How is Winning a Chili Cook-off Like Competitive Advantage? The Art of Authority Podcast Ep4-Mike Saunders The Authority Positioning Coach

Welcome to the Art of Authority podcast, bringing you interviews and episodes to help you radically optimize your authority and influence to become the go to expert in your field. Here's your host, authority positioning coach Mike Saunders.

Hey, guys, Mike Saunders, the authority positioning coach, here for another episode of the Art of Authority. So how's winning a chili cook off like competitive advantage and standing out in your business? Here's a story that happened to me just a few months ago, literally. So every year our church has a chili cook off. And my son and I have been doing a really fun event together because we, we do a father son thing, right? So we do the chili cook off event and he's turning 14 this month. And about three years ago, we started doing this over at the Chili Cook off where we'll pick out a recipe online and you know, we'll search through a whole bunch of recipes and it's fun just to go through and, and select which one we think we should do for this chili cook off. And we would go store then and get the ingredients and look around and just make sure we're getting everything just exactly right. Okay, so doing some pre planning and we fixed a pot of chili three years ago and it won. And it was really awesome to see your chili, you know, picked as the winner. And, and I forget what the prize. In fact, you know what I think that prize was a gift certificate to a local Mexican restaurant. And here in Denver, it's called Casa Bonita. And it's a really old, old. I forget how old it is, but, you know, decades old. And it's just really one of these landma places that when people come to Denver, you typically will go to Casa Bonita at least once or whatnot because it's really unique and interesting. And one of the things that funny, they've got a person all the time dressed up in a big gorilla suit and they will run around and chase people and they've got an indoor rock climbing, no rock diving setup where, you know those cliff divers that you see on TV, they've got one of those, I think it's like 30ft in the air. And they'll get a diver and he'll climb up the rocks and do dives and flips and TW is really awesome. And sometimes the gorilla goes up to the top. And so anyway, I don't know why I went off on that tangent, but anyway, the first time that we did the chili cook off a few years ago, we won. That's where we went. And it was really cool because it was something that we did together. Now, this particular year here, just a few months ago, we did it again, and we fixed a pot of chili, and we thought, you know, we're going to fix it the same way that we did before because it was hot. We like hot chili. And so we went to the store and we got our recipe and stuck with the same one and went and chose the ingredients, and we did something a little different. We really wanted to make it stand out this year even more so than. Than last year, because three years ago we won, but two years ago, we didn't win. Right. And the. The one that did win was made from, I think it was elk meat, and it was really sweet. So it was a sweet chili, and we enjoy a hot chili. So we didn't really like that particular one because we're so sugary, but that's the one that won. And after that particular year, we went and talked to the judges, and we asked them what made them choose that particular chili, and they said it's because it just was really different and it stood out. So we started thinking about what we wanted to do this particular year, and we got the same chili recipe. But this time, we really determined we're gonna make our standout, you know, because if last year it stood out because so sweet. We want to make this one stand out. So we went to the grocery store, did our shopping, and, you know those peppers called habanero peppers? Well, they're really hot, right? So here's a little writer downer. Side note, if you ever want to make a good pot of chili, don't put six habanero peppers in your pot of chili. And if you do decide to put six in there, make sure you don't leave the seeds in like we did. So we discovered that that was not a good idea. Six was too much, and six with the seeds in it just took it over the edge because we just about lost our minds when we tasted that when we got it done. Remember the old Looney Tunes, when someone, you know, eat something hot and the steam comes flying out of their ears and their head and all that? And, you know, and the, you know, the alarms are going off, you know, like, five alarm. So that's what. What it was when we were tasting that before we took it over. And so we started googling around, around, you know, how to tone down chili and how to, you know, make it, you know, the. The. The take the edge off. And so we discovered a couple little ways, I think, adding some, I don't know, Flour or tomato paste, something like that, you know, took it down from 12 alarm down to 5 alarm, and it was still super hot. In fact, when we. When we did go over to the contest and we entered it, you know, everyone was eating each other's chilies, and we got ours, and I couldn't even finish my. My whole bowl of chili of ours because it was still so, so hot. But guess what? We won. We won this year, and it was because it was so hot. So the takeaway lesson is it was so hot that it stood out. And applying that to business, your business. Think about what you do. How can you explain very clearly what you do for your target audience? Because remember that a confused mind doesn't buy. So if you're gonna start explaining this and that and the other, and, oh, this one's really good because. And we got this product that if you start going all over the place and explaining your business to someone in your target audience or maybe a potential customer, and you're just jumping all around, they're not gonna get it. They're not gonna understand exactly what it is that you do to solve their most important problem, Right? So think about that. That's just something super important to keep in mind. And if you take away nothing from this episode and keep in mind that there's two things. Make yourself stand out and make yourself super, super clear in how you explain your business. So what if you had a really strong, unique, and different competitive advantage? That's where it comes into play. That's where you start really drilling down deep in explaining how your product or service can help your target audience. You know, I talk. I teach marketing workshops, and recently I did one on competitive advantage. And.

