The term "positioning" was coined in 1972 by Al Ries and Jack Trout, and big product brands have used positioning to gain competitive advantage ever since then. I interviewed Al Ries about how the concept of positioning applies to professional services businesses.

CPP 015: Is Positioning Professional Services Different Than Products? Al Ries Explains.

Sprinkled throughout the world of indie consulting are people who have found &#39;orphan problems&#39;, adopted them, and cultivated the expertise necessary to solve those problems. The Self-Made Expert podcast is conversations with these people about their journey of cultivating expertise outside the world of academia and the licensed professions. With your host, Philip Morgan.

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This was a delightful conversation, and one that made me laugh more than any in recent memory. Rob Fitzpatrick shares the journey from showering under a 5-gallon bucket in a warehouse scheduled for demolition to running a satisficing lifestyle business with $20k/mo in book revenue and a growing community.

TSME 163: Rob Fitzpatrick

This was a delightful conversation with emerging expert Denis Oakley. I especially loved how Denis "got his reps in" by selling business models on Upwork.

TSME 162: Denis Oakley

Jonathan suggested a followup conversation; I enjoyed hearing from him about his transition from surfing a once-in-a-generation tech wave to a very different kind of advisory business, his inventory of every nasty email he's ever received from his list, how he runs inexpensive experiments, and the relationship between death and mission.

TSME 161: Jonathan Stark Followup

Kyle and I discuss entering a new market, inventing new terminology, and pursuing a transformative agenda.

TSME 160: Kyle Bowen

Did you know Jim Thornton built something like a private version of Google.com's search engine using a combination of serverless code, Screaming Frog, and Neo4j? In this conversation that touches on, among other things, the marketing caste system, Jim explains why he did this and how this played into his self-made expertise journey.

CPP 015: Is Positioning Professional Services Different Than Products? Al Ries Explains.

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