Al Ries and Jack Trout nailed it in their book Positioning:
The essence of positioning is sacrifice. You must be willing to give up something in order to establish that unique position.
I’ve seen this play out in my own work and in my experience coaching agency owners.
There are three sacrifices agency owners need to make to own a clear position:
When owners aren’t willing to make these sacrifices, their agencies stay stuck. They have too many competitors and too little leverage. It shows up in their bank accounts.
Let’s choose a random slice to use as an example. Say you want to be the only design agency that builds Squarespace websites for dentists in suburban Portland.
You've decided to work with dentists only. If a podiatrist wants your help, you pass. If that exciting Nike project shows up, it’s a great gig that’s not for you.
Clients want the most specialized help they can find. That usually means working with someone who has experience with people just like them. Think about how people handle serious health issues: they look for a doctor who has treated their exact condition. They’ll travel far and pay a lot to find one.
If a dentist needs a website, a web designer is good. A web designer who has worked with medical offices is better. A web designer who has built sites for lots of dentists is best. A web designer who has worked with dentists who have the same size practice, same years in business, and same kind of patients is a dream come true.
If you’re that last web designer, you go straight to the top of their list. But to get there, you have to commit to working with that kind of client and let go of everyone else.
What about the accounting firm you’ve had on retainer for years? They don’t fit anymore.
What about that portfolio piece of the touchscreen installation you built for an international bank? It won’t help you land dentists in suburban Portland who want new websites. Archive it.
Narrowing your position means letting go of old clients to make room for the right ones.
If you build Squarespace websites for dentists in suburban Portland, what do you do with the WordPress skills you learned ten years ago?
Nothing.
Like your typewriter skills and VCR repair expertise, you thank it for the role it played in your life and move on.
That can be hard, especially for designers. Skills get tied to identity. If being great at WordPress feels like part of who you are, letting it go is painful. But holding on makes it harder to own a clear position. Every hour you spend learning the latest WordPress update is an hour you could spend getting better at Squarespace and making your work more valuable to your specific clients.
Part of what makes a mechanic a mechanic is that they can change a carburetor. But it’s also that they don’t know what a JavaScript method is—and they don’t care to.
Offer only what a dentist in suburban Portland needs. Drop everything else.
If you’ve been running your agency for a while, some of your team members probably love the variety. One week, it’s a web app for a startup. The next, it’s a motion graphics project for a clothing brand. It keeps things interesting for them. What they don’t know is that it’s wearing you down. Work is harder to find, and you keep dropping your prices to win jobs.
So you’ve committed to Squarespace websites for dentists in suburban Portland.
Your senior designer hates the idea. A couple of those projects would be fine. But all day, every day? They’d rather quit.
If you’re serious about your new direction, let them. This person is no longer the right fit. The best thing you can do for them is help them find a role somewhere they’ll thrive.
The upside: when your position is clear, the wrong people can see it, and so can the right ones. There’s a designer out there who already loves building sites for dentists, or who would jump at the chance to become the best in the world at it.
Yes.
Almost every agency owner I’ve coached who committed to a specific position—really committed—has made more money. None of them have said they want to go back. The sentiment I hear most from them is usually the same: “I wish I did this sooner.”
For anyone who thinks narrowing leads to boring businesses, I keep a list of agencies who seem prove otherwise. The Bar Brand People only work with bars, restaurants, and hotels. Brandt Creative only works with fitness companies. mr. h only works with travel and hospitality brands.
And if you think serving dentists is just my silly example, Studio 8E8 markets dentists’ stories.
Years ago, I coached an agency owner doing around $200K/year with a team of 5. He committed to a narrow position. Ten years later, they do about $5M/year with a team of 50. The owner promoted an employee to CEO and and stepped out of the day-to-day entirely to pursue new ventures, funded by the financial success of the agency.
For the first five years of running my own agency, we did six figures every year making websites, web apps, brands, and strategy decks. In year 6, we decided internally to only do design system work. That was the first year we hit $1M. The next year, we made that commitment public. We did $2M. The year after that: $3M.
But it’s not just about money. Every owner I talk to who has committed to a narrow position describes the same thing: relief. No more juggling ten different client types, ten different service areas, ten different things their team needs. It’s no wonder so many agency owners burn out. The range that feels like an asset is quietly draining them.
The key is focus. It’s an input, not an outcome.
And it starts with sacrifice.
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