Vice Chairman of Ogilvy UK, author of Alchemy
Rory Sutherland is vice chairman of Ogilvy UK, wrote Alchemy and founded Nudgestock, a festival of behavioral science and creativity. He started as a graduate trainee at Ogilvy and Mather Direct. He contrasts the laws of physics, largely set in stone, with the laws of psychology, which are magnificently malleable. Psychology is full of butterfly effects, he says, where small things make an inordinate difference to how people respond.
Lenny's Podcast 00:49 16:01 My First Million 10:43 11:07 36:57 41:37
Positioning
Familiar enough to be understood, strange enough to be interesting. Distinctiveness beats optimized logic at winning attention.
There are slight little splinter on the attention. It's something that slightly raises up from the normal shape.
Rory Sutherland
argues a perfectly logical position is also a forgettable one, because buyers run on memory and heuristics rather than spreadsheets. The distinctive, slightly weird asset an optimiser would strip out is often what actually gets you chosen.
builds positioning as a rational chain: competitive alternatives, the capabilities only you have, and the value a specific segment cannot get elsewhere. Get the logic right for the best-fit customer and the pick becomes obvious. The work is precision, not flourish.
