The Essence of Things

In classical philosophy, the ‘essence’ of a thing is its fundamental nature. The set of attributes that make it what it is in objective reality.

This includes all properties necessary for something to be the kind of thing it is. For example, the essence of a triangle includes having three sides. Without these essential properties, it is no longer a triangle.

Having a certain function also enters into the nature of a thing. If the purpose of the triangle is to be a flag, that is its function. It’s a flag.

Things can also have ‘accidental’ properties. Accidental properties are not essential to the essence of a thing’s existence. They can vary without affecting the fundamental nature of the thing.

If the flag happens to be blue, red, green, or another colour, makes it no less a flag. It’s still a flag. In this example, colour is an ‘accidental’ attribute. It’s not part of a flag’s essence.

🔺 Essence: The core set of traits defining a thing's identity, like a triangle having three sides.

🚩Accident: Accidents are changeable, non-essential traits that don't alter a thing's essence, like a flag being red.

Why am I blathering on about ancient philosophy?

Aristotle, who wrote about these concepts, was attempting to categorise and explain the physical world in a systematic and rational manner.

As if there is a universal metaphysical truth.

This is a mindset company executives also commonly unconsciously adopt; behaving and controlling the business as if it exists in some kind of objective reality.

It feels natural to do this. Our minds convince us there is a universal truth.

But, there isn’t.

There is no objective reality.

Companies get lost chasing this notion. It’s one of the most common weaknesses I see.

It creates an internal consensus that the ‘essence’ of the value proposition can only be its objectivity. Its facts. Its features. Its benefits.

Usually, this takes the form of positioning the product on a ‘cheaper’ or ‘better’ claim — a race to the bottom in messaging and margin.

When other companies in the same category have this same mindset, everyone ends up doing pretty much the same damn thing.

They converge on a shared sense of logic, attempting to appeal to prospects as if they are all perfectly rational buyers (as economists like to think). It’s like distilling every value proposition to a math equation.

Result? The category and all of the vendors within it become commoditised.

If there is no objective reality, what is there?

How you perceive the world is not an objective reality. It’s a perception of reality. This is true for everyone.

For example… what is Hawaii?

Is it an island? Yes. Amongst the most remote in the world.

Is it a mountain? Yes. The tallest in the world (taller than Everest).

Is it a volcano? Yes. It grows about 42 acres a year.

Is it a U.S. state? Yes. The 50th.

Is it a strategic naval base? Yes. HQ for the United States Pacific Fleet.

Is it a tropical paradise? Sure. I’d live there.

Is it the taste of a mai tai? You bet.

The point: Each mind perceives what it perceives about a given thing. This can be altered by context and perspective. There is no objective essence.

So are Aristotle’s concepts useless? No.

Noam Chomsky has argued that if you take Aristotle’s concepts of ‘essence’ and detach them from objective reality, then reapply them to the human mind, they make perfect sense.

How so?

Aristotle’s concepts reflect the way our minds work when we perceive the world around us. This perceived objectivity is not in the ‘real world’, it’s in our heads. They are our way of conceiving the world.

There is no essence of a thing, empirically. Our minds impose a structure on the world, which is informed by our inherent nature and biological need to categorise things by their function and form. Their perceived essence.

The essence of a thing only exists in one place, the mind. Therefore, the same object can have different properties of essence and accident to different people (assuming there was a shared notion that an object exists).

Huh?

Consider a chair. The ‘essence’ of a chair — four legs, a seat, and a backrest — makes it a chair in the mind. This is its essence.

The fact these features make it possible to sit on it and derive value (comfort) makes it function essentially a chair.

A chair is also accidentally a foot rest, since it could be used in that capacity.

But, this essence only exists from the perspective of the observer.

To a Martian, a chair’s function could be nothing, or, something else. For example, a wooden chair’s function could be essentially a fuel for a fire and accidentally a device to sit humans on.

Outside of the mind, the chair is nothing. It is what it is.

Let’s visit Hawaii. To a resident of Hawaii, its function is home and accidentally a vacation destination. To a tourist, Hawaii’s function is a vacation destination and accidentally a place people live.

Outside of the mind, Hawaii is neither of these things.

