The Purple Cow

[Matt23]

• The old way of sales is called the "TV industrial complex"; create factories and a product, invest heavily in marketing to the masses, increase sales, take revenue and reinvest in marketing.   This form of marketing and sales is no longer viable.  There's too many products, people have everything they need, people have less time and attention to invest in new products.  Nowadays, the only way that will really work is by creating a Purple Cow; something so remarkable that the marketing is baked right into the product itself.  Something that isn't oriented around advertising but is instead oriented around creating great products that a select group of people will buy.  
• Moores' Idea Diffusion Curve  
  • Innovators --->  Early Adopters ---> Early & Late Majority ---> Laggards
    • Ideas spread only from right to left.  So, in order to get an idea accepted by the majority of people, you have to first get the Innovators to buy the idea.  Thus, the innovators are who you should be marketing to. 
    • Innovators:  People who are seen as experts in what they know, people who want to be the first one to own something, people who are interested in what's new.  Their friends see them as experts and trust their opinion.  So, if an Innovator passes along an idea or product to their "early/late majority" friends, they will more than likely buy in to the idea themselves.  
• Otaku
  • Something more than a hobby but less than an obsession.  
  • Target markets with existing Otakus.  For example, the hot sauce market has an Otaku, but the mustard market does not.  You don't see thousands of homegrown mustard companies shipping their niche mustards around the world.  But you do see this with hot sauces.  
• Find the market niche first, then make the product.  Not the other way around. 
• Worst = Marketing to keep busy. 
• Better = Doing nothing.
• Best = Doing something.
• Once you've managed to create something truly remarkable, do these two thing simultaneously;
  • Milk he cow for all its worth.  Figure out how to extend it and profit from it for as long as possible.
  • Create an environment that will make it likely that you'll create a new Purple Cow to replace the first one when the benefits inevitably wear off.
• "Very good" is an everyday occurrence.  Be remarkable.
• Following leaders is another form of safety.  And safety is risky.
• The reason it's so hard to follow the leader is that the leader is the leader since he did something remarkable.  And that remarkable thing is now taken.  It's no longer remarkable when you do it. 
• You're ads shouldn't cater to the masses.  They should cater to those you'd choose if you could choose your customers.  (ex: Mint Mobile commercials with Ryan Reynolds)
• All the obvious targets are gone.  
• It's useless to advertise to anyone (except 'sneezers' with lots of influence)
• Could you create a collectible version of your product?
• Half-measures will fail.  Complete overhauls on things that the right customers care about, that might work.
• Marketing done right = changing the product, not the ad. 
• The vast majority of product success stories are engineered from day one to be successful. 
• Ideavirus analysis; put all your product developments through this analysis
  • How smooth and easy is it to spread this idea?
  • How often will people sneeze about it to their friends?
  • How tightly knit is the group I'm targeting - do they talk much?
  • Do they believe each other?
  • How reputable are the people most likely to promote my idea?
  • How persistent is it - is it a fad that has to spread fast before it does, or will the idea have legs (and thus I can invest in spreading it over time)?
• Awareness is not the point.  Two of the most popular TV commercials of all time sold not one more bottle of coke.  They entertained and got attention, but no incremental sales.  Kmart has plenty of awareness.  So what?
• Old vs. New rules to marketing
  • Old rule:  Create safe, ordinary products and combine them with great marketing.
  • New rule: Create remarkable products that the right people seek out.
• The only products with a future were those created by passionate people.
• One hundred years of marketing thought are gone.  
• We can no longer target the masses.