Posted by Principle No. 2 of the Beatles’ success is: Develop your products and services gradually, and give your 100th customer as much attention and enthusiasm as your first.
Most rock bands consistently play the same kind of music, and the songs are similar. The Beatles took a different path. From album to album they changed the nature of their songs, and in many ways. They came up with new song themes, melodic lines, introduced new arrangements and previously unused instruments. Albums with such disparate songs as “Yesterday” and “Revolution” sold more than a million copies in a decade.
The Beatles, in addition to their own style, smuggled elements from other types of music into the songs they wrote. They started with rock’n’roll, but based their work successively on Indian music, country, blues, acoustic folk, jazz and classic pop. The musicians of the Beatles skillfully combined already existing musical trends. They followed the needs of listeners and even anticipated changes in listeners’ tastes.
The principle of product customization is eternally alive in business, and the multimillion-dollar record sales of the Beatles are a case in point. Almost 40 years later, the same rule is being applied by Amazon.com, successively customizing its book offerings. Also Porsche started with the fantastically selling Boxter and today offers the Cayenne SUV, Apple Computer went from personal computers to iPhones. It follows that in order for a company to grow its business, it must constantly keep track of its customers’ needs and adapt its products to what they want.
Read about Principle No. 3 in our next blog post.