Instead of using demographics, Coach conducted ethnographic research to understand Gen Z's core tensions, like craving self-expression while valuing sustainability. This insight into their "dualities" and "emotional trade-offs" was the foundation for their "Expressive Luxury" positioning, which resonates on a deeper human level.

Instead of random growth, businesses have five clear expansion paths: serve wealthier clients (upmarket), serve a mass market (downmarket), enter a new vertical (adjacent), generalize your solution (broader), or hyper-specialize (narrower). This provides a strategic map for growth.

Framing a product around "life moments" (e.g., graduation, first job) shifts the focus from functional utility to emotional significance. Coach isn't in the handbag business; it's in the "belonging business." Its real competitors are other products that provide similar affirmation.

To connect with Gen Z, Coach shifted its brand positioning from simply being an affordable luxury good to being a tool for self-expression. This move addresses a core tension for this generation: the desire to express their true selves while navigating the pressures of constant social media visibility.

Growth isn't random; it can be planned along five vectors. From your current market, you can target higher-paying clients (upmarket), a larger volume of smaller clients (downmarket), different industries (adjacent), a wider category (broader), or a more focused sub-niche (narrower).

For a brand with high uniqueness and meaningfulness, low awareness is an opportunity. It signifies that the brand resonates strongly with those who know it, and the path to growth lies in expanding reach rather than fixing a broken product or message. This represents significant "headroom."

While scaling a proven system is usually the right move, there's an exception. If a new customer segment offers exponentially higher order values for the same fulfillment effort, the potential leverage justifies risking a new acquisition channel.

Sell to startups at their inception when they have no switching costs and few stakeholders. As these customers scale into major companies, your business scales with them, turning early adopters into significant, long-term revenue streams.

While strong marketing is ideal, a business model engineered for high lifetime value (LTV) is a more powerful lever for growth. The enormous profit margins generated per customer create a financial cushion that allows you to scale profitably even with less-than-perfect, inefficient marketing campaigns, crushing competitors who rely on optimization alone.