If you're like me (a regular young hustler) you probably find all the talk that people (espcecially those bank boys) do about strategy very complex and you wonder how even they can implement such high sounding but vague models. For me the book is simply a common sense approach to developing practical strategies for accelerated growth.

In Jan 2008 I came a cross a phenomenal book called Blue Ocean Strategy sometime last year and implemented a few of the ideas into my businesses. I saw almost instantenous results doubling my revenues in just 3 1/2 months. Today i have a small team working with me who i shared the strategy i developed and not even a global economic recession can stop a Blue Ocean strategy.

I would be placing excerpts on Blue Ocean on this thread but would like to encourage everyone out there to get a copy of the book or attend a training workshop. The INSEAD institute of Blue Ocean Strategy I'm working on a plan to bring in Blue Ocean Strategy coaches from the Insead Instigtrainers for a workshop in partnership with a well known training firm.

Google, check out the website and let's discuss.

I am convinced that this is the only way to save Nigerian small businesses from the damage done by a fwe irrresposible organisations to the world economy. Here are a few questions to get your Blue Ocean brain gears shifting,

Is your company facing heightened competition from domestic and international rivals?

Do your sales representatives increasingly argue they need to offer deeper and deeper price discounts to make sales?

Are you finding you need to advertise more to get noticed in the marketplace, yet the impact of each advertising dollar spent is falling?

Is your company focused more on cost cutting, quality control, and brand management at the expense of growth, innovation, and brand creation?

Do you blame your slow growth on your market?

Do you see outsourcing to low cost companies or countries as a principal prerequisite to regain competitiveness?

Are mergers and acquisitions the principal means your company sees to grow?

Is it easier to get funding to match a strategic move made by your competitor than it is to get internal funding to support a strategic move that allows you
to break away from the competition?

Is commoditization of offerings a frequent worry of your company?

List your key competitive factors; now list your competition’s. Are they largely the same?

Companies have long engaged in head-to-head competition in search of profitable growth, but today, competing head-on often results in nothing but
a bloody ‘red ocean’ of rivals fighting over a shrinking profit pool. Blue Ocean Strategy contends that although most companies compete in these
red oceans, this strategy is unlikely to create strong profitable growth in the future.

Tomorrow’s leading companies (and this is especially true for Nigeria) will succeed not by battling competitors but by creating ‘blue oceans’ of uncontested market space. These strategic moves - termed ‘value innovation’- create leaps in value both for the firm and for buyers, creating all new demand. Blue Ocean Strategy provides a systematic approach to making the competition irrelevant by providing the tools for successfully creating and capturing blue oceans.

Based on extensivew research on a wide range of strategic moves across a host of industries, Blue Ocean Strategy highlights the six principles that every company can use to successfully formulate and execute blue ocean strategies.

The six principles show how to
1. Reconstruct market boundaries
2. Focus on the big picture
3. Reach beyond existing demand
3. Get the strategic sequence right
4. Overcome organizational hurdles
5. Build execution into strategy

Australian Casella wines created a blue ocean strategy that, in just two years, caused its [yellow tail] wine to become the fastest growing brand in the
histories of both the Australian and the U.S. wine industries and the number one imported wine into the United States, surpassing the wines of France and Italy.

Below are steps they took to create a blue ocean strategy—steps that any company can take to get out of the red ocean of competition:
1) Eliminate factors that the industry takes for granted but adds no perceived value to customers.
Casella Wines recognized that most wineries touted aging and tannin qualities, two factors that intimidated customers. Casella decided to focus their efforts on different qualities.

2) Reduce factors well below the industry’s standard to avoid the mistake of over delivering in order to beat the competition.
To avoid customer confusion, Casella Wines limited their offerings to just one white wine and one red wine.

3) Raise factors well above the industry’s standard so your customer won’t have to make compromises.
Casella Wines raised the involvement of retailers with [yellow tail]’s success by giving retail employees Australian outback clothing that made [yellow tail} seem friendly instead of intimidating like other wines.

4) Create new sources of value that the industry has never offered.
Casella wines created new customer experiences for wine drinking: easy drinking, ease of selection, and a sense of fun and adventure.

5), (contd)

It's good to know someone here knows about the Blue Ocean strategy phenomenon. First heard about the concept in the last quarter of last year, and made it one of my primary objectives for this year to go to (Fontainbleu) INSEAD for training on this new strategy concept. At the moment am putting in a strong motivation for my employers to pick up the bill, however, come what may I intend to add this to my knowledge base before the end of the year. It will really be great if truly you or anyone for that matter can bring in the facilitators as it can help my present course of action. Please intimate me on your plans as regards, (i) Facilitators (ii) When (iii) Possible cost ,

Might not be able to wait for next year, so hurry man and goodluck!

I have heard so much about Blue ocean strategy, but have not read it. Will do so soon. But is it for someone who has plans of starting a business, no matter how small. with no initial business experience except for street smart! Will search for the book though.

