The Rule of 1 is concept for those who are looking for an easier method for increasing their sales and interest from potential customers. 

The concept is simple and is one of the cornerstones behind my approach to branding, positioning, marketing and even sales. 

The Rule of 1 is simple, it is that in order to capture an audiences attention you must have a single clear message or idea that can be understood by your target audience quickly and easily. 

This reasoning behind this is based in principles of psychology. 

It is that when we make ideas or messaging complex or difficult to understand people tend just to tune out, the exact opposite of what we want.

So the Rule of 1 is this, all aspects of your marketing and sales should be focused around one central idea. Simple. 

However, just because it is simple, doesn’t mean it is easy.

If you go now and look at your website, your competitors website, or other direct/indirect competitors often you will see that better a business has simplified their messaging to address a single problem or outcome the more successful they are.

This is because they are not trying to solve every problem that their target personas experiences, they are positioning themselves as the best at solving on very specific problem. 

When someone wants that problem solved there is no question that there is only 1 business that is positioned to best provide the desired outcome.

The problem is that it takes a lot of courage to not talk about everything you can do and just focus your products or services on one central idea.

We all have a bad habit of wanting to add more, wanting to solve more, want to be more. Chasing new shiny objects because they are exciting and present us with new possibilities. 

Unfortunately what this actually does is dilute our messaging, it dilutes our positioning and dilutes our ability to make the impact we want.

So what is the solution? How do you build out a business around one central idea?

You make sure that the one central idea idea is big enough that it is attractive to prospects. 

For example, the platform Slack doesn’t position its big idea around a messaging app for teams, that wouldn’t be a big idea that organisations would prioritise. Instead, their big idea is centred around Organisational Transformation. 

Around this one central idea they can create a plethora of ideas, content, tools that reinforce their ability to deliver on this single concept.

All of their marketing and advertising backs their ability to provide this solution.

When you have one central idea all your communication can be directed towards empowering this message.

This message gets people curious in learning more. It is simple. It attracts attention. Most importantly it is clear and not confusing. A prospect can see any part of your marketing and know in less than 10 seconds exactly how you can help them.

Do you have one central idea? Is your messaging, your marketing and your sales team communicating a singular clear concept together or is your message confusing and diluted?