When a Bigger Audience Isn’t Better

You’re reading an excerpt of Great Founders Write, by Ben Putano, writer, entrepreneur, and book publisher. He’s the founder of Damn Gravity Media, a publishing house that inspires and educates tomorrow’s great founders. Purchase now for lifetime access to the book and on-demand video course.

Jay Acunzo is a father, author, keynote speaker, podcaster, and one of the best B2B storytellers in the business. Brands pay him $2,500 an hour to develop content that resonates with their audiences.

But Acunzo’s personal audience? Not as big as you might think. At around 20K Twitter followers, he’s a relatively small fish in the world of B2B marketing. This is by choice.

“I have a small but passionate, long-lasting, and very loyal audience from a lot of premium brands. So I can charge higher amounts for what I offer,” said Acunzo on an episode of the Creative Elements podcast with Jay Clouse.

Acunzo’s high-value audience allows him to charge more while earning higher profit margins and working with fewer people. He didn’t build a bigger audience, but a better one. That’s the definition of leverage.

Acunzo uses an analogy to illustrate his audience-building strategy:

Are you building a Toyota audience or a Tesla audience?

Toyota is a car for just about everyone. It’s safe, reliable, and relatively affordable. Because of this, Toyota has a massive global audience. But a car for everyone is, by nature, average. No one will fault you for buying a Toyota, but no one is gawking at your new whip, either. Tesla, on the other hand, is distinctly not for everyone. Their first model was a $100K electric sports car—it was exciting, expensive, and exclusive. Tesla created a premium product for the elite few, and they built a rabid fanbase in the process.

There’s nothing wrong with building a Toyota audience. Toyota is one of the world’s most popular brands for a reason. But building a global audience doesn’t work for every type of business. Acunzo’s consulting and speaking business is better served by a Tesla audience. He sells high-value products and services to deep-pocketed customers who love his work. He doesn’t need a large audience to succeed—just a passionate one.

But the greatest advantage to building a Tesla audience is not the raving fan base, or even the higher profit margins that come from charging premium prices. It’s the freedom to choose how and when to grow.

Thanks to a quirk in buyer psychology, being exclusive makes you even more desirable to the masses. Millions of people want a Tesla who can’t afford it. Tens of thousands of marketers and entrepreneurs want an hour of Acunzo’s time but could never afford his rate. Your exclusivity creates pent-up demand. Your brand becomes aspirational.

With an aspirational brand and pent-up demand, you have the choice to “move downstream” by offering lower-priced products. This is exactly what Tesla has done with the Model 3, a car similarly priced to a brand-new Toyota Camry. But the psychology doesn’t work in reverse. “Toyota couldn’t just move upstream,” said Acunzo. “They had to create an entirely new premium brand: Lexus.”

Acuzno has also moved downstream to tap into pent-up demand. He’s launched courses and communities that cost a fraction of his hourly consulting rate. He also creates loads of free content through his podcast, newsletter, blog, and social channels. This free content attracts a younger, less-affluent fan base that may one day earn enough to pay Jay’s premium rate—or not. Either way, thanks to his high-paying customers, everybody wins.

“I like to tell my subscribers: when a few benefit, we all benefit.”

If you’re selling high-value goods or services, you don’t want to build a large following of casual onlookers. You want a small but fiercely passionate audience of fans who can afford what you do—or aspire to do so. In other words, you want to build a Tesla audience. This will give you the option to stay exclusive—earning more profit from fewer customers—or go downstream to tap into pent-up demand.

Media may be the new leverage, but a bigger audience is not always better. Let’s look at exactly how to build a high-value audience for your business.