Customer Reviews

Seizing the White Space: Business Model Innovation for Growth and Renewal

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Not much gets written about business models. I don't know if it isn't sexy enough or it somehow gets bucketed into the sleepfest of most strategy books. The only book I can think of, in recent years, to broach the subject was the self-published Business Model Generation by Alexander Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur.

Seizing the White Space: Business Model Innovation For Growth and Renewal is a fine exception. Author Mark Johnson co-founded Innosight with author and HBR professor Clay Christensen, and while Christensen has been publishing niche extensions on disrupting education and health care, this book is a wonderful addition to the broader ideas of Innovator's Dilemma and Innovator's Solution. Both of the latter books were incredibly important in explaining how companies lose edge in the marketplace and are often blindsided by innovation, but there were some barriers to understanding exactly how to apply the concepts. Johnson does a great job of taking that next step in Seizing The White Space.

The book is squarely focused on showing companies how to build new businesses in area that are outside their current business models. This could be through replacing an existing business, building new models where there are barriers to consumption, or by filling gaps in the market. The final section delivers roadmap on how to go about the redesign and implementation of your new business model. Cases include Tata Motors and Hindustan Levr (India), Xiameter that grew out of Dow Corning, and Better Place, the Israeli start-up trying to change the automotive business model with electric cars.

Seizing The White Space is surprisingly short at 150 pages which makes the book very accessible. The language and concepts also match that accessibility. The book is worth a quick look, a reminder of the unconscious parts of strategy that you too often take for granted.

This is one of the most enjoyable business boks I have ever read. I am a devout student of strategy & innovation and hence have read quite extensively on those subjects. But when it comes to the question of business models, even Adrian Slywotzky, who may be considered as the real father of the concept of business models, is not as clear in handling the concept as Mark Johnson. Johnson's definition of the concept, and especially his breaking it down to four elements (he calls them boxes) is brilliant. Sure, Slywotzky's business model definition also has four elements but here the boxes make the handling of the concept terribly simple and managable. In short, the definition of this rather hard-to-grab concept is excellent.

Johnson's next move in the book is to show how a new business model can be designed on the basis of his four-box formula. He starts with the first step of defining a new customer value proposition (CVP). After this, he moves backwards to work out the 'processes' that need to be created or improved so as to fulfill this new CVP as well as singling out the `resource requirements' in the organization. From there onwards he shows how to work out the `profit model' for the newly generated business model. Hence, once all those four boxes have been filled `democratically' (with participation from managers at all levels of the company) and carefully, the company is now ready to implement the new strategy.

At this point comes the other strength of the book whereby it does not leave the subject at the point of strategy formulation. Instead, it moves to explain even the knittty gritty details of implementation/execution. Here also Johnson is very good and drives on deep experience.

The book is full of enlightening case examples. Some are known stuff (like iPod, iPhone, Hitli etc.) but you find a lot of new examples which are really good.

When you reach the end of the book -which I assure you it will be very very swift (I finished it in only three sittings)- you feel relieved because you feel like you finally have a workable model in your hands which you can start toying with tomorrow morning.

This is a very very good book on strategy. There may be other good business model books around as one reviewer suggested. But this book should certainly be included in that list of excellent books on business model generation and implementation. I personally thank the author for giving me such a great pleasure in reading this wonderful work.

The author is co-founder with Clay Christensen of Innosight. This book is distilled from many years of applying The Innovators Dilemma. For that alone it is an important book. However the author has stepped even further down the path of applicability by forcing you the reader to consider your business as solving the question, " what job does the customer want done?" From there one can see applying the ideas of Blue Ocean Strategy (Johnson alls it "white space" . But the growth in your learning continues as you realize just how powerful these ideas are for reinventing your company business model. The author could have stopped then and it would have been a fine book. But he is thorough and so he proceeds to show you all the things that interfere with new business model innovation, how many different approaches worked (or failed) for different companies and the structural thinking behind it. This is not a huge book , nor a heavy read . It is theory into practice with a heavy emphasis on practical. This is a must read, must own book if you are or aspire to be a business leader.

The book is a rather quick read and primarily for people who have not read Business Model Generation: A Handbook for Visionaries, Game Changers, and Challengers by Alex Osterwalder, Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make Competition Irrelevant by W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne, and Clayton M. Christensen's The Innovator's Dilemma: The Revolutionary Book that Will Change the Way You Do Business.

For people who have followed the development of the business model concept, and read case studies such as Southwest Airlines, Hilti, Xerox, Kodak, DEC, FedEx, and Tata, this book is a bit of a disappointment. I looked forward to reading this book and wanted it to be a 5 star experience, but after reading it I have more questions about the author and the writing of the book, than about any new content or ideas.

The book in three bullet points:

* It presents the concept "White Space" defined as an area where new or existing customers are served in fundamentally different ways and there is a poor fit with the current (incumbent) organization; "The range of potential activities not defined or addressed by the company's current business model".

