No Ocean Strategy: Why Sailing For Blue Ocean Is A Ticket On The Titanic

To read this “mini-book,” as well as our entire archive of writing on Category Design, subscribe to Category Pirates here:

categorypirates.substack.com

In 2005, a little book called Blue Ocean Strategy grew into a global bestseller.

With over 4 million copies sold and industry recognition as “one of the most iconic and impactful strategy books ever written,” Blue Ocean Strategy changed the way many people thought about business. We tip our hats to the title, and the framing of the idea, because it is a legendary example of Languaging. More than 15 years later, and you will still hear people in business meetings referencing “blue oceans” and “red oceans.”

But...

There are a few problems.

The book assumes the ocean.

The book assumes incumbents are the ones that create new categories.

The book assumes blue oceans are not about technology innovation.

The book assumes Superconsumers and data-flywheels play a limited role in category domination.

The book assumes category leadership is about product and company design, not the ability to create and design categories.

In this “mini-book” you will learn:

No Ocean Strategy, and why it’s important to reject the premise (“An ocean exists”) when innovating.
The dangers of thinking while remaining anchored to the past (the legacy category).
Why legendary creators, entrepreneurs, artists, executives, and investors do not start with “the ocean” (aka: the category as it exists today)—and how they instead stand in the future and pull the present in their direction.
The (misunderstood) story of Cirque du Soleil, and how they did not “reinvent the circus” but rather invented a whole new category of theatrical art.
Why the phrase “stand apart from the competition” is flawed from the beginning.
And more.

Short, sweet, and jam-packed with incredibly valuable insights, this “mini-book” shatters much of what the business world has considered conventional wisdom from the past 20 years, and instead reveals why it’s so much more important to create net-new ocean territory.