Tag: Business

Permission Marketing was Godin’s first break out hit. His second was Purple cow. We will spend the next two sessions unpacking Purple Cow.

 

What is a Purple Cow?

So what is a Purple Cow? Last week, as I was preparing this lesson, my 12-year old daughter saw the cover of the book and asked me the same question? I thought I had an opportunity to test the concept. She said a Purple Cow would be weird.

“Right,” I said, “But it would get your attention, wouldn’t it?’

She agreed and that is the point. A Purple Cow is different. It grabs your attention. It says, “Look at me,” instead of “moo.”

Godin explained:

Cows, after you’ve seen them for a while, are boring. They may be perfect cows, attractive cows, cows with great personalities, cows lit by beautiful light, but they’re still boring.

A Purple Cow, though. Now that would be interesting. (For a while).

The essence of the Purple Cow is that it must be remarkable.[i]

Read that last line again. The essence of a Purple Cow is that it is remarkable. It stands out. People talk about it and that separates the Purple Cows from all of their bovine competition.

 

Why Do You Need a Purple Cow?

Godin explains that you need a Purple Cow (e.g., a remarkable product that stands out) now more than ever because the rules of marketing have shifted. The old marketing rule was: “CREATE SAFE, ORDINARY PRODUCTS AND COMBINE THEM WITH GREAT MARKETING.” The new marketing rule: “CREATE REMARKABLE PRODUCTS THAT THE RIGHT PEOPLE SEEK OUT.”[ii]

You must remember, it begins with infusing remarkableness into the product from the start. You can’t sell the same mediocre thing you were selling before, slap purple paint on it, and expect the right people to seek it out. We will talk about the right people in the next lesson, but for now, let’s address the need for the cow itself.

Here a summary of the entire book: You need a Purple Cow in order to stand out from the crowd.

Some would say that it is risky to stand out and be different. Godin thinks otherwise. He explained:

My goal in Purple Cow is to make it clear that it’s safer to be risky—to fortify your desire to do something truly amazing things. Once you see that the old ways have nowhere to go but down, it becomes even more imperative to create things worth talking about.[iii]

 

Why Don’t We See More Purple Cows?

If times have changed, and it is risky to play it safe and we know that we need to be remarkable, why don’t we see more Purple Cows? The problem is that it is hard to create true Purple Cows. It is hard to build remarkable directly into the product. It is easy to be boring. It feels safe to be boring.

But, as Godin explained, “Boring is always the most risky strategy.”[iv] If you do something different, some people will not like it, and we are often more concerned about the people who will not like it than those who will become Raving Fans (Note: Raving Fans is the title of another great book by Ken Blanchard that you really ought to read).

 

A Final Word of Caution

Often, we think that the opposite of remarkable is terrible, but that is not always the case. The opposite of remarkable “is ‘very good’…Very good is an everyday occurrence and hardly worth mentioning.” If you get good service, you hardly notice. That is the kiss of death.

If, on the other hand, it is extremely bad or extremely good, you take notice.

Obviously, I am not encouraging you to be extremely bad. That doesn’t take a lot of effort. Ignore your customers. Focus on yourself. Screw up the order and act annoyed about having to do something about it.

But what about the other end of the spectrum—the remarkable end of the spectrum. How many products or services have you found that are truly remarkable? When you find one, you know it. Think about these remarkable products and services:

• The iPhone
• The Fitbit
• Warm Krispy Kreme Donuts
• The Mazda Miata (or other sports car of your choice)
• Intraocular Lenses (contacts that are implanted in your eye)

How do people react when they find true Purple Cows? In the next lesson, we will talk about the other important component: Purple Cow spotters.

 

What About You?

Do you have a Purple Cow? Was remarkable built-in or are you trying to paint a cow purple and sell brown cow with a dye-job?

 

References

[i] Godin, S. (2002). Purple cow: Transform your business by being remarkable. New York: Portfolio. (p. 3).

[ii] Godin, S. (2002). Purple cow: Transform your business by being remarkable. New York: Portfolio. (p. 21)

[iii] Godin, S. (2002). Purple cow: Transform your business by being remarkable. New York: Portfolio. (p. 30)

[iv] Godin, S. (2002). Purple cow: Transform your business by being remarkable. New York: Portfolio. (p. 62).

Note: The Purple cow picture is in the creative commons:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/elzey/5967239803

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Dr. Darin Gerdes is a tenured  Professor of Management in the College of  Business at Charleston Southern University. All ideas expressed on www.daringerdes.com are his own.

This post was originally created for Great Business Networking (GBN), a networking organization for business professionals where Dr. Gerdes is the Director of Education.

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