The Best Of Category Pirates 2024

Dive in to the most popular posts of all time and get a piratey start to 2025.

Arrrrr! 🏴‍☠️ Welcome to a 💎 free edition 💎 of Category Pirates. Each week, we share radically different ideas to help you design new and different categories. As a paid subscriber, you get access to an archive of 99+ mini-books, audiobooks, jam sessions, and every future post.

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Dear Friend, Subscriber, and Category Pirate,

This year, Category Pirates achieved incredible milestones — and it’s all thanks to you, our community of different thinkers.

Here are some of our proudest moments from 2024:

1. Helped 50 category designers find their superpowers in the Category Design Academy.

This year, our Category Design Academy graduates proved what’s possible:

• Mike Steadman built a razor-sharp POV, attracting Superconsumers and closing two $25,000+ contracts within 90 days of starting the Academy.

• Pablo Gonzalez reframed trade shows with his "Digital Word of Mouth" category, increasing his engagement fee by $10,000 and earning equity stakes in clients’ businesses.

• Holley Miller designed her "Revenue Reliability" framework, helping innovative medical device companies 4x their revenue.

Our first cohort of graduates found what makes them unique and are already changing the world with their category design skills. And our second cohort is two months into their training! We couldn’t be more proud of them — and are excited about what they’ll achieve this year.

2. Expanded the category design content library.

Published over 50 pieces of original content, including new frameworks like the One-Sentence Strategy, The Problem Is Your Problem, and The 2-4-8 Sales Strategy Framework. We also experimented with AI and released 21 audiobooks so you can listen and hone your category design skills at the gym, during a walk, or on the (Category King) throne.

3. Grew the Category Pirates Ship.

Welcomed thousands of new pirates as subscribers, starting fresh conversations and collaborations around Category Design. We also honed our POV on how to help people find their unique category superpower and get paid for it (which is the topic of our upcoming book!)

4. Explained Category Design in action.

Experimented with videos sharing our category lens on topics like brand hierarchy, Languaging, grief, AI, and more to prove the transformative power of Category Design. We’re considering a (potential) podcast, so let us know if you’ve enjoyed these conversations.

5. Gave feedback on 55 one-page strategies in Strategy Therapy.

Taught category designers how to create bold and different one-page business strategies. On top of the course, we held 8 live workshops to help students hone their strategies, ask questions, and get insights from the community. We also launched the free 5-day Strategy Sprint email course to teach you the fundamentals of strategy.

Now, more than ever, we believe in the power of category design to make a radical difference.

Here’s a sneak peek at what we have planned for 2025 (no promises!):

• Paid To Be You: Launch a new book, course, and podcast to help you discover what makes you different, leverage that to create massive value for others, and get paid (exponentially) for it.

• Unleash 1,000s of Category Designers: Help people understand and leverage category design through the Category Design Academy, Strategy Therapy, and Paid To Be You courses and communities.

• Share Practical & Tactical Ways to Design Your Dream Career: We understand how AI is changing work for everyone — and we want to help you get ahead of it. So, in addition to sharing Category Design theory, we’ll also give you practical frameworks and examples on how to design a legendary career in an increasingly Native Digital world.

If you’re ready to stop competing on someone else’s terms and start creating on your own, you’re in the right place.

To help you do that, here are our top posts of all time — organized by the problem you need solved.

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💸 I want to design my dream career and own my niche.

Start with Living Your Category POV to unlock your unique point of view. Then explore:

1. How To Have A Legendary Career (Part 1)

2. How To Have A Legendary Career (Part II)

3. Position Yourself Or Be Positioned: The Personal Category Design Playbook

4. Category Superpower: Why Your Greatest Strength Depends On Making A Difference For Others

5. The Power of Outcomes: How to Generate High-Impact Outcomes That Create Enduring Value For Your Company And Yourself

6. The Value Of Your Value: How To Elevate Your Pricing And Move From Hourly Wages To Outcome-Based Wealth

7. Paid To Create: How To Leverage Your Intellectual Capital To Accelerate Your Career & Achieve Financial Freedom

8. How To Achieve Your Own Personal IPO: A Very Different Approach To A Legendary Career

9. How To Create A Category As A Small “e” Entrepreneur: 7 Legendary Ways To Niche Down

10. Radical Resilience: How To Be Mission-Driven When The Odds Are Against You

11. Engineering Exponential Moments: How To Recognize & Capitalize On Opportunities To Create A New & Different Future

12. The Mentor Myth: What Native Analogs Can Learn From Native Digitals (And Vice Versa)

🏆 I want my business to lead a new and different category.

