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A blog post

On Being an Internet Chameleon

Posted on the 01 March, 2012 at 11:40 pm Written by in All, Business Strategy

One of the smarter people we know is David Strom, a networking and communications consultant who is also a superb writer (he’s the Business Channels editor of ReadWriteWeb) and sharp observer of things technical. In the latest issue of his newsletter (Web Informant) he presents a business-cultural view of technology companies. We found his analysis striking, not only because to us it’s right on, but also because his analysis can be extended to just about every business where we’ve been invited to contribute our consulting skills.

Below is a quick synopsis of his analysis, with some of our additions. (You can find the full text here.)

While it’s tempting to think of the Internet Chameleon as the company you’d like to be, there are significant business opportunities associated with each of the three company types.

  • Big, conservative buyers are going to be more interested in purchasing from Mature Turtles: “like” purchases from “like.”
  • Smaller, less well-funded firms are more open to the risk-reward tradeoff associated with buying from Internet Chameleons. They will put up with some chaos in exchange for a less expensive, easier to use product or service.
  • The Middle Earth firms are of course, the ones that face the biggest challenges. How can they retain the most valuable components of their past success with what the market demands today?

It’s critical to know which type your company falls belongs to and what the implications are for how you can move your business ahead.

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