What up, marketers. Welcome another 1-1-1 edition of Adam’s Letter. Thanks to the 50 of you who joined the community in the last week. If someone sent this to you - please subscribe!

Quick programming Note - I heard from several of you that while you enjoy reading the marketer deep dives, they aren’t quite as applicable to your day-to-day as the 1-1-1 emails.

So, we’re switching things up.

Thursdays will now be 1-1-1 emails (like this one). Then on Sundays, you can kick back and read about your favorite marketers over your weekend morning coffees. Thanks for the feedback. Let’s dive in!

Strategy: 6 Questions to Build a Founder Brand

This week I met with an investor who was looking for direction on building his brand.

My mind immediately went to some lessons I learned from Dave Gerhardt’s book, “Founder Brand.” Dave is one of my favorite people to study in the marketing space (spoiler alert: he’s the feature for Sunday’s deep dive).

In the book, he provides 6 foundational questions to help direct companies as they build their brand around their founder or lead personality:

1. What is the founder's back story?

2. What problem does your business solve?

3. Who’s the villain (in your customer’s story)?

4. What’s the solution you provide?

5. What are the benefits for the customer using your product?

6. What’s the customer’s life like before and after using ur product?

I think these questions are valuable for nearly any brand to consider - whether built around the founder or not. If you’re unsure about whether your brand should be founder-led, I encourage you to check out Dave’s book.

Example: 7 ways to build your founder brand

Staying on (founder) brand, this week’s marketing example showcases 7 ways to build the Founder Brand.

Milestones, BTS, and Personality are the three that have worked best for me, personally.

Idea: Niche-ing down is terrific advice

In the last issue I said, “Niche-ing down is terrible advice”

And WHEW did that get some responses… Niches be crazy!

I love the feedback and conversation and am sharing two of the best responses I received:

The first is from the incredibly talented, Jonathan Yagel:

The second is more of a testimonial from reader, Rob Bettis - whose business and marketing acumen I deeply respect:

My response: they’re right!

But I am too.

There is a difference between how you wrap your personal brand/service as a marketer, and your actual skillset. If you go back and read the post, I never said picking a niche or vertical for your brand is inherently a bad thing.

I’m talking about our skills and value as marketers.

To that, I hold fast to the idea that “We need to be generalists in a world of specialists.”

Choosing a niche can absolutely fuel quick growth (and cap long-term opportunities), and that’s a fair strategy to take.

My point was that “being generalists across culture, business, media, and marketing functions is the only way we can effectively drive the brands we’re tasked with leading.”

So to fully cop out, the answer is: both.

(But mainly, I’m right) 😉 

Happy Thursday!

Thanks for reading! If you found this valuable, consider subscribing or sharing it with a friend 😊 

If you enjoyed this issue, take a look at some others:

• How to make $400/hour with your newsletter

• How to earn more from your 9-5