Is Hawaii a mountain or an island? It’s both inside the mind, depending on the perspective of who is observing. It’s also metaphysically neither.

Let’s use G Sheets as another example.

To an accountant, its essence is a tool to manage the books. To a HR manager, its essence is tool to manage staff holidays. To the accountant, G Sheets is essentially a tool to manage the books and accidentally a staff management tool (and the opposite for the HR manager).

The point?

There is no objective reality (should I say that again? 😉).

There is only perception, which you can play around with. You can craft an advantageous perception of reality in the minds of your prospects.

Does what you are selling have to be better or cheaper? No, it can be different and supported by a differentiated essence that can’t be obtained elsewhere.

How to do this? There’s many ways.

One approach is to take a perceived accidental property and reposition it in the mind as an essential property.

For example, once upon a time, an accidental trait of electric cars was that they accelerated pretty quickly. Tesla repositioned this trait as an essential function of their cars — ludicrous mode became part of their essence which supported the idea of status-signalling electric cars.

This is the chief objective of Positioning. To construct a unique essence of a thing in the mind that works more valuably in your favour — along an intangible dimension that increases pricing power and margins. Buying into an idea, not the facts.

Hawaii is functionally a tropical vacation destination. Factually, it’s a U.S. island in the Pacific with consistent year round temperatures in the 20s°C that you can visit for a few thousand dollars (on the lower end).

But, that’s approaching it through the lens of objective reality.

What also constitutes is its essence in the mind?

To me… Polynesian paradise. I’m buying into the combined idea of mai tais, hula dancing, luau parties, surfing, tiki torches, and aloha vibes. Hawaii-ness.

Actually, it’s more than that. It’s the pursuit of what I ultimately perceive to be the essence of exotic. It’s giving me something I can’t get anywhere else. Not in Jamaica. Not in Bali. Not in the Maldives.

But, how does that map to relatively boring categories like B2B software?

Salesforce is functionally a CRM in the mind. Factually, it has a lot of neat features to help you build and manage your sales pipeline.

But, what constitutes its essence? Too many... the leading CRM for serious sales teams.

People buy Salesforce not just because of its objectivity and facts. They buy it for the idea of what it is. To feel serious. To feel safe. To buy the best. To signal.

Salesforce is the king that created the Cloud CRM category. That’s the idea.

The same is true of Orcale.

It’s idea — it’s essence — that people buy into is valued at nearly $100bn.

How so? Oracle’s market cap is $280bn and it’s brand is valued at $92bn (according to Kantar) — equal to roughly a third of its total value. Its brand channels its perceived essence that prospects gleefully buy into.

Why? It has an intellectual margin supported by its perceived essence: the price of leadership, safety and reassurance (hypothetically speaking).

Its essence is more than just product features and capabilities mapped to benefits and a commoditised ROI calculation for the CFO.

It’s Oracle — it’s the leader, it’s peace of mind, it’s reliable.

The Law of Perception

Everything I have written about here relates to the Law of Perception.

This is a key principle that Al Ries and Jack Trout laid out in their book The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing.

It is one of my favourite chapters.

Here are excerpts:

This thinking, in itself, is derived from the German philosopher Immanuel Kant — who pointed out that we can never really know what is “out there” beyond ourselves, because our knowledge is limited to the constraints of our minds and senses.

In other words, we don’t know how things are “in themselves”, but only as we experience them.

This thinking was further developed by the German psychoanalyst Fritz Perls, who developed principles for a new type of therapy in the early 20th century — Gestalt therapy — that helped individuals personally grow and develop psychologically (and is still widely practiced today).

At the root of this therapy is the acknowledgement and acceptance that our personal sense of reality is created through our perception; through the ways in which we view our experiences, not the events themselves.

However, it is easy to forget this, or even fail to recognise it. Fritz says we tend to mistake our viewpoint of the world for the absolute, objective truth, rather than acknowledging the role of perception and its influence in creating our perspective, together with all the ideas, actions, and beliefs that stem from it.

The only truth one can ever have is one’s personal truth, derived from perception.

That’s it for today. I’ll be back in your inbox soon.

Martin 🤘

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