BUD: I love you, Miss Kubelik.
FRAN: [cutting a deck of cards] Seven… queen.
BUD: Did you hear what I said, Miss Kubelik? I absolutely adore you.
FRAN: [handing over the cards] Shut up and deal.
That’s the ending of my favorite movie of all time, called The Apartment.
It stars Jack Lemmon as sweet and harmless accountant Bud Baxter… Shirley MacLaine as cute and clever elevator girl Fran Kubelik… and Fred MacMurray as handsome and cruel business executive Jeff Sheldrake.
The setup in a nutshell:
Fran is in love with Sheldrake… Sheldrake uses Bud’s apartment as a place to sleep with Fran on the side away from his wife… and Bud falls in love with Fran.
By the end end of the movie, after Sheldrake breaks Fran’s heart one too many times and Fran tries to commit suicide in Bud’s apartment, things are set right. Sheldrake is left out in the cold and Fran winds up with Bud. Bud might not be powerful and sexy… but at least he’s sweet and he absolutely adores her.
The point being, sometimes you’re not the best, or the first. And that can be ok. You can still get the girl. Or the customer.
And along these lines, I want to propose to you the idea of second-best positioning.
A famous example of this is Avis rent-a-car.
Back in the early 1960s, Avis was the homely mule trotting behind the spry stallion that was Hertz. And rather than trying to pretend otherwise, Avis decided to own their second-best position. The result was the following ad campaign:
“Avis is only No. 2 in rent a cars. So why go with us? We try harder.”
Within a year of launching this campaign, Avis went from a loss of $3.2 million to a profit of $1.2 million. Within 5 years of this campaign running… the difference in market share between Hertz and Avis shrank from 32% to just 13%. It even looked like Avis might overtake Hertz — and need a new ad campaign.
“All right,” you might say, “good for Avis. But why wouldn’t I find a uniquely best position for myself… and instead accept the role of a homely second-best mule?”
Fair point. My only answer is that second-best can get you free promotion. And lots of high-quality leads. And almost certainly more sales than you can handle. At least if you’re selling some kind of service, and can follow the clever program outlined below.
It’s something I found in Glenn Allsop’s article, which I shared in a post a few days ago.
Did you read Glenn’s article? All the way to the end? That’s where the clever second-best biz idea was. From what I understand, it works like this:
1. You are in business offering some kind of service. Say, copywriting.
2. You decide you want to help a charitable cause. Say, the unbeaching of that tanker that’s stuck in the Suez Canal.
3. So you contact 25 of the top level people in your field, who have premier positioning. A-list copywiters, etc. They all agree to provide a free copy critique, which will be sold for top dollar to help the charitable cause.
4. You then create a page to promote this event. “The greatest copy critique event of all time! Featuring A-list copywriters! In support of the beached Suez canal tanker!”
5. With some hand-waving, this offer goes viral. Not impossible — considering the premier positioning of the 25 A-list copywriters at the heart of it.
6. The 25 premier slots sell out in minutes after the event goes live.
7. You then update your page to say, “Missed out this time, or want another critique option? Check out our $40 sales copy critique and get feedback in the next 72 hours.”
And there you go. All the opportunity a sweet, second-best copywriter can handle. At that point, you’ve just got to shut up and deal.
Do you want a copy critique? It’s something I offer from time to time. But the offer only ever goes out to subscribers of my email newsletter. If you’re interested, you can join it here.