Creating Blue Oceans

Welcome to the Age of Now

Research suggests that brands that engage people emotionally can command prices as much as 20% to 200% higher than competitors', and sell in far higher volumes. Companies can turn brands into Lovemarks by establishing attributes that capture the heart and imagination of target customers: Sensuality, Intimacy, and Mystery. 

Kevin Roberts, Saatchi & Saatchi CEO Worldwide talks about why Lovemarks are more valid than ever in the “Age of Now” via AdAge: 

The Age of Now is all about the mastery of emotional communication; not manipulation, but of having relationships, perfect "rules for the road" for the social-networking miasma that has grown around and through us. In the Era of New marketing, it was all about your product. In the Age of Now it's all about the single question consumers have of you: "How will you improve my life?" Answering this is to deliver priceless value.

Don’t miss out on Gabor’s upcoming Slingshot Living radio interview with Kevin Roberts. Stay close via the Slingshot Inner Circle newsletter or follow on Twitter (@SlingshotLiving).

[Image via Lovemarks Campus.]

Tata expands blue ocean with a little help from employees

To maximize the size of their blue oceans, companies need to take a reverse course. Instead of concentrating on customers, they need to look to noncustomers. And instead of focusing on customer differences, they need to build on powerful commonalities in what buyers value. That allows companies to reach beyond existing demand to unlock a new mass of customers that did not exist before (from Blue Ocean Strategy by Professor W. Chan Kim and Professor Renée Mauborgne).

Via IndianCarsBikes:

From time to time, on all our products, we work with sister companies in the group to create exciting offers for colleagues and their families, just like we do for our own colleagues. As for the Tata Nano specifically, as for any prospective customer, it is equally an aspirational car for colleagues across the group. In the Tata Group, companies offer colleagues in other companies special offers on their products. As for the special offer on Tata Nano for TCS colleagues, the response incidentally has been overwhelming. 

See how meaningful innovation, based on unconventional thinking, is possible at both ends of a mature industry—like the auto industry—in the Tata Nano case study from Slingshot: Re-Imagine Your Business, Re-Imagine Your Life.

[Image via Google Images.]

Our mystery guest revealed...

 

With much fanfare, it is time to reveal the identity of Gabor’s current guest on the Slingshot Visionary series. It is non-other than Kris Carr, wellness warrior, creator of crazysexlife.com and best-selling author. Listen to Gabor’s interview with Kris, and find out the answer to the question: 

How can you re-imagine your health? 

Congratulations to Allison Hill for the fastest correct submission. Allison wins an autographed copy of Kris’ bestselling book Crazy Sexy Diet.

Join the fun: Be the first to guess the name of our next inspirational guest, and win! Subscribe to the Slingshot Living Inner Circle newsletter and receive all the clues. 

Re-Imagine your business, re-imagine your life. Click on over to Slingshot Living for more inspiration. 

 

Creating your own country

Unconventional wisdom has been a critical driving force for great accomplishments during the course of human history… inspiration is all around you (from Slingshot: Re-Imagine Your Business, Re-Imagine Your Life by Gabor George Burt). 

And here is a powerful dose of Defying Conventional Wisdom via Yahoo!:

Pay Pal founder and early Facebook investor Peter Thiel has given $1.25 million to an initiative to create floating libertarian countries in international waters, according to a profile of the billionaire in Details magazine. 

"There are quite a lot of people who think it's not possible," Thiel said at a Seasteading Institute Conference in 2009, according to Details. (His first donation was in 2008, for $500,000.) "That's a good thing. We don't need to really worry about those people very much, because since they don't think it's possible they won't take us very seriously. And they will not actually try to stop us until it's too late."

[Image via Parabolic Arc.]

Are You Pampering Your Customers Enough?

Head on over to Gabor’s regular feature at American Express OPEN Forum for the answer. 

Article preview: 

As customers, we often don’t get what we expect to get. This can happen towards both extremes: at times we are unexpectedly seduced, at other times we are left feeling deeply underwhelmed. The contrast between such opposing experiences provides valuable insight into how companies should strive to interact with their customers.

[Image via zakgollop.]

 

Guess who? Our next mystery guest…

This week we continue with the fun twist on our Slingshot Visionary series: Be the first to correctly guess the identity of Gabor’s next visionary guest and receive an autographed copy of this bestselling author’s book for healthy living.  

Here are a few clues about this mystery guest: 

Clue 1: Best-selling author and wellness warrior.

