The Challenge
Prologue
2
The Challenge
Prologue
Imagine someone forced you to create a new
bestselling product or service.
What would you do?
You
must
make a bestseller.
Or else.
Oh, and don’t count on a
big marketing budget.
No PR media tour.
No fancy launch party.
Imagine this happened to you
3
The Challenge
Prologue
You can’t simply be the lowest-priced. This
has to be about sustainable success.
The clock is ticking. Everything depends on whether you
can make a sustainable bestselling product or service.
Where do you start?
What questions do you ask yourself?
Given competing equally-priced, equally-
promoted products , why are some products far
more successful than others?
One more thing…
4
The Challenge
Prologue
Our search for a formula begins with a question: why do these
keep selling but those don’t? What attributes do the bestsellers
have that their competitors don’t?
If we can’t use marketing and lowest price, what else could fuel
the success of bestselling products and services?
Something they do?
Something they are?
Something they have?
What’s different about the bestsellers?
Why did these sell...
…but those didn’t?
Sustained bestsellers NOT successful
5
The Challenge
Prologue
Maybe we can reverse-engineer
successful products and services to nd
what they have in common.
We need to nd common attributes across products
and services that are sustainably successful. There must
be something we can use to make a formula...
What’s our big fear?
It can’t just be luck, right? Because if
it really all comes down to luck...

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