Ricky’s Online Business Blog

Yes I admit I’m a blue ocean strategy fan.  My PC desktop is an ocean viewing.  I even tend to look at everything through the lense of blue ocean vs. red ocean.

The problem is, we just can’t ignore competing in the red ocean, whether now or in future.  Perhaps our industry is still red.  Perhaps a blue ocean will also turn red after some time.  Competitive strategies still have an important place in business and marketing.

I heard that a telecommunication company in Malaysia has two teams of people planning their business strategy, one called “Compete Today”, another called “Compete Tomorrow”.

As the names suggest, the “Compete Today” team plan strategies to outsmart their competitors in today’s market.  Whereas the “Compete Tomorrow” team brainstorm and explore new markets and plan strategies for the future.

So I’m learning not to just look up to anything “blue ocean” as good and look down on anything “red ocean” as bad.  A more holistic perspective is required.

According to the blue ocean strategy, one way to find your blue ocean is by targeting and turning current non-customers of your products into your customers.  It is interesting to observe how non-users of a product can be turned into users by innovative offers and technologies.

Looking at the development of Internet in the past one and half decade, we can see the role of Internet users changing, from mere consumers of information in the 90’s, to producers and publishers of information on the Internet nowadays!

Just think about it.  In the good old days, we surfed the World Wide Web to read up what the site owner wrote. Then with the development of web authoring tools, the more technical people among us learned to design and publish web pages on the Internet.  Around the turn of the millennium, any IT student (including me) could do up a web page!

With the flourishing of social networking web sites in past few years, even non-technical people got to express themselves on the Internet.  Nowadays, more than 9 out of 10 college students own a piece of virtual property on Facebook or Friendster!

When blogs were popularized in more recent years, we change from owning a member page on Friendster to owning a blog!  Now virtually any Internet user can express themselves and shout on the Internet by blogging.  Even those who used to consider Internet as a scary place started to speak up!  Think about it.  It’s easier to learn WordPress than Microsoft Word!

So the Internet population has been transformed from content consumers to content “prosumers” (producer-consumer).  The technologies have turned non-users of the Internet to voice our thoughts, to using the Internet to rave about anything!

But many people in this country are still not using the Internet yet.  But watch and see.  When mobile Internet becomes so pervasive in our mobile phones, there will be more people surfing the Internet on mobile than through PC.

If most mobile users know how to send an SMS message now, they will know how to “micro-blog” in the future.  Microblogging tools such as Twitter may not be so popular and useful now.  But it will be in the future as more non-Internet users become Internet users via mobile phones.  At that time, even more people will publish content on the cyberspace!

The blue ocean strategy is more than just a business fad.  Now we can hear more and more people talking about it.  I can read more bloggers talk about “blue ocean” and “red ocean”.  Consultants and trainers are preaching about it.  Businesses, even non-profit organizations, are starting to adopt it.  One author even predicts that BOS (blue ocean strategy) will be prevalent for many years to come.

Some time ago I received an email from a Singaporean who just took a course in BOS at UCSI Blue Ocean Strategy Regional Centre, and commended how good the training had been.  I soon surfed to their web site and found it interesting.  But I didn’t notice their building was quietly being constructed right near my house until I passed by recently!

It is good news that more and more businesses are becoming aware of the dangers competing in red ocean, and the importance of creating their own market (blue ocean) by making the competitors irrelevant.  Easier said than done.  But it is achievable.  And there have been many success stories, both locally and abroad.

It is good for the businesses as they can transform their businesses and earn like never before.  They will no longer need to rely on competitive tactics, and even unethical ones, to outsmart one another.  It is good for the market as businesses truly listen and study what it needs, and even discover what it really needs.  It is good for the society as our lives can be improved through creativity and innovation in blue ocean strategy.

But what happens when everyone is doing BOS?  Not every BOS will be good BOS strategy.  Some can be BS strategy.  It will be interesting to see what happens in future when “blue ocean strategy” is as commonly understood and practiced as “differentiation”, “segmentation” and “branding”.

Are you not on the BOS bandwagon yet?