Good Evening,
Happy Halloween!
I didn’t trick or treat as I am a grown up and don’t have children so I just stayed home and lounged a bit. I decided to watch some TV for a change of pace. I haven’t had cable in years (my internet marketing career literally began with a blog about cord cutting) so I fired up my Roku to watch some Netflix (Star Trek, naturally). It occurred to me as I did that Roku and Netflix are two of my favorite companies and I feel that I relate to them a lot.
Here’s Why:
Roku – For those that don’t know Roku is the industry leader in streaming media players. I love their devices… but what I love even more is that they are in an industry with Amazon, Apple, Sony, Google and some of the other biggest companies in history, and they absolutely dominate the market. In my opinion it is for two reasons:
- They make a great product.
- They focus on one and only one thing; providing a great streaming experience.
The first one should be self explanatory (though looking around you never know) but the second is more interesting.
Amazon, Apple, Google etc… they are titans… but they do a lot of things and streaming media devices are pretty low on the list. They are only able to pick up market share that they have just by the fact of who they are. They are tech companies that also sell streaming media, whereas Roku is a streaming streaming media company and does little to nothing else. They know who they are, and they work to improve that and only that, and because of that they dominate. That’s wat we are going to do with Legiit. Be the best online business solution in history.
Netflix – What I like about Netflix is how well they are able to see around the corner, catch trends, disrupt industries… and when they screw up they adapt quickly. First they went against the conventional wisdom of the time… that people liked going to video stores to rent movies, and came up with an entirely different business model… shipping movies to people at a subscription rate, with no return date or late fees. Totally unheard of at the time. And before long it was bringing Blockbuster and other video chains to their knees. Then the story gets a bit more interesting. They were able to spot the trend that people were moving away from physical media and into streaming so they started to adapt and focus more on streaming and less on the mail in business. This is where they screwed up initially. They originally intended to spilt the business into two brands. The ship to home business was to be renamed Qwikster and rebranded while the streaming side would still be Netflix. They underestimated how much the public liked getting their red envelopes with movies, the outcry (and effect on their stock) was enormous… and less than a month later they essentially admitted they made a mistake, that it was stupid, and kept them both as Netflix. They went on to literally be synonymous with at home streaming services and lead the way for thousands of other services to follow. In the ensuing years they have also started the trend of having their own content, becoming the creator as well as the platform.
That is still playing out so its tough to call it another trend they got in front of, but it seems possible.
Being ahead of the curve, being flexible, an industry trend setter.
Another thing Legiit is going to be.
Who are some of your favorite companies? Why? How can you apply these concepts in your businesses?
Talk Soon,
CMW