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Richness or reach? The trade-off used to
be simple but absolute: Your business strategy either could
focus on "rich" information -- customized products
and services tailored to a niche audience -- or could reach
out to a larger market, but with watered-down information
that sacrificed richness in favor of a broad, general appeal.
Much of business strategy as we know it today rests on this
fundamental dilemma.
Now, say Evans and Wurster, the new economics
of information is eliminating the tradeoff between richness
and reach, blowing apart the foundations of traditional
business strategy. Blown to Bits reveals how the
spread of connectivity and common standards is redefining
the information channels that link businesses with their
customers, suppliers, and employees. Increasingly, your
customers will have rich access to your customers, and your
competitors will pick off the most profitable parts of your
value chain. Your competitive advantage is up for grabs.
To prepare corporate executives and entrepreneurs
alike for a fundamental change in business competition,
Evans and Wurster expand and illuminate groundbreaking concepts
first explored in the award-winning Harvard Business
Review article "Strategy and the New Economics
of Information," and present a practical guide for
applying them.
Examples span the spectrum of industries
-- from financial services to health care, from consumer
to industrial goods, and from media to retailing. Blown
to Bits shows how to build new strategies that reflect
a world in which richness and reach go hand in hand and
how to make the most of the new forces shaping competitive
advantage.
Philip Evans is a Senior Vice President
of The Boston Consulting Group in Boston. Thomas S. Wurster
is a Vice President of The Boston Consulting Group in Los
Angeles. The authors are coleaders of The Boston Consulting
Group's Media and Convergence Practice.
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