I’m a superhero. Don’t let the bald head and soft waistline fool you. I may not look like a superhero, but I am one.
I’ve been a superhero since I was a kid, though they were humble beginnings. When I was six years old we couldn’t afford a cape, so I just clothespinned a pillow case around my neck. It was enough to help me fly over the rolling hills and pastures of rural Oklahoma.
When I was ten years old I became a different hero. I put down the cape and picked up a glove. I became George Brett, cranking thousands of basehits and scooping up short-hopping hardballs at the hot corner (third base).
At fourteen years of age, I donned a red apron (instead of a cape) for my first real heroic job. Sure, stocking, bagging, and carrying out groceries at my grandparent’s grocery store doesn’t seem all that glamorous, but my epic battles against hail storms, icy patches on the sidewalk, and drunken locals are the stuff of legend.
In college I gained new and special powers by acquiring a new weapon… a computer. With it, I was sure to stave off the evils of poor layout and design.
Since those days, I have met my kryptonite. Broccoli when I was six. Mrs. Buchanan’s class when I was ten. At fourteen it was girls. In college, it was doing dishes (based on the perpetual stacks of dishes by our sink, it was apparently my roommate’s kryptonite as well).
Are those things really capes or kryptonite? Did they give me special powers or weaken me? No. That’s just the stories I told myself. “This glove will make me a better fielder.” It didn’t help me nearly as much as repeated practicing. “I don’t even know how to function around girls.” I did if I would just be myself around them.
What stories are your customers telling themselves about your products? Do they see your product as a cape, or as kryptonite? How do they see your competition? If they see kryptonite, you have the opportunity to provide a cape. Apple has done this time after time. The computer interface is kryptonite? Here’s one that’s a cape. Movie-making software is kryptonite? Here’s a cape. PC manufacturers would point out that Apple’s premium prices are kryptonite. Apple’s answer is the Mac Mini. We’ll see if that’s a red cape, or just another black mock turtleneck in disguise.
As Seth Godin encourages us to look at the stories we are presenting as marketers, look at the stories your customers are already telling themselves… about you and your competition. Godin challenges us to understand their worldview and how our story fits in. Do you know those worldviews? Do you understand how you fit in? Are you someone’s kryptonite? Or will every six year old someday clothespin your product around their neck and learn to fly.