My English presentation about Purple Cow, a book by marketing guru Seth Godin. You should read it. Check out my presentation if you're curious about it.

1. Purple Cow
K.R. Drewel
The book in a nutshell

2. Contents
1. What is Purple Cow?
2. Who is Seth Godin?
3. So what exactly is a Purple Cow?
4. Why do companies need a Purple Cow?
5. What are sneezers?
6. What is an Otaku?
7. What is the secret formula? (The ‘magic’ cycle of
the cow)
8. Discussion

3. What is Purple Cow?
• It’s a book about marketing
written by Seth Godin in
2002.
• It’s about transforming
your business by being
remarkable.
• It still kicks ass and makes
sense, even though the
book is ten years old.

4. Who is Seth Godin?
• Bald marketing guru who
makes a lot of money by
writing these sort of books.
• Also a very influential
blogger (sethgodin.com)

5. So what exactly is a Purple Cow?
Seth describes it as one of the new
marketing P’s:
“The essence of the Purple Cow is
that is must be remarkable. In fact,
if remarkable started with a P, I
could probably with the cow
subterfuge, but what can you do?”
(pg.2)
In short: A Purple Cow is a product (or
sometimes service) that dares to
stand out.

6. Why do companies need a Purple Cow?
We all know this doesn’t work
anymore… The media landscape is
shifting.

7. Why do companies need a Purple Cow?
“Among the people
who might buy your
product , most will
never hear about it.
There are so many
alternatives now that
people can no longer
be easily reached by
mass media”
Bottom-line
• Too many products
• Hard to stand out

8. This is very
confusing. Not just
for consumers, but
for companies too.

9. The big question is: How can
companies and their
products be remarkable?
The book covers a few steps on
how to be remarkable. There are
two main rules.

10. First rule: Make an awesome
product.
This one actually makes the most
sense. Your product should always
be the Purple Cow. Your marketing
could be awesome, but product
should always come first. Halfway
through

11. Second rule: Get people to
like your awesome product.
You can do that by finding ‘Sneezers’….

12. What are sneezers?
“Sneezers are the key
spreading agents of an
ideavirus. These are
experts who tell all
their colleagues or
friends or admirers
about a new product or
service on which they
are a perceived
authority. ”pg. 31

13. They’re not always early
adopters…
Early adopters sometimes are careful with
sharing ideas. Sometimes they don’t have
enough credibility.

14. So how do you create an idea that spreads?
1. Don’t try to make a product for everybody.
2. Sneezers in markets for ‘everybody products’ have too
many choices.
3. Create ideas that spread in a niche market. With a
niche you can segment a chunk of the mainstream
4. This in turn will create focused ideas
Look for people with
an Otaku.

15. What is an Otaku?
“Otaku describes something
that’s more than a hobby but
a little less than an obsession.
(…)People read Fast Company
because they have
an Otaku about business. (…)
Otaku, it turns out, is at the
heart of the Purple Cow
phenomenon.”
As a company you have to connect with this
people. These are the sneezers who first Some examples
hear about your Purple Cow. They also help
to improve your product.

16. Bottom line
Find influential people to talk about
your product.

17. Is there a secret formula?
No. But there is something
that Seth calls ‘The Magic
Cycle of the Cow’. It consists
of 4 simple steps.
1. Get permission
2. Work with sneezers
3. Let a different team milk
4. Reinvest
Almost
there!

18. 1. Get permission from people
you impressed the first time
Let people know when you
might have another Cow.
Make them feel special.
2. Work with sneezers
Make them ‘sell’ your story
for you.

19. 3. Let a different team milk the product
Let other teams milk the cow.
Do it as fast as possible. Don’t
believe your own press
releases.
4. Reinvest
Launch another Purple Cow.
Fail as much as you can to
learn as much as possible.
Assume that previous
remarkable things won’t be
remarkable now.

20. That was Purple Cow in a nutshell. Please read
this book. It’s fun and easy to read and it will
give you a lot of insights.

22. Discussion:
Purple Cow is written in a very easy way. Seth Godin
makes a lot of assumptions by using his gut feeling.
This is often regarded by marketers as something
bad. What do you think?
Is having a gut feeling about a product or
service a bad thing for marketers? Or is it
necessary to develop a Purple Cow?