Seth Godin has a great post on being exclusive, and how if you haven’t looked at it for your business - you should.
I have long been a believer in targeting products and businesses to an individual consumer. Not in the sense of making everything personalized, but by nailing down a target market so tightly that it can be embodied by one person.
The same has been said about writing a book. I have heard that if you write for a group of people, you will fall short of your mark, everytime. But if you write for one person who embodies all those that you will be marketing too, you will hit dead on. By trying to write to a group of people, you skew your message. It isn’t a focused sales presentation - it is a train wreck of sales points that don’t really shine in one direction.
Likewise, in LIMITING the people who can partake in your product or service, you can focus all your efforts in one single push. You don’t need product variations, an employee roster as long as your arm, or a billing structure that is terribly nuanced. All you need is a good, solid sales target and expertise to go along with it.
Aside from your own marketing efforts, flip to the side of being the customer. How much fun is it to be an insider? Won’t you do anything to get that inside advantage that others around you don’t have?
That is the effect of exclusivity.
Price accordingly. Market succinctly. And exclude indefinitely.