"Into the Great Wide Oceans of Red and Blue"

Imagine what it was like over 150 years ago. No cars, no music industry, airplanes, pharmaceuticals, management consulting, and so on.

If you can either imagine OR you lived 30 years ago....no cell phones, express package delivery, social media, disposable contact lenses and so on.

Am I going down memory lane? No but we are going swimming into oceans! The oceans are red and blue.

Let's start with the Red Ocean. In business there are a massive amount of different industries that we all know of. This is....the red ocean. We know the industry boundaries, the rules, the competition and within this ocean there a number of companies trying to outperform each other in this crowded space. Hence...the bloody waters of competition.

Then there's the blue ocean.

This ocean is all the industries that don't exist! Yes, the idea of demand is created instead of being fought over. Opportunity to be profitable and grow is quick. This ocean is going to be the most viable way for any company to succeed.

Am I suggesting coming up with something that's never even been discovered? If you can do that....good for you but no I am not suggesting that.

Blue oceans are created through altering the boundaries of an industry. Most 'blue ocean' companies began from within a 'red ocean'.

Red oceans are littered with line extensions of current products/services within. The 'known.' This type of behaviour limits strong strategic thinking because it's based in confronting an opponent rather than looking at creating 'new'. The red ocean is about dividing existing areas and feels constrained while blue ocean is new market space.

Break the tradition of the current industry you are in and swim into that big deep blue sea.