The Position
In which we carve out space for our purpose, our products, our story.
Trends are hard on the psyche. They lead us to believe that everyone is doing this one thing this one way, and if we are not interested in that, then we are alone. In fact, the larger and louder a particular trend is, the more likely people are to be looking for something else.
“The larger and louder a particular trend is, the more likely people are to be looking for something else.”
This is what we call whitespace, the place where we begin to dig our trenches and find our own vantage point. For every movement, every trend, no matter how universal it seems, there are a lot of people for whom it does not resonate.
It might seem like the cheerleaders are the most popular students, but they’re not going to rule the school forever. There are burnouts like Kurt Cobain huddling in corners and smoking, rolling their eyes and plotting revenge. There are nerds like Mark Zuckerberg in their dorm rooms ranking their classmates’ attractiveness, coding their way to a new social order.
It’s the mark of a visionary to see the spaces in between the obstacles, to be brave enough to make a new path there, rather than take a well-beaten one. What happens when we do this is we eliminate competition, or much of it. Offering something unique, with a different message and angle, is how we become the only option for those we want to serve.