Sometimes people are like, oh, yeah, my competitive advantage is that we've got great customer service. Well, and literally, I ask people this so many times. You know, hey, let's talk about what's your competitive advantage? And they'll tell me, we've got 20 years in business. We've got great customer service. And that's really not at all a competitive advantage. Unless, you know, just as a side note, if it's extreme, over the top customer service, right? Because then that's something memorable. And like Seth Godin says in. In a lot of his writings, you want to be that purple cow. You know, I love his book called Purple Cow. And he talks about being something that's worthy of being remarked about, so being remarkable. So if you have customer service that is so over the top that is worthy of being remarked about, that can be a Competitive advantage, but typically just being nice to people and having your, you know, customer service, you know, in, in the good or good excellent area. Enough. So how can we describe and have things in our messaging that lets our target audience know that we're different? Because guess what, your competitive advantage ties into your expertise and authority and influence. Because when your competitive advantage is strong and when your competitive advantage is clear and concise, now you've got that expertise back dialed in super strong and super well. So with that thought in mind, we have to make sure that our business messaging and our deliverables illustrate and communicate our competitive advantage so clearly that it makes us stand out clearly to our target audience that we become the obvious choice. You need to think about what is their biggest problem that your product or service solves. And how can you articulate that literally in one sentence? And then of course, you know, you can have your, you know, your usp, your unique selling proposition, which is like a tagline, that's the one sentence. Then you can have your, you know, 22nd elevator speech or whatever you want to think of it as, because you don't want to bore people with a two minute dissertation on what you do. But maybe that one liner is not enough. So you need to have these, these things prepared, right? And like for instance, one of my taglines is building your authority is your number one priority. Because it is, because when you can distance yourself from your competition, you exert influence over your competition. Because when you're targeting audience sees what you do and they see that you come at your business with integrity, authenticity, transparency and authority, you've won. So you need to think about that when you're describing what you do for your target audience in a unique and, you know, clear way. So I would say to you that if you paused even now, the takeaway from this lesson is to think about what you do for your target audience and write it down. Then think about how you solve the biggest problem for your target audience with that statement, okay? And then even interject this, this is an interesting way to look at it too. If your 10 year old niece or nephew said, hey, what do you do for a living? How would you explain what you do for a living? And so many times the light bulb goes off because we love to use the, you know, $10 words and I'm blah, blah, blah. When your 10 year old niece or nephew asks you what you do, you're like, oh, well, I help people with their boom. We never, you need to have a little mix between the really simplistic because Sometimes that's too simplistic, you know, for 10 year old to use that phrasing and messaging to talk about your business to your target audience. But you need to have elements of that in there so that people get it. Because once they get it now, they're ready to listen and understand and have you go deeper and talk a little bit more tech. But you don't want to confuse them with tech and that's really, really important.

So I would encourage you to take a look at my authority audit service because it's a package where I get on the phone with you for about 30 minutes and we go through some strategies and put together an audit scorecard for you so you can see exactly where you are currently in your authority positioning and how your messaging may look on your website and online and how your competitive advantage may look. And I give you a blueprint and a checklist of some things you can be doing right now to develop powerful, strong authority positioning assets so that you're seen as the obvious choice. So make sure that you focus on building your authority because it really is your number one priority. Until next time, make it a great day.

You've been listening to the Art of Authority podcast. Are you interested in building your authority positioning as the number one strategy to grow your business, brand and influence? Book your authority audit today. This seven point audit of your current authority position will uncover opportunities and show you how to be seen as a leading expert and authority your industry looks to. For advice, visit www.awarenesspositioningcoach.com.