The "Micro Step" (Over The Shoulder)Part 2
What it looks like to start something new...part two.
“Least amount of risk, least amount of effort, and greatest number of options”
- Dan Nicholson
How do you get to where you want to go with the least amount of risk, least amount of effort, and greatest number of options?
Convention wisdom has taught us that when starting something new, we should “burn the boats” or “take a leap of faith”.
We disagree.
In fact, our operating system is built on the opposite of the leap; the micro-step. Read The "Micro Step" (Over The Shoulder)Part 1 here before continuing.
Caught up?
We’re going to continue this “over the shoulder” journey; an inside look at how we micro-step into new programs.
In a few months, the Certainty Accelerator will look different than it does today (duh). Inevitably, a new wave of marketers will see it for what it is, at that point in time, and try to start there - they will make a leap. Then they will wonder why it worked for us and isn’t working for them.
The biggest reason is…
We started with the first micro step (posted above), not with the final product (duh).
And we micro-stepped along the way.
Each step starts with a hypothesis.
The Hypothesis
This initiative started with asking the same question we ask ourselves every time we start something new.
The Question:
“What needs to be true for the tradeoff to be worth it?”
We do this ahead of time and in a state of sobriety.
No matter how much we love the idea of a thing, we set the criteria to validate the thing ahead of time, so that our love of the thing doesn’t cause us to violate our economic and personal principles.
The Answer:
We would need to see at least thirty people value it over $5,000 a year, with the limited information we have given them.
The Reason:
We already knew we would cap it at a max of ten enrollments each month, so this wasn’t a micro-step to see how much money we could make - it was a micro-step to see if this was the right audience for this offer. Since it’s designed to help people get their income to a place where they can comfortably afford CCA, it only makes sense to offer it to people who value what CCA is.
Ever met someone who hates their business or their clients?
It’s often because they took a series of leaps to make more money faster and never took the small steps to gauge the risk or validate their assumptions.
The Hypothesis:
“We believe that more than thirty people will fill out the form and place the value of this offer above $5,000 a year.”
We were right. But…
…it’s important to point out that this was a micro step to test a hypothesis, it was not a goal. If it were a goal and we were wrong, we might have pushed harder to reach the goal instead of examining WHY our hypothesis was wrong.
We micro-step because we learn more when we micro-step.
The Data
72% of applicants gave their phone numbers so we would notify them when invites went out. That’s a signal that most applications want to make sure they don’t miss it - even if it’s just curiosity - it’s intent.
When asked what they would invest in something like this the responses ranged from “I have no idea” to “$1,200” to “$45,000” with an average of $13,500 a year.
56 applicants put the value at $5,000 a year or greater.
What Does It Mean?
Remember…
“Least amount of risk, least amount of effort, and greatest number of options”
We are only enrolling ten people max per month, so we’re going to do the bare minimum possible to get those ten. Not because we are lazy, but because doing more would increase the risk without increasing the revenue.
More effort, more risk, same revenue?
No thanks.
The Next Microstep:
We’re going to reach out to the people who filled out the form in the order they filled it out.
Once we enroll ten, we will stop.
Then, next month, we will resume.
Simple.
In fact, if you filled out the form, check your email. You might have an invite from support@certaintyu.com sitting in your inbox. If you didn’t apply, you can fill out the form to get on the list here.
And Then What?
We will build out the program the same way; one micro-step at a time, adjusting with each step.
It will be a lot of work, but it won’t be a lot of unnecessary work. We leave that to the leapers.
The time, effort, and bandwidth we don’t waste on unnecessary work can be reallocated to the product and experience.
Hope that makes sense.
Some people need to see things in action to understand them (I am one of them). I hope this over-the-shoulder was useful. If so, you’ll love the accelerator - there will be a lot of over-the-shoulder sessions.
If that’s not your style, that’s cool.
More power to you.
Play Your Game
Certainty U
PS. Look at these absurdly awesome humans playing their game: