The Double-Edged Sword of the "Shark Tank Effect" with Club Penguin Cofounder Lane Merrifield

Have you ever wondered how platform businesses like Spotify and Amazon became so successful? In Platform Revolution, a team of economists and businesspeople—Geoffrey G. Parker, Marshall W. Van Alstyne, and Sangeet Paul Choudary—offer some insight: Platform businesses harness their unique characteristics to drive competitiveness and transformation, resulting in profound economic, societal, and political impacts. Parker, Van Alstyne, and Choudary also highlight the distinct skill set required to operate such a business and provide practical tips for aspiring platform entrepreneurs.

In our guide, we’ll compare the platform business model to the traditional business model known as a pipeline, explain why platforms are becoming dominant, and explore their wide-ranging effects. We’ll also outline essential design and management strategies for platform developers. Our commentary will provide additional insights on economic concepts, discuss tips from business experts, and explore real-world applications of Platform Revolution principles.

Business Model Generation, a contemporary guide to systematic business innovation, provides a template for brainstorming and visualizing the overarching elements that make up a successful, holistic business model.

The authors analyze the different ways you can combine these elements to create the most successful business model patterns. In addition, they provide techniques you can use to generate your own innovative business models, as well as strategies you can incorporate to regularly analyze and optimize your existing business models.

This guide supplements each key concept and strategy with up-to-date examples and commentary, and we suggest complementary processes to effectively incorporate their concepts into your own business models.

Peter F. Drucker is widely regarded as one of the most influential thinkers in the field of modern management. Drawing from his decades of experience as a consultant, Drucker authored dozens of books on organizational management and innovation, and he’s been cited as a major influence on many of today’s business leaders. The Essential Drucker is composed of key chapters from Drucker’s most respected works and provides an overview of Drucker’s core ideas.

In this guide, we’ll distill the heart of Drucker’s writings, from the roles and duties of management to the skills managers need to keep a workforce productive. We’ll explore the responsibilities of management to society and its importance in fostering innovation. We’ll also turn to other business writers who’ve expanded from Drucker’s principles, companies that have successfully implemented Drucker’s concepts, and experts who offer ideas that contrast with those that Drucker presents.

Have you ever wondered how platform businesses like Spotify and Amazon became so successful? In Platform Revolution, a team of economists and businesspeople—Geoffrey G. Parker, Marshall W. Van Alstyne, and Sangeet Paul Choudary—offer some insight: Platform businesses harness their unique characteristics to drive competitiveness and transformation, resulting in profound economic, societal, and political impacts. Parker, Van Alstyne, and Choudary also highlight the distinct skill set required to operate such a business and provide practical tips for aspiring platform entrepreneurs.

In our guide, we’ll compare the platform business model to the traditional business model known as a pipeline, explain why platforms are becoming dominant, and explore their wide-ranging effects. We’ll also outline essential design and management strategies for platform developers. Our commentary will provide additional insights on economic concepts, discuss tips from business experts, and explore real-world applications of Platform Revolution principles.

Are you spending too much time on your devices? Psychologist and marketing expert Adam Alter suggests that excessive technology use is common and can lead to behavioral addiction. In Irresistible (2017), he explains how smartphones, social media, and video games are designed to keep users hooked—and how you can regain control of your technology use.

In our guide, we discuss the rise of technology addiction and how you can identify it. Next, we examine the techniques technology developers implement to keep users hooked. Finally, we explore Alter's suggestions for combating technology addiction and fostering a healthier relationship with digital devices. Our commentary explores other experts’ perspectives on addiction, insights into the potential harms and benefits of technology use, and tips for managing your technology use in a healthy way.

If there’s a secret to success in the tech industry, it’s a thorough understanding of the network effect: The more users you gain, the more valuable your product becomes and the easier it is to profit and grow. But if bigger equals better, is it even possible for a company starting from scratch to compete with established tech giants? In The Cold Start Problem, venture capitalist and former Uber executive Andrew Chen explains how to do exactly that: build a billion-dollar tech company from the ground up.

In this guide, we’ll explain how to build a startup that uses the network effect to compete with the established giants in your industry. In our commentary, we’ll explore tips from other books about scaling small businesses, including Blitzscaling and Crossing the Chasm. Additionally, we’ll provide further advice on how to market your product, incentivize your users to promote it, and ensure it remains profitable.

