"From Impossible to Inevitable" by Aaron Ross book review

Introduction

From Impossible to Inevitable: how hyper-growth companies create predictable revenue… by Aaron Ross, author of Predictable Revenue, which has been called the sales bible of silicon valley; and Jason Lemkin, founder of SaaStr.com, the largest community of SaaS founders, and ex-CEO of EchoSign, which he grew from 0 to over $100mm sales.

Motivation

The authors studied the world’s fastest-growing companies and extracted key lessons to help CEOs achieve predictable hyper-growth. Their template for growing your company 2 to 10x involves 7 steps: nail your niche, create a predictable pipeline, make your sales scalable, double your deal-size, be prepared to do the time so you don’t give up at the wrong time, embrace employee ownership, and finally, define your destiny. Here, we’ll cover the first and arguably most important step: nailing your niche.

What does it mean

When you nail your niche, you have a well-defined audience that you’re going after, you understand deeply a pain your audience experiences, and you have created a solution that leverages your unique strengths.

If you’re struggling

with growth, have hit a sales plateau, and your prospects treat you like a “nice to have” instead of a “need to have”, then you’re most likely facing a ‘nail your niche’ issue.

So, how do you nail your niche? The recipe here is to iterate through: audience - pain - solution - results until you find a combination that works for you.

AUDIENCE – First, start by focusing on a single industry or type of customer – perhaps based on their job title or daily routine. And create a list of 10-100 of these ideal customers. You may be tempted to broaden your horizons and tap bigger markets… don’t! The problem is that you won’t be able to craft a message that resonates, and you’ll sound like everyone else.

PAIN – Next, identify your audience’s true pain point. Often, when you talk to customers, they will tell you what solution they want. For example: a pretty website. But that’s not what they really need, and that’s not what you should offer. Anyone can create a pretty website! What they need is a website that will convert more customers.

SOLUTION – So how can you do that? And how can you do it differently than others? Do you have a unique skill, experience, or way of thinking that will help you craft a value proposition?

RESULTS – Finally, will you be able to build a portfolio of ‘results’, can you measure your impact? These case studies will prove instrumental for clarifying your message to prospects, who want to know: “what will I get?” Conclusion Nailing your niche means reframing your prospects’ wants into needs, and mapping your strengths to deliver a unique solution. This will set you on the right path to execute the authors’ 7-step plan to achieve predictable hyper-growth, just like many others have done before.

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