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"Playbook" analyzes marketing strategies

BRIAN CASSELLA / THE SEATTLE TIMES Rich Tong, left, and John Zagula are venture capitalists and authors of "The Marketing Playbook," due out in late fall.

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What: They're authors of a new book, "The Marketing Playbook: Five Battle-Tested Plays for Capturing and Keeping the Lead in Any Market."

Jacket cover: Using five principles developed from their experiences, the two discuss how companies make strategic decisions to get into the marketplace and win. Marketing is not about big budgets, advertising or public relations, Zagula said. Tong said it's about finding gaps in the market to make a lot of money.

Background: While in marketing positions at Microsoft, Zagula and Tong started developing theories based on patterns they saw. Since then, they've been battle-testing those ideas at Ignition, which screens more than 1,000 companies each year in order to invest in a few.

What they found: Whether a company is a startup or a billion-dollar software enterprise, the theories applied. "We've been doing this (concept) for 10 years," Tong said. "We haven't found a company that wasn't executing one of these five." he said.

No. 1: Drag Race: Pick a company and try to beat it in head-on competition. Example: Microsoft Excel vs. Lotus 1-2-3.

 
No. 2: Stealth: Remain under the radar, slowly gaining on the competition. About 90 percent of startups begin in stealth mode. Example: when Enterprise Rent-a-Car focused on in-city rentals rather than airport business. It handles replacement cars for people who have been in accidents and loaner cars for repair shops.

No. 3: Platform: This is where a company allows others to succeed. Example: A mall that draws in shoppers for multiple stores.

No. 4: Best of Both: Bringing two ends of the market together. Example: Volkswagen, which ties the reputation of an economical, high-performance, German-engineered car for regular people.

No. 5: High-Low Play: A product that can be both a big-margin product and a low-end product that sells a lot. Example: Michael Graves, the architect known for hip teapots, has crossed the chasm by selling both expensive ones and a mass-produced version at Target.

Playing the field. Throughout the book, the two use sports metaphors to explain marketing. Ironically, the two joke that it was really the reverse process for them: It took drawing comparisons between sports and marketing to understand sports. "Now we get it," Tong said.

The prose: Writing was difficult. "It was a lot of fun and a lot of pain," Zagula said. "It is gratifying to have people you know read it and say it doesn't suck."

The fine print: The book, published by Portfolio, a division of the Penguin Group, is scheduled to be in stores starting Oct. 25. In the meantime, it can be ordered on Amazon.com.

— Tricia Duryee