Peter F. Drucker is widely regarded as one of the most influential thinkers in the field of modern management. Drawing from his decades of experience as a consultant, Drucker authored dozens of books on organizational management and innovation, and he’s been cited as a major influence on many of today’s business leaders. The Essential Drucker is composed of key chapters from Drucker’s most respected works and provides an overview of Drucker’s core ideas.

In this guide, we’ll distill the heart of Drucker’s writings, from the roles and duties of management to the skills managers need to keep a workforce productive. We’ll explore the responsibilities of management to society and its importance in fostering innovation. We’ll also turn to other business writers who’ve expanded from Drucker’s principles, companies that have successfully implemented Drucker’s concepts, and experts who offer ideas that contrast with those that Drucker presents.

Do you feel like the job market is changing faster than ever? Does job stability seem like a thing of the past? In The Startup of You, LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and entrepreneur Ben Casnocha argue that to build a successful career in the modern world, you must approach your career as if it were a startup company—something that’s always growing and adapting. By applying principles of entrepreneurship to your career, you can overcome unexpected career obstacles and react quickly to opportunities.

In this guide, you'll learn about the changes to modern work and how to approach your career as if it were a startup company using three entrepreneurship tactics. We’ll supplement Hoffman and Casnocha’s strategies with those of other business professionals and provide suggestions on how to apply their strategies to your career.

If you’re planning to start a business, The Unfair Advantage is the guidebook you need to achieve success. Entrepreneurs Ash Ali and Hasan Kubba tell you how to realize your entrepreneurial dreams by finding and using your unfair advantages, the qualities or conditions that give you an edge over competitors. Ali and Kubba explain that everyone has unfair advantages, and you need to use yours if you want to succeed in the ruthless domain of startups.

Drawing on over 20 years of experience building startups and coaching entrepreneurs, Ali and Kubba describe the mindset you must adopt and the steps you must take to achieve startup success—from identifying a viable business idea to building a winning team. In this guide, we’ll examine Ali and Kubba’s tips for finding and applying your unfair advantages. We’ll also compare the authors’ ideas to those of other business leaders—for instance, ideas from Brian Tracy in Goals! and Grant Cardone in The 10X Rule—and share additional steps you can take to achieve startup success.

Peter F. Drucker is widely regarded as one of the most influential thinkers in the field of modern management. Drawing from his decades of experience as a consultant, Drucker authored dozens of books on organizational management and innovation, and he’s been cited as a major influence on many of today’s business leaders. The Essential Drucker is composed of key chapters from Drucker’s most respected works and provides an overview of Drucker’s core ideas.

In this guide, we’ll distill the heart of Drucker’s writings, from the roles and duties of management to the skills managers need to keep a workforce productive. We’ll explore the responsibilities of management to society and its importance in fostering innovation. We’ll also turn to other business writers who’ve expanded from Drucker’s principles, companies that have successfully implemented Drucker’s concepts, and experts who offer ideas that contrast with those that Drucker presents.

All business methods, technologies, and consumer products grow obsolete and are replaced by something new. Innovation is the process of discovering those new ways of living, working, and doing business, and entrepreneurs are the people who work to bring the future into being. In Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Peter F. Drucker describes innovation as a methodical process to find ways to improve every aspect of business and life.

Drucker is widely regarded as one of the most influential thinkers in the field of modern management. In this guide, we’ll describe Drucker’s template for structuring an entrepreneurial organization and how to explore innovative opportunities. We'll go over strategies for bringing innovations to the market and discuss how to manage entrepreneurial startups. We’ll also examine how Drucker’s ideas carry forward into the 21st century, and we’ll compare how Drucker’s thoughts on innovation compare to those of business leaders today.

Are you a struggling entrepreneur? Is running your company exhausting and overwhelming? In The Pumpkin Plan, entrepreneur and keynote speaker Mike Michalowicz says the problem is that you’re trying to be everything to everyone—you’re chasing every potential customer and offering every service those customers may want. To escape this overextended state, change your mindset from quantity to quality: Instead of trying to cater to everyone, focus on providing a unique product or service to the people who will most appreciate it—and doing so better than any of your competitors.

In this guide, we’ll discuss the components of the quality mindset, exploring how they benefit your company and how you can implement them. In our commentary, we’ll expand on Michalowicz’s insights with advice from his other books, as well as compare his ideas with those of other business experts like Ken Blanchard and Sheldon Bowles (Raving Fans).