Begin with The Magic Triangle: Why Category Design Is The Single Point Of Failure. Then dive into:

1. The Big Product Lie: Why Minimum Viable Product, Product-Led Growth, And Product-Market Fit Are Myths (And Misleading Startup Frameworks)

2. The Category Design Scorecard

3. The Marketing Funnel Funeral: How To Replace Dusty Funnels With Dynamic Flywheels That Attract, Engage, And Retain Superconsumers

4. The 3 Marketing Metrics To Rule Them All [Part 1]: How To Prioritize What Matters, Produce Revenue-Generating Results, And Skyrocket To Category Success

5. The 3 Marketing Metrics To Rule Them All [Part 2]: How To Market Category Potential, Whether You Are Creating A New Category Or Redesigning A Legacy One

6. The 3 Marketing Metrics To Rule Them All [Part 3]: How To Attract Investor Interest, Drive Market Capitalization, And Claim Your Place As Category King

7. The Lightning Strike Strategy: 5 Practical & Tactical Elements Of A Memorable Marketing Event

8. The B2B Tech Marketer’s Guide To Category Design: How To Engineer Your Market, Find What Makes You Different, And Become A Category Queen

9. The “No-Sell” Sell: A Counterintuitive Approach To Make Customers Come To You, Instead of Chasing After Them

10. Solving for Churn: How Non-Obvious Bundles and Business Models Reduce Churn, Without Relying On Price

🔍 I want to understand the basics of Category Design.

Start with A Beginner’s Guide to Category Design for a crash course in thinking different. Then explore:

1. The Big Category Lie: The 8 Reasons (Everyone Says) Category Creation Is A Bad Idea

2. The Big Brand Lie: How Categories Make Brands & Why Brand Marketers Never Believe It

3. The Magic Triangle: Why Category Design Is The Single Point Of Failure

4. 8 Category Levers: How To Build A Massive, Pacific Ocean-Sized Differentiation Moat

5. How To Leverage Superconsumers For Growth & Category Creation: What Every Business Can Learn From Southwest Airlines

6. How To DAM The Demand: Redesign Your Category, Take 76% Of The Market, And Leave Your Competition Wondering What Happened

7. Become Known For A Niche You Own: Why Legendary Writers Use Languaging To Design New & Different Categories

8. The Art Of Fresh Thinking: How To Create Obvious & Non-Obvious Content

9. The Problem Is Your Problem: 5 Mistakes Aspiring Category Designers Make When Answering “What Problem Do I Solve?

10. How To Reframe The Problem & Win: The Art Of Reimagining Existing Obvious Problems To Create New, Non-Obvious Solutions

11. Simplicity Is Velocity: Why Less Wins When Designing Your Category, Your Products, And Your Languaging

🧪 I want to find weird data and spot future opportunities.

1. Category Science 101: How To Use The Right Historical Data, The Right Way, To Spot Weird Future Exponential Opportunities

2. Crossing The Chasm With Category Science: 7 Ways To Use Historical Data To Spot Future Exponential Growth Opportunities

3. Sizing The Category Prize: How To Run A Size Of Prize Analysis To Understand Your Category’s True Potential.

4. Microsoft Office’s Legendary Data Flywheel: Why A Superconsumer Of 1 Category Is Also A Superconsumer Of 9

🤯 I want to expand my mind and think different.

1. The Art Of Critical Reading: How To Transform From Reactive Reader To Reflective Thinker (Part I)

2. The Art Of Critical Reading: How To Transform From Reactive Reader To Regularly Rejecting the Premise (Part II)

3. The Innovator's Delusion: 4 Assumptions That Make "The Innovator’s Dilemma" Dangerous & What To Do Instead [Part I]

4. The Innovator's Solution: The 5-Stage Strategy Framework For How Incumbents Survive & Thrive [Part II]

5. Permission To Play: How Category Designers Break Free From Constraints & Unlock Legendary Ideas With Play

6. Living In The Future: How Pattern Breakers Defy Convention To Design New Categories

7. Find Your Business Bandmates: The Playbook For Finding Partners Who Share Your Mission & Grow Your Impact

☠️ I want to design a different business strategy.

