Project Description

book cover Purple CowBy: Seth Godin

Notes:

  • In the past, it was easy to market, because consumers had specific needs and the first product to meet it did really well.
  • Everyone has everything they ever wanted, so no incremental benefits will work anymore.
  • Allow users to change their behavior to use your product in remarkable and new ways.
  • Products are first purchased by innovators, then early adopters.
    • Don’t go after the middle until you’ve sold to the other groups, because they passively adopt products that are recommended by the other two groups.
  • Must advertise to only those who are listening.
    • For example: Google ads in search results.
  • Must advertise to those who spread the word to others.
  • A lot of the benefits go to the brand that’s winning.
  • Being safe is risky.
  • Need a good slogan or symbol so that a person could easily spread the word to others without messing up the message.
  • Can’t build a fast growing company around a plain and boring product.
    • Make pecan / tequila ice-cream versus making vanilla. Can’t build a brand around the later b/c is caters to everyone.
  • Steps to make your product pop:
    1. Get permission from your current customers to inform them of new and cool things you offer.
    2. Target people who will spread your ideas to a wider audience.
    3. Once you cross the line from remarkable product to profitable business, let your team milk the idea.
    4. Reinvest. Do it again with the same audience and beat out your current product.
  • Figure out all the important products that were made in your industry. Model the behavior of those product developments, not the products.
  • If everyone liked it, it would be boring.
  • If they weren’t afraid of failure, what would you do.
    • The hardest possible path generally plays it safe.
  • Cheap it the worst possible idea unless you can completely change the landscape of an industry.
  • Better to launch 10 products and split the money between them versus launching 1 big product.
    • You need more tries to get it right.
  • You want to be the very best, in a strange way, to get yourself known.
    • Be the certified specialist.
    • Make yourself unique in any way.
    • You want to be the “most” something.