Get Different – Mike Michalowicz

Get Different is a marketing book written by Mike Michalowicz, and was released in September 2021. 

The book offers a no-bullsh*t method to position a business, service, or brand to get noticed, remembered, and chosen by the right audience. It outlines three simple steps: Differentiate, Attract, and Direct, and explains how to use them to create a successful marketing plan.

Great Offers Need Different Marketing

The simple truth is that marketing happens in milliseconds, not months.

According to Time magazine, the average website holds visitors’ attention for a mere fifteen seconds. Instagram reports people spend less than ten seconds on a post. And what about more tactile marketing? I’ll bet you riffle through your junk mail at warp speed.

Try this. Right now, blink as fast as you can. That blink you just did took longer than a tenth of a second. The average blink is—get this—two hundred and fifty milliseconds. Thoughts can be spawned and acted upon in less than one hundred fifty milliseconds.

Successful marketing happens in a mere blink. Your prospect blinks and moves on or, if you do it right, stays. You need to win the blink.

The key to successfully marketing in milliseconds is simple: Be different so that people must take notice. Be different enough that the hardwired part of the human brain forces the prospect to contemplate and consider what they are seeing.

Try a Different Medium

Start by identifying your target audience. Who are the people you are targeting with your marketing efforts? Knowing this will help you understand what marketing mediums will be most effective. Once you have identified your target audience, it’s time to start experimenting with different mediums. Try something new, different, and unique that will grab the attention of your target audience.

For example, if your target audience is mostly young adults, consider using social media platforms such as Instagram and Snapchat to reach them. If your target audience is mostly professionals, look into using LinkedIn or email marketing campaigns. You could also look into advertising on podcasts or creating a video series.

Once you have identified a few mediums that you think will work for your target audience, it’s time to start testing and measuring the results. Monitor the response rate and engagement levels to see which mediums are most successful. Then, focus your efforts on those and create more effective marketing campaigns.

What Attraction Influencers Will You Use?

To attract your target audience, consider using the following Attraction Influencers: 

• Authority: Show that you are a leader in your industry and have greater knowledge, expertise, capabilities, or influence than them.
• Trusted Source: Leverage past experiences with your brand to build confidence and familiarity.
• Repetition: Keep repeating your message to gain their attention.
• Social Significance: Show them how your product/service can elevate their standing in any capacity.
• Alignment: Show that your product/service validates and aligns with their beliefs.
• Safety: Make them feel safe and protected from physical harm or discomfort.
• Comfort: Show how your product/service can help them maintain and expand elements of their life they already enjoy.
• Expansion: Show how your product/service can help them expand on the things they already like, own, and believe.
• Belonging: Show how your product/service can help them feel a sense of belonging.
• Health: Show how your product/service can improve their physical, mental, and sexual health.
• Relief: Show how your product/service can offer them relief from physical or emotional pain.
• Beauty: Consider how they define beauty and amplify it by sharing something they find pleasing to the senses.
• Esteem: Make them feel valued and recognized for their importance and relevance.

The Secret: Be Different

The key to successfully marketing in milliseconds is simple: Be different so that people take notice. Be different enough that the hardwired part of the human brain forces the prospect to contemplate and consider what they are seeing.

Trying to do the same marketing as everyone else, over and over again, just better, will make you super frustrated. It’s no wonder so many businesses think marketing is a waste of time and money. Who would be good at riding that merry-go-round? No matter which seat you hop on, they are all just painted horses on poles, going around in circles—going nowhere.

Do whatever it takes to remember this for the rest of your life. Better is not better. Different is better.

The Simple Directive of The Musical Stairs

Your singular call to action can be as simple as “come get some free ice water.” In fact, the simpler the better. You could keep it so simple, you don’t even need words. To get more people to use the stairs rather than the adjacent escalator, the city of Brussels made the stairs musical.

They painted them to look like black-and-white piano keys and rigged each step to play a different note each time someone stepped on them. No signs urging people to take the stairs.

No messages about health or exercise. It was just a set of painted, musical stairs that got noticed and engaged people who wanted to have fun, compelling them to take the stairs.

The DAD was built right in. Musical steps are noticeable (different), fun (attractive), and actionable (directive), all without saying a word.

The Dad Marketing Framework

We’re still cave people when it comes to mental processing. Our brains still filter out the familiar and only take notice when something is different. This is why it is vital that you stop marketing the same way everyone else in your industry does and start “getting different.”

DIFFERENTIATE! Do different to get noticed.

You’ve already learned why different things work. This first step in the framework is to identify a marketing approach that stands out in a sea of sameness.

ATTRACT! in a way that attracts your ideal prospects.

Next, ensure that your approach will appeal to the people you want to serve, not turn them off.

DIRECT! Tell them how to act.

Finally, your strategy must compel your ideal prospects to take a specific action you desire.

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