Know Who You Serve
With our 16-year anniversary coming up this weekend, I’ve been reflecting on the highs and lows of business—and the lessons we’ve learned along the way.
One lesson stands out above the rest:
Know who you serve.
Not broadly, specifically. The more specific the better.
For Almond, I think there are two customer archetypes that we are uniquely positioned to serve:
- Longboarders who want to add some variety to their surfboard quiver—generally in the form of a mid-length, fish, or similar.
- Life-long shortboarders who don't want to ride a board with 27L anymore—and want to step up to something with more foam to up their wave-count.
In 16 years of chats in the shop, email inquiries, and phone calls, I would say those two scenarios stand out above the rest. I light up like a Christmas tree when someone starts sharing their story and it begins to align with one of those two scenarios, because I know with a very high level of confidence that we know how to serve that customer and solve that problem.
It's the "great, that's exactly what we do!" moment.
The content we put out is aimed at trying to gently nudge our customers toward that sweet spot of "who we serve best"... The Three Board Quiver and the motto "with the right attitude and the right equipment, even two foot waves can be firing" reenforce this mindset, approach, and archetype for the customer who we feel we best serve.
Even Almond's Guide to Your First Year of Surfing is intended to put novice surfers on the pathway toward becoming eager novices as quickly as possible by removing some of the hurdles that keep them stuck as beginners.
We're able to speak to our ideal customer so confidently because... we are that customer. At the end of the day, we have a high level of conviction in the work we do because we're solving the problems that we ourselves have lived through.
We have the highest level of empathy for the folks who are experiencing the same sorts of problems we too have faced. Talking to our ideal customer is no different than talking to a fellow entrepreneur of a small consumer-facing brand—there is a unique shared experience that builds trust and allows us priceless insight to speak into their pain-points and goals.
In whatever work you do, be brutally honest in answering the question "who do I serve best?" Then figure out how to create as much value for that person as your imagination will allow.
Hope to see you on Saturday for our 16 year anniversary celebration.
-Dave
P.S. I'd love to hear—what's the biggest challenge you're working to solve for the people you serve?
