Not your industry. The one next door. The one that shares your customer and gives them a reason to need you. FinTech looks at Real Estate. Health looks at Hospitality. Cinema looks at Paint.

The most powerful partnerships are almost never within your own category. They're with the adjacent industry that shares your customer without competing with you. The vertical adjacent mapping exercise: name your industry, name three adjacent industries, find the one person in each who is doing something genuinely new. That person is your next conversation.

— THE BUILD —

Apply the vertical adjacent mapping exercise. Name your industry. Then name the three industries that share your customer without competing with you. For each adjacent industry: who in that space is doing something new right now? Write three names — one per adjacent industry ...