Purple Cow

I believe we’ve now reached the point where we can no longer market directly to the masses. We’ve created a world where most products are invisible. (Location 148)

Almost everything we can realistically imagine that we need has been invented. (Location 248)

All the obvious targets are gone, so people aren’t likely to have easily solved problems. Consumers are hard to reach because they ignore you. Satisfied customers are less likely to tell their friends. (Location 257)

The old rule was this:      CREATE SAFE, ORDINARY PRODUCTS AND COMBINE THEM WITH GREAT MARKETING. The new rule is: CREATE REMARKABLE PRODUCTS THAT THE RIGHT PEOPLE SEEK OUT. (Location 306)

The marketer of yesterday valued the volume of people she could reach. The center of the black curve above was the goal. Mass marketing traditionally targets the early and late majority because this is the largest group. But in many markets, the value of a group isn’t related to its size – a group’s value is related to its influence. In this market, for example, the early adopters heavily influence the rest of the curve, so persuading them is worth far more than wasting ad dollars trying to persuade anyone else. Before and After TV-INDUSTRIAL AGE POST-TV AGE AVERAGE PRODUCTS REMARKABLE PRODUCTS ADVERTISE TO ANYONE ADVERTISE TO THE EARLY ADOPTER FEAR OF FAILURE FEAR OF FEAR LONG CYCLES SHORT CYCLES SMALL CHANGES BIG CHANGES (Location 312)

The reason it’s so hard to follow the leader is this: The leader is the leader because he did something remarkable. And that remarkable thing is now taken – it’s no longer remarkable when you do it. (Location 359)

Instead of trying to use your technology and expertise to make a better product for your users’ standard behavior, experiment with inviting the users to change their behavior to make the product work dramatically better. (Location 426)

If a product’s future is unlikely to be remarkable – if you can’t imagine a future in which people are once again fascinated by your product – it’s time to realize that the game has changed. Instead of investing in a dying product, take profits and reinvest them in building something new. (Location 439)

product. The vast majority of consumers are happy. Stuck. Sold on what they’ve got. They’re not looking for a replacement, and they don’t like adapting to anything new. You don’t have the power to force them to. The only chance you have is to sell to people who like change, who like new stuff, who are actively looking for what it is you sell. (Location 467)

A brand (or a new product offering) is nothing more than an idea. Ideas that spread are more likely to succeed than those that don’t. (Location 483)

It’s not an accident that some products catch on and some don’t. When an ideavirus occurs, it’s often because all the viral pieces work together. How smooth and easy is it to spread your idea? How often will people sneeze it to their friends? How tightly knit is the group you’re targeting – do they talk much? Do they believe each other? How reputable are the people most likely to promote your idea? How persistent is it – is it a fad that has to spread fast before it dies, or will the idea have legs (and thus you can invest in spreading it over time)? Put all of your new product developments through this analysis, and you’ll discover which ones are most likely to catch on. Those are the products and ideas worth launching. (Location 498)

Differentiate your customers. Find the group that’s most profitable. Find the group that’s most likely to sneeze. Figure out how to develop/advertise/reward either group. Ignore the rest. Your ads (and your products!) shouldn’t cater to the masses. Your ads (and products) should cater to the customers you’d choose if you could choose your customers. (Location 596)

Make a list of competitors who are not trying to be everything to everyone. Are they outperforming you? If you could pick one underserved niche to target (and to dominate), what would it be? Why not launch a product to compete with your own – a product that does nothing but appeal to this market? (Location 632)

The lesson of the Cow is worth repeating: Safe is risky. What tactics does your firm use that involve following the leader? What if you abandoned them and did something very different instead? If you acknowledge that you’ll never catch up by being the same, make a list of ways you can catch up by being different. (Location 729)

What would happen if you gave the marketing budget for your next three products to the designers? Could you afford a world-class architect/designer/sculptor/director/author? (Location 788)

Zara, a fast-growing retailer in Europe, changes its clothing line every three or four weeks. By carefully watching what’s working and what’s not, they can evolve their lineup far faster than the competition can ever hope to. What could you measure? What would that cost? How fast could you get the results? If you can afford it, try it. “If you measure it, it will improve.” (Location 814)

Once you’ve managed to create something truly remarkable, the challenge is to do two things simultaneously: Milk the Cow for everything it’s worth. Figure out how to extend it and profit from it for as long as possible. Create an environment where you are likely to invent a new Purple Cow in time to replace the first one when its benefits inevitably trail off. (Location 870)

How could you modify your product or service so that you’d show up on the next episode of Saturday Night Live or in a spoof of your industry’s trade journal? (Location 941)

Do you have the email addresses of the 20 percent of your customer base that loves what you do? If not, start getting them. If you do, what could you make for these customers that would be superspecial? Visit www.sethgodin.com and you can sign up for my list and see what happens. (Location 960)

Could you make a collectible version of your product? (Location 969)