Clue 2: Prominent green juice lover.

Additional Clues: To be revealed to Slingshot Inner Circle subscribers. 

To Win: Be the first person to send the mystery guest’s name to fun@slingshotliving.com 

Deadline: Thursday 25 August at 07.59 AM USA

Interview will air on SlingshotLiving.com on Thursday 25 August at 08.00 AM.

 

How can you harness the power of unconventional thinking?

 

Head on over to Gabor’s regular feature at Business Insider for the answer. 

Article preview from the Business Insider:

Unconventional thinking means looking at the world through an inquisitive, investigative lens, like you did as a child. And this perspective should not be limited just to your work, but permeate your general outlook on life. After all, some of the greatest inspirations and most profound unconventional ideas will come to you in moments and situations completely removed from your business. The whole world is your reservoir for unconventional ideas… 

[Image © 2011 Slingshot]

Don’t play no game that I can’t win

In a hazardous and unpredictable environment, the role of unconventional thinking is especially critical as a basis of business strategy. When market conditions are unprecedented, traditional ways of operation cannot apply. Instead of a strategy for mere survival that may simply accelerate your company’s decline, you should recalibrate your perspective in order to see the environment as full of new, exceptional opportunities (from Slingshot: Re-Imagine Your Business, Re-Imagine Your Life by Gabor George Burt).

In lockstep with this line of thinking, an insprirational example from the Beastie Boys. Via CNBC:

Technology has changed the music business, and most labels and artists aren’t happy with one of the results – easier pirating. Bootlegs are the bane of the business, putting a dent in legitimate sales when they flood the market before an album’s even released. Cease and desist letters, lawsuits and sabotage haven’t stopped the tide.

A change in perspective might be more constructive than continuing to fight this losing battle.

Beastie Boys are among the artists and labels that have done a 180, embracing “the leak” as a marketing asset. Just last month, Beastie Boys countered a leak of their new album, “Hot Sauce Committee Part 2” by streaming every track with a link to buy. And they cleverly billed theirs as the “filthy dirty nasty version” versus the sanitized one that was leaked.

[Image via Virgin Media.]

Where Are You Hiding Your Trojan Horse?

Enjoy the latest contribution from Gabor, “Where Are You Hiding Your Trojan Horse?” via the CBS Radio Altitude Group blog. Our resident Blue Ocean Strategy expert has been called on by CBS Radio Altitude Group to explore how you can use your dormant youthful creativity to re-imagine your business and re-imagine your life in this featured series. 

From the CBS Radio Altitude Group blog:

In my last article I challenged you to look back in history and to think of your favorite examples of people daring to defy conventional wisdom.

Here are a couple of mine. In the eleventh and twelfth centuries BC, one of the great epic wars of ancient times was fought. The Greeks assembled a massive flotilla of warships and brought its might against the city of Troy. Their mission was to take back Helen, the abducted Greek queen, and to punish the Trojans for the fiendish act. But the city had formidable defenses, and the two armies remained deadlocked. There they stood, shield to shield, lance to lance, neither able to budge the other. The siege went on for ten fruitless years.

[Image © 2011 SLINSGHOT]

Lessons Learned From The Recession

How did 60 business leaders succeed in the economic downturn of 2008? It’s the topic of a new book entitled Lessons Learned From The Recession, compiled by Dr. Richard Norris and Mark Stephens of the Business Leaders Book Club. What follows is a brief excerpt from one of the inspirational stories of the book. It is by Peter Sage and Anya Navidski of the Space Energy Group, in which they discuss how they were able to advance their bold vision for space-based solar power even during the tough period of the recent recession.

Excerpt:

The primary principle here is simple, timeless and yet profound. People buy people before they buy their products, ideas and concepts. In other words, if you are committed to the very centre of your being and believe with every cell that this is going to happen regardless of the good opinion of others, then that certainty, that conviction, that level of total resolve, will recruit others who also want to believe.

And so it started. Friends, family, even people we met in bars were touched by the magic of the vision to the point where they wanted to get involved and support, either passively through investment or by joining the team. Of course, leaders go there first and this was documented by a personal investment of around $4m by Peter himself and matched over time by other ‘believers’ who became angel investors.

Download your complimentary copy of Lessons Learned From The Recession by Dr. Richard Norris and Mark Stephens. Get a taste of the pioneering world of space-based solar power in Gabor’s interview with Peter Sage, accessible here.

[Image via Inhabitat]