Clarity is Expensive

After many years of writing for big companies, a few universal truths have emerged from hundreds of projects, no matter the budget:

• Having a clear audience is critical for creation, promotion, and sales.
• Having a clear goal is existential for the project and ultimately the company.
• It’s rare that a project has both worked out. In most cases both are missing.

Clarity is expensive. It takes the right people, the right amount of time, and levels of risk tolerance usually not found below the C-suite or above “the mail room.” Safety matters in the middle, thus “cornflower blue.”

Lack of clarity is even more expensive, though. What those in the middle don’t know (or care), is that a lack of clarity in your goal or audience can mean everything, especially for a new product or service.

Small businesses, creators, and entrepreneurs: you need to understand this is your biggest opportunity. Getting clear on your audience and goal is 5 minutes of thinking to yourself, or a few weeks of testing landing pages.

Compare it to the hiring process, PowerPoints created (for 10 separate, hour-long meetings with sparse attendance), and the quarterly budgeting concerns of the massive ship of a big business that’s trying to turn (on a dime that’s usually the size of a year or more using the tactics of decade ago).

None of your bigger competitors can do what you can do to get clear.

Their greatest (and often ignored) expense is your greatest advantage.