The Two-String Kite
By Jared Smith
A two-string kite is a beautiful thing to behold—particularly for a seven-year-old kid. And when Mom gave me mine, I knew I was holding something special in my hands. Two-string kites are so much better than one-string kites. After all, they have twice as many strings. For a seven-year-old kid who didn’t know much, I knew opportunity when it came knocking, and boy, was it knocking now.
Mom always wanted me to become some type of professional like a doctor, a lawyer, or an accountant. Now, whether it was nature or nurture, or fate or freedom, that influenced my destiny, I’ll never really know, but I do know that the marketer and salesperson in me continues to prevail.
Still, Mom remained hopeful—up until that fateful, blustery October day when she gave me my two-string kite. I hurried outside to join my friends in the cul-de-sac in front of our house. The air was electric as we readied our kites for a morning of rigorous flight and glorious adventure. Within minutes, the sky was rippling with kites—some dodging, others wheeling—many of them soaring to meet the cold blue sky. With secret delight I observed my peers as they tried desperately to keep their pathetic one-string kites from plummeting to the ground.
Moments after I unveiled my kite, the other neighbourhood kids carelessly and hurriedly grounded theirs, and they rushed over to take a look at this new phenomenon in the sky. It was plain as day; my two-string kite was ten times more manoeuvrable than anyone else’s—and on top of that, it also happened to be faster, bigger, more streamlined, and more colourful than anything any of us had ever seen. With a little luck and some cross-handed skill, I performed small miracles with my kite. It flipped, it dove, and it twirled—nobody had ever twirled a kite before.
For hours, Mom watched from the bay window of our house, tears of pride trickling down her cheeks. She called her sister, her mom, and her friends and shared the beautiful moment with them. “You won’t believe how cute this is. Jared is sharing his kite with all the little kids in the neighbourhood. He’s such a wonderful, thoughtful, caring little boy!!!”
You could probably imagine the look of shock on her face when I finally came home for lunch and emptied my pockets on the kitchen floor. “Mom, check this out!” I had made over $32 in quarters, nickels, and dimes that morning. This caught Dad’s attention, who tried to hide his proud, beaming smile as he commented, “Not a bad hourly rate for a seven-year-old kid!” Mom, on the other hand, was beside herself. “This is YOUR fault,” she said as she darted a look in my Dad’s direction. With his tail between his legs, he scurried off, and I was left to face the wrath on my own.
A week later, the wind in the sky picked up again and I tiptoed past my mother with my two-string kite in great entrepreneurial anticipation. I was going to make a killing. However, to my shock and dismay, I arrived on scene only to be greeted by a sight that I will never forget. The sky was littered with two-string kites.
In business, as in kite-flying, if the equity in your brand and the essence of your differentiation lies in something tangible (e.g., we sell for less, we deliver overnight, we offer two-string kites, we have new technology), you will be forever vulnerable to the competition. After FedEx sank millions into its new brand, we deliver overnight or it’s free, imagine its surprise when it woke up one morning to the sound of Purolator saying, so do we. What if Superstore came out with a new slogan, “We sell for less than Walmart”? Unless you can do something that is extremely difficult, perhaps impossible, to replicate, you might want to consider creating a brand based on a unique theme or intangible idea. It may well be something that represents your culture and your values—an intrinsic characteristic that nobody can take away from you.
At Incite Solutions, we help clients create unique, themed, and sustainable brands that make their customers say, “Cool, I’d like to be a part of that.” If you want a brand that’s superior and more enduring than a two-string kite, give us a call at Incite today. We’ll help you soar above the rest.
