Al RamadanPlay Bigger: How Pirates, Dreamers, and Innovators Create and Dominate Markets

As a CMO of a large corporation this book gave me clear advice and examples of how I could take a stagnating family of brands and breathe new and different life into them.

Not sure I would give any biz book 5 stars, but I read about 3-4 a year and this is one of the best in recent years - in part as the playbook for category domination is well-timed for my business. The thesis is well-founded - a few companies (1-3) take almost all the spoils from new categories. for example in marketing automation software, here's the rundown for value creation for the companies that launched in last 10 years: Marketo $1.8B, Eloqua $850M, Pardot $80M and the rest....? Or file management: Box, Dropbox, that company that renamed itself...and ??? You get the point.Would like to have read more and less obvious case studies - google, amazon, salesforce etc are all so unique in the scale of their success and category domination. would like to have heard more about companies that jumped into the #1 slot in categories that had 3-8 competitors early on - and how they used their own category "lightning strikes" to turn the category into a 1 or 2 horse race.Advice on how to do category design in a big company or for own personal life seemed a little thin - but the core of the book is aimed at entrepreneurs and provides the playbook and advice to go after a category and win. So if you think your company has potential, buy this book. I just bought ten more for my mgt team and other CEO friends.

Play Bigger is highly recommended and a must read book regardless of the industry or field you are in. For people in technology - the industry that the authors have build their reputations in - it is a fascinating view into the process of defining, creating and winning a category. The book is filled with excellent examples of how category leading firms - from Birdseye Foods to Uber - have created and dominated markets by focusing on category design as well as product and company design.I particularly appreciated two of the chapters - Chapter 5 on the importance of a Point of View and Chapter 10 on how you can play bigger. In the final chapter, the authors connect the concepts of the book to the reader personally and help empower to reader to 'play bigger'. I also greatly appreciated the footnotes and encourage the reader to check each one out - the authors have great insights and a wonderful sense of humor.Play Bigger has a personal connection for me in that I have been on the receiving end of the power of category design. I competed with one of the authors who was at Mercury Interactive. Mercury brilliantly re-defined the software testing market, introduced a compelling point of view (Business Technology Optimization), secured alignment with thought leaders and industry analysts and became the overwhelming category leader leaving all the other firms behind. It happened quickly (within a year) and once it was over it was over. Mercury went on to have a successful acquisition by HP and other the other firms fell by the wayside. The lesson was painful at the time but was also a front row seat to the power of category design and a fascinating lesson. Proof that much can be learned from failure as well as success.Play Bigger is a great read and the authors have a fascinating point of view. I am confident that Play Bigger will eventually be considered one of the must read books. Enjoy.

PlayBigger should be required reading for any "business builder" who dreams, doesn't remember their dreams or just needs to start thinking bigger. While the book is a guide to designing, creating, owning and continually evolving a market category, it is also a manual full of highly motivational and practical life lessons.Full disclosure, I have the personal pleasure of knowing the PlayBigger founders. They have taken their many years of pushing the marketing envelope, combined it with validated market data, leveraged Kevin Maney’s great writing talent and created a must read “classic” that allows room for each individual’s voice and wisdom to shine.There is a 1981-1983 comedy TV program “The Greatest American Hero” about a guy walking the beach who finds a superhero suit left behind by space aliens. In his excitement, he drops the suit's manual on the beach and now he has to learn the powers of being a super hero alone. How many early stage companies, established businesses, brilliant MBA students and those of us who are veterans of a long list of adventures still keep searching for “The Manual.” Start with this book.I admittedly am scared as hell to go down a ski slope at 80 MPH, let alone lean into it. I don’t work for SAP, but know many who have and don’t any longer (page 26). But, I do know innovation and wisdom. This world desperately needs new ways of thinking, impacting and solving a long list of problems. PlayBigger delivers on a clear road map to category design and points the way for those brave enough to seek to “dent the universe.”All of us who are serial entrepreneurs, impassioned change agents, strategic marketing gurus, investors, mentors, voices of written and verbal reason can learn a great deal from the vision and grounded reality shared by the authors.

Book was as good as new!

excellent

This book has helped me re-define the positioning of my business and approach new business ideas from a different perspective. Quick to read and informative.

Lectura forzosa para todos aquellos que se dicen creativos e innovadores. El pensamiento "fuera de la caja" permite crear cosas que alguna vez se les llamaron inimaginables.

Super livre qui approche le sujet de category creationPragmatique et truffé d'exemple