Definitely not congruent with the powerful brand Best Buy has spent millions building. It makes sense to me that Best Buy would sell laundry machines and refrigerators, because Sears and the like have gone out of business and no one else has stepped into that market.
But hostestly, I thought that email was spam at first or a joke of some kind.
Recently I posted on some thoughts I had about a talk David Heinemeier Hansson gave. He talked about the importance of focusing on problems that other people have and providing solutions to those problems.
I just watched a video (skip to 42:45) with Seth Godin from 2006. He gave a talk to some Google employees, and at the end opened it up for questions. Someone who worked on Google Maps asked why they hadn’t been more successful in taking market share from Mapquest. Seth’s answer: “We didn’t have a maps problem.” Just a refresher: Google Maps was revolutionary in that it was the first service to let you drag the map around with your cursor and see satellite footage overlayed with streets). Google Maps was tough to print out, which is what most of us do when we look up directions online. So while people were impressed with the snazzy features, they ultimately used other services like Mapquest once the novelty wore off. Simply put, we didn’t a big enough maps problem.
Now it’s 2008, and I don’t think Google Maps has changed much. I will say that even though Mapquest has its own draggable map with satellite footage, Google Maps has a better interface. I use Google Maps when I want to see the area where my destination is, and Mapquest when I need directions. Of course, with GPS, Mapquest’s days may be numbered.
You may haven noticed Starbucks has changed its logo. The idea is to go back to its “roots” to help Starbucks compete with smaller coffee shops that are eating away at market share. But the logo is just so dang ugly. Not only is the green logo much more clear and visually pleasing, it also has the benefit of not pissing off certain Christians (hint: look at the mermaid’s chest).
The old “new” logo:
The old logo:
Apparently you can now get pasta at Pizza Hut. This is very confusing for a company that previously marketed itself as the place for best pizza. Check out this commercial:
I’m guessing Pizza Hut is looking to diversify and capture a new market. While there may indeed be an opportunity in delivery Italian-style food (pizza, pasta, calzone, etc.), a brand with the name pizza in it won’t be very successful. The name “Pizza Hut” clearly communicates that they sell pizza (not rocket science here).
It’s further confusing to the customer with the spin-off of the pizza hut logo:
The problem is this only appears in commercials, and isn’t actually a brand that they are building. Mixed messages will only hurt the Pizza Hut brand.
Stanford University has an awesome annual conference called Startup School, which has talks about how to start a successful company from famous entrepreneurs, lawyers, and venture capitalists. I’ve watched every single one, and my favorite by far is the talk by David Heinemeier Hansson, creator of Ruby on Rails:
A few great points from his speech and my two cents:
1. It’s ok to not have a goal of making billions.
We constantly hold up the creators of great companies (like Bill Gates) in the highest regard and laud them for making billions of dollars (and they deserve it). But they are a very small fraction of entrepreneurs and businesses, and statistically you have a much better chance at making a million than a billion. Making a million is a fantastic success, even though it’s not as sexy as a billion.
2. You don’t need to be the next Google, Facebook, or Craigslist.
Don’t obsess about being the “next big thing.” There are tons of successful, profitable companies out there that come about simply from solving problems. In fact, David Heinemeier Hansson became successful because he ran into a problem that many other people had, and created a solution for that problem. Sometimes we’re married to the idea about being the “next big thing” when really we just need to step back, take a look at the world around us, and develop a solution to a problem that a bunch of other people have too.
3. It’s possible to treat your customers well AND charge them a price.
Many developers passionate about democratizing content online, and that’s great. But if you want a successful company that is financially viable, you should probably charge a price. In the age of open-source, it’s important to remember that businesses do charge for their products and services. Seems like a no-brainer, but I think a lot of entrepreneurs think that they can just build a great product and maybe get some VC funding for it. The bottom line is there needs to be financial viability for the long run (something Facebook and Youtube are having problems with).
4. Having a limited amount of time every day to work on something really focuses your energy.
I’ve always got a bunch of projects going on at the same time, and invariably one doesn’t progress as fast as I want. By sitting down and blocking out specific times to work on specific projects, I’ve had more luck ensuring all my projects keep moving forward.
