Why My Hardcover Book Counts As Digital Disruption
It is with great pleasure that I mark the arrival of Digital Disruption: Unleashing The Next Wave Of Innovation, by announcing that as of today, February 26th, you can buy Digital Disruption as … a hardcover book.
At first impression it may feel a bit wrong to publish a book called Digital Disruption in a form as old-school as a hardcover book. In fact, as I’ve traveled around talking about the book, several people have half-jokingly suggested it was hypocritical to do so. I have taken the ribbing with a smile, but when people have the time and interest, I explain to them that publishing in both eBook and hardcover is exactly what digital disruption requires.
Some erroneously assume that digital disruption only applies to cases where digital products replace physical ones. It’s true that when mobile banking replaces teller banking or digital music wipes out CDs, we call this digital disruption. But as I show in my book, there are many more ways that digital disrupts, ultimately creating more disruptions, more rapidly, in more industries, including – as I write in the book – industries as analog as pharmaceuticals and military camouflage.
In fact, more is the most operative word in digital disruption. Under its growing influence, more people will bring good ideas to market more swiftly, reaching more possible customers, delivering them more value than they had received before. How do they do this? By exploiting the free and nearly free digital tools made available by companies like Kickstarter, Amazon Web Services, and Square, individuals with the digital disruptor’s mindset can bring even very analog products to market more rapidly than before.
Free digital tools are just one ingredient in the recipe for digital disruption; exploiting digital platforms is another. All of this is done in the service of giving your customers the next thing they need most – a technique called innovating the adjacent possible. In the book, I explain how, employing these tools, every company in every industry can choose to become a digital disruptor now rather than stand back and watch someone else do it for them.
No matter what the industry, as you choose digital disruption, you’ll leave a trail of more rather than less in your wake. For example, even though the radio is still the primary way people listen to music, it is now accompanied by Pandora, iTunes, Spotify, and more, leading people to engage in more hours of music listening, in more places, at more times, than ever before.
Which brings me back to my announcement. I don’t technically care that you read my book as an eBook or a hardcover. What I want is more – more readers of the book, to put it frankly, because the ideas in it will stimulate even more digital innovation. To make sure I get more, I have to give more. More options for you to fit the book into your life in whatever way makes sense for you. That’s why we’re publishing digital and physical versions – I even recorded an audiobook version – because thinking like a digital disruptor makes me focus on you and your needs, not me or my publisher’s needs.
So welcome to the world of more, a world in which you will have more options as consumers, more opportunities as innovators. It’s a world that will challenge you, but it’s a world you’re going to find, well, more interesting.
Digital Disruption: Unleashing The Next Wave Of Innovation, now available in eBook, hardcover, and audiobook editions. To learn more about the book, visit forrester.com/disruption, or attend my free Webinar.