By edith on 08-17-2010

Below is Edith Yeung’s interview with Clate Mask, Cofounder and CEO of Infusionsoft and New York Times Best-selling author, about his passion for small businesses, how he differentiate and compete with the big boys.

Clate Mask is cofounder and CEO of Infusionsoft and New York Times Best-selling author of Conquer the Chaos: how to grow a successful small business without going crazy. He started Infusionsoft as a custom software shop headquartered in a strip-mall in Mesa, Arizona 2001 with brothers Eric and Scott Martineau. Over the years, and under his leadership the company has evolved to what it is today, a three-time Inc 500 ranked company with nearly 20,000+ die-hard users of its web-based marketing and sales automation.

Infusionsoft helps entrepreneurs convert more leads, get repeat sales, save time and money through it’s web-based software that combines email marketing and CRM in one app driven by a powerful automation engine that allows entrepreneurs to manage more and market better with the same number of people.

How did you differentiate yourself (Infusionsoft) from all the bigger CRM, email marketing, marketing automation companies when you first started?

We focused on solving the problems of small businesses. And when I say, “small businesses” I mean the size of business most vendors won’t touch. We love helping businesses with less than 100 employees. We think that’s where the need, the fun and the opportunity is. Because of the size of business we serve, our solution is different. For example, we combine CRM, Email Marketing and Marketing Automation into one integrated solution, whereas our competitors that serve bigger businesses tend to approach these needs as separate, technological, point solutions. That’s not what our small business customer wants or needs. So, the nature of our target customer makes it very easy to be different from our competitors.

How has Infusionsoft evolved since it first started in 2001? Has your positioning changed over time?

Yes. We’ve evolved from a positioning of CRM, to Marketing Automation, to Email Marketing 2.0, which is a suite that combines CRM, Email Marketing and Marketing Automation. One thing that hasn’t changed: we always have and always will serve small businesses that want to grow fast.

What are / have been the biggest challenges in building a brand from the ground up & how you did overcome them?

To me, the biggest branding challenges revolve around market penetration and positioning. You can’t afford to build your brand to everyone, all at once. If you do that, you’ll waste time and money and you’ll attract a bunch of bad customers you can’t help properly. You have to start by targeting the most narrowly defined sub-target market (niche) and then build out from there to a mass market.

My favorite way of thinking through this is to draw an inverted pyramid (or triangle) on the whiteboard, define the entire, broad market you hope to eventually dominate and then define layers of the market, starting with the bottom—the tip of the pyramid. The idea is to nail that tip (niche) and then gradually move up the inverted pyramid. The challenges comes in defining each layer of the market and attacking only that layer. Building a brand from the ground up has everything to do with the way you intelligently move up the inverted pyramid.

Do you think your small company size an advantage? How to capitalize on your size to achieve maximum efficiency and impact?

Absolutely. We’re more nimble than the bigger guys. We’ve got heart. Our people care because they’re enrolled in a mission rather than simply collecting a paycheck. Plus, our customers like dealing with a small company that really cares about helping small businesses grow.

“I am just starting out as an entrepreneur and I see tons of competition out there”, what would be your advice for startup entrepreneurs? What resources are the most valuable to you when you first started?

Differentiate, differentiate, differentiate.

Focus on what you do well, what you love and what you don’t like. Many people will say you should start with the market and then bring it back to how you can solve a problem in the market. If you’re a one-man shop, don’t do that! Start with what you love. Exclude everything else. And then relentlessly pursue the problem you love to solve. If you take this approach, you won’t make the mistake of chasing bad jobs, bad clients and bad dollars. And you’ll attract the clients who see the problem(s) you solve and want a solution to those problems, which will make your business strong.

As for resources, if you’re just starting out, you should read Michael Gerber’s, “E-Myth,” Dan Kennedy’s “Magnetic Marketing” and Napoleon Hill’s “Think and Grow Rich.” You should also read the book I co-wrote with Infusionsoft co-founder, Scott Martineau. It’s called, “Conquer the Chaos: How to Grow a Successful Small Business Without Going Crazy.” How’s that for a shameless plug?

About edith

Edith Yeung is the Founder of BizTechDay and SFentrepreneur. She is also a lecturer at UC Berkeley International Program and committee member of the San Francisco Small Business Week. She has previously worked with AT&T Wireless, Oracle, Siebel, Autodesk, Cisco Systems, Symantec, American Management Systems (AMS), Telstra Australia, Matav Hungary Telecom and Taiwan Semi-Conductor.

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