If you don't read any other book on branding read this. Not the latest, but still the best.

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Product Description

"Eating the Big Fish is on fire with ideas.
Best in the marketplace." –Steve Hayden, President, Worldwide Brand Services, Ogilvy & Mather
"In 1986, the Levi′s® Dockers® brand challenged the biggest fish in the men′s apparel sea, Haggar. And we beat the pants off them! In his new book, Adam Morgan adroitly presents many of the same fundamental marketing principles which worked so well for us. A must read for marketing professionals." –Steve Goldstein, V.P. Marketing & Research, Levi′s Brand U.S.A.

Years ago, Avis was a little fish in the car rental industry. Fearing the company would be swallowed up if they didn′t "try harder," Avis boldly announced its #2 status to the world through advertising–and the rest is history. Why has this approach become a marketing legend? Because there are more people who can relate to being #2, 3, or even 4, than can claim they know what it′s like to be the Big Fish.
There are plenty of little fish out there, circling in schools around the brand leaders they so desperately wish to surpass. Squeezed by new competition, a retreating consumer, and aggressive retailing practices, marketers of second– and third–rank brands are struggling to survive in a business environment where they have fewer resources and less control than ever before. But instead of watching–and copying–every move the Big Fish makes, these "Challenger" brands need their own set of marketing rules if they have any hopes of staying afloat and competing effectively against the leader.
Eating the Big Fish is the first book that sets out to define those rules. Adam Morgan offers an innovative mental and strategic framework for those who find themselves in this new, hostile middle ground, looking for aggressive growth against the market leader. Morgan, the Joint European Planning Director of TBWA (the international advertising agency behind the campaigns for such brands as Absolut vodka, Apple computers, and Sony Playstation), has examined in detail forty of the most successful Challenger brands of the last ten years –new or relaunched brands which have achieved rapid growth (and fame) with limited marketing resources. He outlines the reasons why Challengers must think differently in order to survive, offering hands–on advice, plentiful examples, and invaluable information to help a Challenger learn how to swim out of the shadow of the Big Fish.
At the heart of the book are the Eight Credos of Challenger Brands –Morgan′s analysis of the common marketing strands that these Challengers seem to share, which range in scope from the need to project who you are and what you believe in (#2, Build a Lighthouse Identity) to insights about the organizational structure and focus in such companies and brands (#8, Become Idea–Centered, Rather Than Consumer–Centered). Morgan fully analyzes each Credo, discussing in detail the marketing strategy and behavior of the specific Challenger brands that have shaped the rules. He provides case studies that include both his agency′s clients and other well–known brands, such as Lexus, Oakley, Fox TV, Energizer, Virgin Atlantic, Swatch, Nissan, and more. Morgan then draws the Credos together into a "Challenger Strategic Program" that can be applied to the reader′s own market and brand challenge, offering a proposed outline for a two–day Off–Site Program that will attempt to kick–start the Challenger process for a core group within any marketing or management team. In addition, Morgan looks at the great Challengers of the last ten years who have gone on to become brand leaders, and shows how even the rules of brand leadership have changed –why staying #1 now means, in fact, thinking and behaving like a #2.
Anyone can follow a leader. It takes a smart company to go up against the Big Fish, and Morgan′s innovative, strategic program will show even the littlest fish how to make a meal out of the competition.

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #266022 in Books
• Published on: 1999-02-12
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 304 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
The title of this book comes from an advert from Avis, the car rental firm, published at a time of planned growth. It positioned Avis as a small fish being chased by a bigger one--a bigger car hire firm. They had to stay ahead or be swallowed. Morgan calls Avis and others like them "Challenger Brands" or second-raters, and he examines 40 of them in this book. His aim is to identify their common marketing strands as they find themselves in an increasingly vulnerable position. By using the lessons revealed in the book, second-raters can develop strategies to consolidate and, if they want to (they don't always), compete with the leaders. The book is divided into three sections. The relatively short opening one outlines the challenges facing the second-raters, but the real meat is in the much larger section two where Morgan lays out his Eight Credos of Challenger Brands, their key marketing features. The third and final section, again short, is very practical. It shows how any company can use the Eight Credos as part of a two day practical exercise to start improving their own market position. With wide ranging examples from both the US and Europe, Morgan stresses time and again that you can learn from those outside your own market as well as those within it. He makes his points very well indeed, revealing that second-raters will have to operate very differently from market leaders if they are to survive. --Sandra Vogel

Review
: "Although out last year, Eating the Big Fish, is one of the most stimulating books on brands and has grown to become a must read." (Marketing Business – Year′s Best Books, January 2001)

"...full of such useful ideas that a whole generation of marketing folk bang on about [it]"  (Campaign, Friday 23rd November 2007)

"Always find your brands in the slipstream of the market leaders? Well this could be the book for you." (The Drum, October 17th 2008)

Review
"...full of such useful ideas that a whole generation of marketing folk bang on about [it]"  (Campaign, Friday 23rd November 2007)

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Customer Reviews

A blueprint for entrepreneurial thinking
This book contains a concise analysis of what has made some of the most successful brands of recent time succeed. However, what makes this book special is that it lays out a series of exercises that promote innovative thinking. This process has already helped develop new ideas for one of my clients.

Powerful advice, engagingly written
This is the definitive work for the challenger brand. Every number two or three brand is tempted to copy the strategy of the number one, only with less resources. Adam Morgan makes it clear that this is the wrong approach and he gives a step by step process on the right way to attack number ones, leveraging the freedom and flexibility that challengers have. As you read each chapter, you find yourself nodding at the good sense and practicality of the alternative approach.
It is recommended reading at this business school

Ahead of the pack
I don't think it's exaggerating to call this a classic. The thinking on challenger brands is engaging, sharp and smart: it is also littered with the sort of examples that really help bring the studies to life and are of enormous practical worth. Indispensable stuff.