Become Revolutionary

Guy Kawasaki (born in Honolulu, 1954) is a former Apple Computer executive. In the hands of Guy as Chief Evangelist, at that time Apple was famous for "marketing evangelism". If you know PC users or Macintosh laptops, you can notice how "fanatic" Mac owners were. It is very difficult to "shake their faith" to switch to another product, with a million reasons they will immediately put forward. Instead of considering changing products, they will instead preach about a million advantages of Apple Macs compared to other PCs. This is "evangelism." Instead of just selling, Apple has created evangelists for its products.

With its track record of being able to print millions of Apple PC evangelists, Guy Kawasaki's book entitled "Rules for Revolutionaries", which has been translated into Indonesian by the Popular Science Buana, immediately fascinated me. This is a compulsory book that must be read by anyone who wants to create revolutionary products and services. Or in the intelligent, funny and sometimes rude Guy Kawasaki narrative described as "the new manifesto of the capitalists": Creating Like a God, Ruling Like a King, Working Like a Slave. How does Guy Kawasaki explain it?

Creating Like a God (Create Like a God)

To be able to create like a god, you must first be able to think differently from the average person. In Guy's term, we must be able to get rid of our old "idols". Take the example of a train that we have known so far is a train with 1 locomotive and carriages that follow behind it. If you want it faster, the engine locomotive is enlarged and enlarged again. However, the superfast train turned out to be possible after the engine idols in the locomotive had been discarded, and made innovations by putting the engine in each carriage. Thinking differently can also be done by separating forms and functions. This is what happened through the phenomenon of online stores. A function store is selling. So whether he is present or not physically is just a form. Online shops refuse to submit to forms, they prioritize their functions, namely interacting and serving sales to customers.

Of course, as a "god" you don't just think differently. Maybe your product is just weird. So you also have to create a great product that meets the criteria abbreviated by Guy as: DICEE. Deep- Indulging - Complete - Elegant - and Evocative (evokes memories). Great products are deep, have features that are not versatile, all-round products will generally fail on the market. Great product also Indulging (exciting) offers new things and experiences that make customers feel fun to explore everything that is offered. And besides being elegant, evocative factors that involve emotions and memories will make customers become fanatical about your product.

After that you also have to make sure that your product continues to be updated. Guy described that everyone knows Apple products are actually far better than Microsoft products, but Microsoft dared to release their "imperfect" products first and keep updating them.

Ruling Like a King (Command Like a King)

Having great products (in your view), doesn't necessarily make new customers hit your product. Actually there is a very wide gap between your prospective customers and your product. Taking them across safely is the next task. And the barrier between your product and potential customers must be broken down, for example your product is great, but it has the complexity that makes prospective customers doubt. Then this must be anticipated. Guy himself, for example, once led a very powerful relational database software maker, but failed because it was too difficult to use new users.

The most important step in "Ruling Like a King" is to create evangelicals not just sales. Evangelicals not only use your product, but also fanatics and will continue to tell the greatness of your product to anyone. There is a friend of mine who is very fanatical with a particular HP brand, so that every person will change his cellphone he will chat about the various advantages of the brand. Not even paid, the friend had become an evangelical HP product he used. There are several stages that Guy describes about evangelism, including those that always involve emotional factors in addition to the actual facts about your product. I see this is indeed starting to be used. For example, product advertisements that promise "weight loss guaranteed 3 kg" have provided facts, but "guaranteed your weight dropped 3 kg and more dear to your husband"give facts and emotions.

Besides that Guy also reminded us not to get caught up in the "death magnet", which is a set of assumptions that many people believe but can actually trap. One example is the death magnet "The best product is superior". Yes, it is not always the best product to excel, for example if the opponent's product is sufficient for the customer, promoted properly, and continues to be updated. If indeed "the best superior product" applies, then Bill Gates has now moved to Starbuck, is busy making espresso and living in a rented apartment ... Guy said.

Work Like a Slave

Guy taught that a revolutionary would "eat like a bird, defecate like an elephant." It's really a strange parable, and you will often find strange parables throughout this book. The point is, a revolutionary will constantly search for and absorb information about industry and customers from anywhere (like birds), and spread quickly and in large amounts of the knowledge he has gained (such as elephants). Information and knowledge are key to revolutionaries. So absorbing from various sources and spreading is indeed a logical consequence.

Guy suggested that even though we have been greatly assisted with technology, we must still "think digitally, and act analogously". This means that things that are interpersonal relationships must be maintained. This is sometimes forgotten by entrepreneurs who use the internet to interact with customers. Guy gave an example of how the hotel industry implemented this, although generally they have used the internet to expand interaction with customers, but things that are personal are maintained.

In addition, Guy also reminded us that we should never ask customers to do things we do not want to do. Have you ever tried contacting a contact center telephone number for a particular product or service provider? For example a bank or cellular operator. You will be received by the IVR (interactive voice response) machine and guided to press certain numbers. Sometimes the guidelines are rambling from IVR, so we can't wait to wait for the sentence "press 9 to talk to our officer". And when we press 9, the answer is "sorry all our officers are busy ..." Well! So, if you don't want to experience it yourself, don't make your customers experience the same thing.

Interesting following Guy Kawasaki's "revolutionary" thinking in this book. Guy Kawasaki himself has long been out of Apple. Perhaps because of its revolutionary nature, it is said that even now he stopped being a Mac user and switched to Linux. Now Guy chooses to be a venture-capitalist through his company Garage.com which provides capital for novice hi-tech companies. Apparently Guy also agreed that "Hands on" is better than "Hands Down",

Guy Kawasaki's blog entitled "How to Change the World" can be accessed at https://blog.guykawasaki.com/

Maybe some of you are as revolutionary as Guy Kawasaki?