The reality of changing indices of the global economy calls for corporate organisations and professionals to do a re-think of their current strategy if they must remain in the market space. The trend towards globalization compounds the situation.

The supply of products and services in most industries exceeds demand. The result has been accelerated commoditization of products and services, increasing price wars and shrinking profit margins. All these suggest that the business environment in which most strategy and management approaches of the twenty-first century evolved is increasingly disappearing. Managers need to challenge themselves by breaking out of the red ocean of bloody competition by creating uncontested market space that makes the competition irrelevant.

Proshare Training, the training arm of Proshare Nigeria Limited, Investors Relations/Analyst Services Company will be bringing the Blue Ocean Strategy (BOS) seminar to Nigera tagged “ Develop a High Growth Strategy” designed for top Business Executives, Brand Managers, Business Owners, Policy and Innovative Responsibility Owners in Nigeria .

As part of the strategy, Blue Ocean would be showing how great Companies have emerged during periods of crisis and stiff competing environment by leveraging on the principles of the Blue Ocean strategy.

The facilitator of the training is Simon Van Zuydam, Founder of OnBoard Consultancy Strategy Advisor and Blue Ocean Strategist from Europe. Simon has worked with Multinationals, Small and Medium Enterprises (SME’s) and Start-Ups in Europe, United States (US) and South East Asia.

The “Develop a High Growth Strategy” seminar enrich participants on the how of Challenging Conventional Wisdom; Restructuring Market Assumptions ;Developing a Blue Ocean Idea; High Growth Profit Modelling and Execution Strategy.

The Blue Ocean Strategy Seminar is a two (2) day event scheduled to hold at the Sheraton Hotel and Towers in Lagos Nigeria between April 24 to 25 2009.

Individuals and companies at home and abroad are all affected by the Global Economic Crisis and no profound solution has been forth coming. We all need a change to take place, but how to go about it is the question that we need an able hand to answer.

If truly a Professional (Strategist) will be coming from abroad on Blue Ocean Strategy, that would definitely be a great idea. Please, I need details of the event.

, In times like this, there should still be opportunities,

blue ocean? out of the red ocean right?
how much is it?
seems like i am tripping already,

Sounds pretty interesting!I hope it's truly beneficial to young and aspiring managers.

Reminds me of Micheal Porter's competitive strategy, I hope its truly what i think it is.

Would love to attend, So who knows more about this??

@knzguru,
Are u an advocate of blue ocean strategy?how do one get his hands on it?

Well you could call me an advocate but i'm just a really big fan of Blue Ocean cos its works!

I will soon be posting details of Blue Ocean inspired projects that would be pitched to the government.

I will need Nairalanders' support either by polling or simply by posting their comments.

I google to know more about this blue Ocean stuff i dicover it is a strategic book that talks about creating uncontested market space that makes competion irrelevant, it also talk about a way of growing demand and breaking away from the competition, but my concern is this after creating our own market that is not competitive as times goes on it will become competitive and it will turn to red ocean or what do you think.

It is all about been on top of your game at all times. If you find out that you are playing in the red ocean again, then you have to come up with another strategy to start swimming in the blue ocean.

check this link and fill the form to access blue ocean strategy.

best of luck as you read.

www.fearp.usp.br/fava/pdf/pdf244.pdf

China's most important book review journal 'China Book Business Report' reports that Blue Ocean Strategy has been chosen for two famous nationwide book lists. - The 600 Most powerful Books in the History of the People's Republic of China 1949-2009 & The 300 Most powerful Books in the three Decades of China's Reform and Opening to the Outside World 1979-2009 in the category of 'Economics and Finance' in the middle of Adam Smith's 'The Wealth of Nations', Milton Friedman's 'Free to Choose', Joseph Schumpeter's 'Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy', and Samuelson and Nordhaus' 'Economics'.

Source: http://ping.fm/osyn5

Red Ocean Versus Blue Ocean Strategy

Red Ocean Strategy                                                       Blue Ocean Strategy
Compete in existing market space.                                          Create uncontested market space.
Beat the competition.                                                               Make the competition irrelevant.
Exploit existing demand.                                                          Create and capture new demand.
Make the value-cost trade-off.                                                 Break the value-cost trade-off.
Align the whole system of a firm’s activities                             Align the whole system of a firm’s
with its strategic choice of differentiation or low cost              activities in pursuit of differentiation and low cost.

Strategy will always involve both opportunity and risk, be it a red ocean or a blue ocean initiative. But at present the playing field is dramatically
unbalanced in favor of tools and analytical frameworks to succeed in red oceans. As long as this remains true, red oceans will continue  to dominate companies’ strategic agenda even as the business imperative for creating blue oceans takes on new urgency.

Analytical tools and framework is available in the Harvard Business Press edition of Blue Ocean Strategy.

Need a copy-email b2oconsulting@yahoo.com

That's an interesting article. http://www.unn.edu.ng/ or portal.unn.edu.ng provides easy access to articles and books.