Purple Cow

Create safe, ordinary products and
combine them with great marketing.
The new rule is:
Create remarkable products that
the right people seek out.

once was amazing was now common.

new rule is:

Create remarkable products that

the right people seek out.

The rest of the time, you need to be investing in the Purple Cow. Products, services and techniques so useful, interesting, outrageous, and noteworthy that the market will want to listen to what you have to say. No, in fact, you must develop products, services, and techniques that the market will actually seek out.

You need to do this advertising when these consumers are actually looking for help, and in a place where they’ll find you.

The way you break through to the mainstream is to target a niche instead of a huge market. With a niche, you can segment off a chunk of the mainstream, and create an ideavirus so focused that it overwhelms that small slice of the market that really and truly will respond to what you 31Purple Cow-1st Print_crx.qrk 7/15/03 10:10 AM Page 32Seth Godinsell.

Don’t try to make a product for everybody, because that is a product for nobody.

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.

These consumers don’t necessarily yearn for a new product or service that can benefit them, but if enough of their peers try it and talk about it, these follow-ers are likely to come along as well.

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.