It's all about the execution, stupid

Not really, since Strategy matters more than ever:

When everyone is playing the same game, your execution is critical. [...] Not changing your strategy merely because you're used to the one you have now is a lousy strategy.

Yup, Seth again, this one from July 23, 2012 - such a treasure trove. The gift that keeps on giving.

Does digital open up for more copycats, or does it force us into our own path and localized maximum?

There are probably more Groupon clones, than there are active users of coupon services. But there are still more other start ups playing in the distribution, rewards and benefits arena. And as the different ideas gain traction, it makes a lot more sense to do it differently, rather than trying to "out Amazon Amazon"

Not even sure if Google or Microsoft* can do that in terms of cloud offerings - AWS is THE dog, it plays for scale and pushing costs to zero. Having services like Netflix does a bit for your volume and requirements.

Same way YouTube totally dominates in video hosting, distribution, monetization and partially creation. Pushing the scope ever outwards, doing hangouts on air, paid channels, longer clips, higher quality. Step by step eating up the niches. Vimeo made sense in a more constrained time for the "above average" video producer, but now?  

The same digital flexibility is what you need to play around with, map out not THE path, but a set of options, interconnected or related, and figure out how you might need to pivot up front. Just like playing chess - if competitor X launches this, we'll do ..., but if competitor Y appears, we'll just ...

Run the scenarios. Describe the story. Map the future. 

Rinse, repeat. Because in 6 months there will be new players, models and options.



* love how the blogger dictionary doesn't see the need to capitalize Blogger or Google, but microsoft gets a red line

-...and the sun has been staying around in the early days of June, here's to hoping for many more lazy days and late warm nights...