The start of this year has been extremely transformational for Reliable. We’ve uncovered beliefs we have about life, and we’ve realized a new direction Reliable needs to go in.
The two are completely tied together though.
For example, we realized we had a fear that people aren’t willing to pay our prices, which are higher than 99% of our competitors. Deep down we were afraid that our market doesn’t care if the quality or the service are that much better—they just want cheap and fast, even if it’s riddled with problems and headaches.
But in looking at the actual numbers, and the actual feedback we get from clients, we’ve faced these fears and beliefs head-on and challenged them.
For example, Reliable grew 2.41x last year.
And a ridiculously high percentage of people who use us once use us again and again.
We also have a Slack channel called “Client Love” where our projects team posts amazing things clients write us when they receive their projects.
This growth and feedback show us that there are people out there who crave the quality and service we bring to the table. It’s also encouraged us not to get distracted by people who just really aren’t our market.
So, we met as a company to put our heads together and decided to clearly define who Reliable is for and what we’re all about.
In a nutshell, we answered the following 4 questions:
- Who are we for?
- Who are we against?
- Who do we want to attract?
- Who do we want to repel?
This exercise was extremely transformational…and relieving.
It gave us permission to laser-focus on a very small group of people (our core market) and ignore the rest.
It clarified Reliable’s vision. We’ve already put systems in place to better serve our true audience and removed systems that try to serve anyone else.
We wanted to share this because we believe you’ll have a similar experience with this exercise, and get yourself on track to really take this year by storm.
So without further ado, here are our answers to these truly powerful questions.
Who We’re For
Our fellow designers who are ready to finally have a great experience in getting their designs converted to code. They’ve likely had a bad experience or two (or three!), just as we have in our design agency.
Who We’re Against
All of the PSD to HTML companies that gave us tons of headaches and frustration and are giving thousands of designers that same awful experience too.
They butcher your designs and write code that breaks on different devices and browsers.
Companies who treat their coders terribly and force impossible deadlines on them and crazy-low pay.
Many coders from other companies have joined our team and have told us horror stories. We want to put an end to that.
Who We Want to Attract
Designers who really care about their work, their quality, and their clients. Their mission is to be the greatest designer they possibly can be and to truly make their clients happy.
They want business relationships that maybe even feel more like friendships, and are happy to pay more if they receive more value, convenience, service, and quality (just like we are!).
Who We Want to Repel
Those who are just looking for the cheapest prices around, not the best quality. Those whose hearts are not in their designs and who lack true passion and fire.
And those who ask you to do lots of extra work outside of the project scope but make you feel bad when you ask them to pay for it. (Have you had clients like these?)
Anyone who really cares about quality will have similar values. And, in all honesty, that’s who we’re trying to attract. That’s who we’re fighting for.
This motivates us to keep up the good work and get even better. And the better we get, the more we grow.
