Blue Ocean Strategy

A couple of years ago I briefly read through Blue Ocean Strategy, a book about winning in marketing by "making the competition irrelevant". The strategy divides the market into two categories: red and blue. Red consists of all market spaces already known and contested - they are filled with blood as epic marketing battles take place in this space. Blue oceans are everything that has not yet been crowded with competition, but mostly market space that has yet to be discovered. In a blue ocean you create demand, instead of fighting over. Imagine the first computer developers. They created something new, and also created the demand for it. It was a blue ocean at that time. A blue ocean can become a red ocean, of course, once enough competition arises. The focus on a Blue Ocean Strategy is the creation of value for both the buyer and the seller - basically adding new innovation to the market.

In my business, and my campaigns, I hope to come up with these sorts of innovations - unique additions to what currently exists. There are so many potential opportunities still unexplored, so many ideas still unthought. I will be certainly working closely with everyone creative around me to come up with these ideas, and I will be sure to use them to quickly win over new markets.

Find that you can't come up with brilliant new ideas? There's always alternatives. There are plenty of ideas already floating around that simply need picked up on. Many things have been tried once, but things have changed since then and need tried again. Research some unique business and marketing ideas that didn't quite work the first time, then tweak them to fit your style. You may find this to be your easiest option, sort of like entering a murkier blue ocean. Businesses newsletters featuring unique businesses, like Springwise, might be an interesting place to get ideas going.