're good at. Our belief has been and always will be that we'd rather be great at two or three things instead of mediocre at four or five. We have no interest in being mediocre at anything we do and have heard from our clients repeatedly that they appreciate that fact.
Now when you expand into that 2nd or 3rd area, it's important that there's synergy across the board. Meaning do the two or three areas compliment each other, do they share a similar strategy and do they fit within your company goal/mission? If the answer is yes to all three then chances are you're well on your way to a massive success.
For example, about 18 months ago we decided it was time to expand our efforts in the sponsored influencer industry, which falls under the category of “Engagement” at Carve. We are all much smarter about this than we were just 3-4 years ago, knowing influencers can just buy followers. Instead this is about engagements such as clicks, shares etc. We’ve witnessed our clients' demands increase exponentially in the space, we saw the opportunity to create meaningful long term relationships with influencers and perhaps most importantly, we started to see more sustainable, definable, measurable results. That was the difference maker, the ability to create more sustainable programs that provide trackable results AND that compliments our core media relations business and overall strategy. Knowing we weren’t going to settle for just being a player in the industry but instead wanted to make a serious impact, we quickly developed a strategic and tactical plan that would allow us to go from managing just a couple of sponsored campaigns a year with budgets in the $25k-50k range to now managing as many fifteen to twenty campaigns all year long with tangible, consistent, meaningful, sales-driven results with budgets exceeding $400k. Last year alone we partnered with over 100 influencers, creating 300+ pieces of content that drove more than 100,000 clicks to e-commerce. We’re extremely proud of those accomplishments but that’s not enough. We're constantly analyzing the results, identifying new trends and looking for ways to improve the results from post to post, campaign to campaign, which fits nicely within our company strategy and mission.
To complement Awareness with our on-going earned media efforts and Engagement with sponsored influencer campaigns, 2021 is hereby recognized as the year of Authority which includes thought leadership, executive communications and ownable content. While some of the reasons for our expansion are similar to why we’re now excelling with Engagement and sponsored influencer marketing (client demand, opportunity and measurement), the real reason Authority has become an integral part of our service offerings is the fact that it's ownable content and fits well with our agency goals. Bylines, content marketing and speaking opportunities are part of our larger strategy that allows us to create more sustainable campaigns and original ownable content that elevates our clients position within their given industry, provides opportunities to generate more reach and frequency to our clients audience(s) and ultimately it’s a platform that allows our clients to tell their narrative and story in a more controlled yet powerful, sustainable way.
What’s Next?
In the end it all comes down to the “why”. In this case, the why is about the demand that is already there. It’s now about working with companies to elevate their brand, creating new touch points and sustainable programs that reach their audiences through ownable content and Authority does just that. Four months ago we started with one client dedicated to our Authority program and we sit here today in June and we’re already up to five with more on the way.