What would happen if you took one or two seasons off from the new-product grind and reintroduced wonderful classics instead? What sort of amazing thing could you offer in the first season you came back (with rested designers)? (Location 986)

Go to a science fiction convention. These are pretty odd folks. Do you appeal to an audience as wacky and wonderful as this one? How could you create one? (Jeep did. So did Fast Company and the Longaberger basket company. There are similar groups in the investing community, the market for operating systems, and the market for million-dollar stereo systems. Products differ, but sneezers and early adopters stay the same.) (Location 1023)

A few obvious changes in the can meant a huge surge in sales for Dutch Boy. The obvious question: Why did it take so long? This is marketing done right. Marketing where the marketer changes the product, not the ads. Where does your product end and marketing hype begin? The Dutch Boy can is clearly product, not hype. Can you redefine what you sell in a similar way? (Location 1034)

It’s worth noting that this probably wouldn’t work with bagels or brownies. There’s something very visceral about the obsession that donut fans feel about Krispy Kreme, and discovering and leveraging that feeling is at the heart of this phenomenon. In other words, find the market niche first, and then make the remarkable product – not the other way around. (Location 1055)

Do you have a slogan or positioning statement or remarkable boast that’s actually true? Is it consistent? Is it worth passing on? (Location 1092)

A few years ago, after yet another unsuccessful sales call, I realized the blindingly obvious: It’s a lot easier to sell something that people are already in the mood to buy. (Location 1106)

Marketing is the act of inventing the product. The effort of designing it. The craft of producing it. The art of pricing it. The technique of selling it. How can a Purple Cow company not be run by a marketer? (Location 1179)

If you are a marketer who doesn’t know how to invent, design, influence, adapt, and ultimately discard products, then you’re no longer a marketer. You’re deadwood. (Location 1203)

This is Dineh Mohajer, founder of Hard Candy, a cosmetics company with more than $10 million a year in sales. She knows what young women who love nail polish want because she is a young woman who loves nail polish. (Location 1223)

You’re probably guilty of being too shy, not too outrageous. Try being outrageous, just for the sake of being annoying. It’s good practice. Don’t do it too much because it doesn’t usually work. But it’s a good way to learn what it feels like to be at the edge. (Location 1265)

Remember, it’s not about being weird. It’s about being irresistible to a tiny group of easily reached sneezers with otaku. Irresistible isn’t the same as ridiculous. Irresistible (for the right niche) is just remarkable. (Location 1449)

Of the remaining thirty brands, half were built almost entirely through word of mouth (Hewlett-Packard, Oracle, Nintendo, SAP, Canon, IKEA, Sun, Yahoo!, Ericsson, Motorola, Amazon.com, Prada, Starbucks, Polo Ralph Lauren, and Armani). (Location 1485)

Speeding through the airport the other day, I noticed that the clothing worn by just about everyone working at every concession was totally unremarkable. Why not dress the folks at the ice cream stand in pink and white stripes and bow ties? “Hey, did you see that?” (Location 1622)

You have to go where the competition is not. The farther the better. (Location 1634)

Explore the limits. What if you’re the cheapest, the fastest, the slowest, the hottest, the coldest, the easiest, the most efficient, the loudest, the most hated, the copycat, the outsider, the hardest, the oldest, the newest, the … most! If there’s a limit, you should (must) test it. (Location 1663)

Is your product more boring than salt? Unlikely. So come up with a list of ten ways to change the product (not the hype) to make it appeal to a sliver of your audience. Think small. One vestige of the TV-industrial complex is a need to think mass. If it doesn’t appeal to everyone, the thinking goes, it’s not worth it. No longer. Think of the smallest conceivable market, and describe a product that overwhelms it with its remarkability. Go from there. Outsource. If the factory is giving you a hard time about jazzing up the product, go elsewhere. There are plenty of job shops that would be delighted to take on your product. After it works, the factory will probably be happy to take the product back. Build and use a permission asset. Once you have the ability to talk directly to your most loyal customers, it gets much easier to develop and sell amazing things. Without the filters of advertising, wholesalers, and retailers, you can create products that are far more remarkable. Copy. Not from your industry, but from any other industry. Find an industry more dull than yours, discover who’s remarkable (it won’t take long), and do what they did. Go one more. Or two more. Identify a competitor who’s generally regarded as at the edges, and outdo them. Whatever they’re known for, do that thing even more. Even better, and even safer, do the opposite of what they’re doing. Find things that are “just not done” in your industry, and do them. JetBlue almost instituted a dress code for passengers. They’re still playing with the idea of giving a free airline ticket to the best-dressed person on the plane. A plastic surgeon could offer gift certificates. A book publisher could put a book on sale. Stew Leonard’s took the strawberries out of the little green plastic cages and let the customers pick their own – and sales doubled. Ask, “Why not?” Almost everything you don’t do has no good reason for it. Almost everything you don’t d...

...o is the result of fear or inertia or a historical lack of someone asking, “Why not?” (Location 1672)