1. No Ocean Strategy: Why Sailing For Blue Ocean Is A Ticket On The Titanic

2. The Annual Strategy Planning Trap: How To Stop Fighting Over Budget And Start Focusing On Category Dominance

3. Escape The Annual Strategy Planning Trap

4. Competition Derangement Syndrome: How Competition Ends High-Potential Companies & How To Cure It With Strategy Therapy

5. One-Sentence Strategy: How To Create A Powerful Sentence Your Team Can Rally Behind

6. Simplicity Is Velocity: The One-Sentence Strategy

7. The 2-4-8 Sales Strategy Framework: How Legendary Consultants Drive Deals & Revenue Growth

8. The Big Strategy Lie: Why Strategy Is Not As Complex, Hard, Or Intellectual As You've Been Taught

9. Strategic Pricing Decisions: How To Generate Fast-Cycle Profits & Growth By Offering Customers Pricing Choices

10. How To Hire A Strategy Advisor: 6 Traits To Look For (& What To Avoid) When Building A Great Business Strategy

🤖 I want to be smarter about AI and prepared for the future.

1. Why Native Digitals (People Under 35) Are A New Category of Human—And How They’re Transforming The $6 Trillion “Stuff” Business

2. The Digital Creation Game: Exiting The Analog World Of Competition And Entering The Digital World Of Infinite Creation

3. The Digital American Dream: Life, Liberty, And The Exponential Pursuit Of Capital (Online)

4. The Digital Education Crisis: How Native Analog Teaching Is Failing Native Digital Students & The Massive Opportunity Ahead

5. How AI Is Impacting Content Creation & Category Kings

6. Apple’s Strategic Mastery: Unpacking the Category of Personal Intelligence

🏴‍☠️ I want to see the world through a category lens.

1. The Category Makes the Brand: Unpacking Brand Hierarchy in Category Design

2. Be Clear, Not Clever: How To Create Straightforward Languaging & Drive Results

3. What Apple's $110 Billion Stock Buy-Back Means For The Category Queen

4. The Hero’s Journey: How To Make Your Customers The Heroes Of Their Own Transformational Journeys

5. What "The Innovator's Dilemma" Misses, And Why It Can Be Dangerous For Your Business

6. How To Avoid "Swiping Left" On a Legendary Business Partner

🦜 I want to become a thoughtful thought leader.

1. The “Me” Disease: Why Personal Branding Is A Lie (And How Some Of The Smartest People In Business Fell For It)

2. The Content Pyramid: The 5 Levels Of Becoming A Legendary Writer, Creator, and Thought Leader

3. Content-Free Marketing: How Marketers Got Duped Into Saying Nothing, Everywhere (And Why It Is A Legendary Opportunity)

4. [Part I] How To Become A Top 444 Author: How To Turn Your Breakthrough Ideas Into A Best-Selling Book (According To The World’s First Non-Fiction Study)

5. [Part II] Engineering A Best-Selling Business Book

6. Writer Business Models: How Writers, Creators, And Thought Leaders Monetize

7. How To Write A Top 1% Business Newsletter: 7 Ways To Differentiate Your Content

The future belongs to creators, not competitors.

2025 doesn’t have to be just another year — it can be the year you create a different future by framing, naming, and claiming the problem you solve for others.

So, ask yourself:

• What problem am I owning?

• What future am I designing?

• What legacy will I leave?

Your answers will tell you if you’re ready…

…to make this year legendary.

Arrrrrrr,

Category Pirates 🏴‍☠️

Eddie Yoon

Christopher Lochhead

Katrina Kirsch

P.S. - Start creating a different future for yourself and your company.

Take the step that’s right for you, right now:

1️⃣ Join the free Strategy Sprint email course to break free from a competition mindset.

2️⃣ Enroll in Strategy Therapy to create a one-page strategy and get 1:1 feedback.

3️⃣ Become a paid Category Pirates subscriber to get instant access to our archive of 99+ mini-books, audiobooks, videos, and every future post.