* It provides a business model framework, "The four box business model", comprising a customer value proposition, a profit formula and key resources and processes, very similar to the model presented in the 2008 HBR article Reinventing Your Business Model by Mark W. Johnson, Clayton M. Christensen, and Henning Kagermann, with the focus point on the customers' job-to-be-done.

* It briefly explores the circumstances when a new business model might be needed, being when you must change your current profit formula (overhead cost structure, resource velocity or both), develop many new kinds of key resources and processes, and/or create fundamentally different core metrics, rules and norms to run your business.

A brief summary of the different chapters:

1. The White Space and Business Model Innovation
Introductory discussion on core vs. non-core business, defining the white space that lies far outside an organization's usual way of working, where assumptions are high and knowledge is low. In contrast to the Blue Ocean concept, described in the book Blue Ocean Strategy by W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne, (not mentioned in Seizing the White Space), the white space focus on what a specific organization can do, whereas blue ocean is about doing things differently than competition to be in uncontested markets. In the first chapter Mark includes a nice table on companies founded in the last quarter century that have entered the Fortune 500 in the last decade.

The book contains some questionable statements without references or discussion and chapter one is no exception: "Most successful innovative business models are forged by start-ups" (p. 18) - I would like to see the reference and discussion (and definition of "successful", "innovative" and "start-up") as most examples and discussions covered in this book are not on start-ups.

2. The Four-Box Business Model Framework
The chapter starts off with the discussion about lack of shared vocabulary, "No one to my knowledge squarely focuses on the elements in the business system that are central to value's creation and delivery and the way those elements work together to ensure or impede the overall success of the enterprise" (p. 23) I laughed out loud when I read the references related to the statement above, all from the same page: Peter Drucker (Harvard Business Review), Joan Magretta (Harvard Business School, former strategy editor Harvard Business Review), Henry William Chesbrough x2 (Harvard Business School Press). I would argue that the MAIN reason why there is a lack of shared vocabulary regarding business models is due to academics/consultants that ignore the work of other academics/consultants working in other schools/companies than their own.

The first element of Mark's Four-Box Framework (see figure at tbmdb) is the Customer Value Proposition (CVP), an offering that helps customers more effectively, reliably, conveniently, or affordably solve an important problem (or satisfy a job-to-be-done) at a given price. In some versions of the model, such as Figure 9, 19, 20 and 24, there is no explicit customer mentioned in the CVP. In other versions, such as Figure 21 and in the model presented in the 2008 HBR article "Reinventing you business model", a target customer is included. The second element is the Profit Formula that defines how the company will create value for itself and its shareholders. It specifies the revenue model, the cost structure, target unit margin and how quickly resources need to be used to support target volume. The third element is Key Resources, the people, technology, products, equipment, information, channels, partnerships, funding, and brand required to deliver the value proposition to the customer. The fourth and final element is Key Processes such as design, development, sourcing, manufacturing, marketing, hiring and training by which a company delivers on the customer value proposition. Readers familiar with popular concepts such as Osterwalder's business model canvas recognize most terms and ideas.

3. The White Space Within: Transforming Existing Markets
Chapter three discuss business model innovation opportunities within existing markets by delivering new customers value propositions, something Mark argues often relate to predictable shifts in what customers are willing to pay a premium price for (at least the primary basis of competition). He presents an argument based on one example on how companies compete and differentiate with different forms of innovation (see figure at tbmdb). The references used for the "predictable shifts" are to colleague Christensen's The Innovator's Dilemma: The Revolutionary Book that Will Change the Way You Do Business (Collins Business Essentials), and Geoffrey A. More's Crossing the Chasm: Marketing and Selling Disruptive Products to Mainstream Customers, a book about selling disruptive products to mainstream customers. I would love to read more about these shifts, the research behind it, and how for example design and the use of brands affects the shifts in the basis of competition? The chapter contains a nice case study on Dow Corning and Xiameter (mostly covered in HBR article from 2009), and the more classical case studies on Hilti, FedEx and IKEA.

4. The White Space Beyond: Creating New Markets
Seizing the white space beyond means developing new business models to serve entirely new customers and create new markets, often where large groups of potential customers are shut out of a market because existing offerings are too expensive, complicated or that the potential customers lack access. In the chapter Mark provides a table of archetypal business models and a nice case study on Hindustran Unilever and the Shakti Initiative together with some shorter versions covering MinuteClinic and SAP.

Obvious concepts to discuss in relation creating new markets are the tools, frameworks and methodologies presented in Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make Competition Irrelevant, by W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne. Even though the Blue Ocean Strategy concepts are trademark protected, registered by ITM Research (INSEAD), other authors have been able to refer to the concepts and tools presented in the book.

5. The White Space Between: Dealing with Industry Discontinuity
Chapter five focus on the uncharted territory between what was and what is to be, after game changing events such as the commercialization of Internet technology or the push to address greenhouse gas emissions. Mark presents ideas in relation to unpredictable or radical shifts in market demand, in technology and in government policy targeted at the business environment. Examples are in the defense industry (transformative market shifts), Encyclopaedia Britannica (technology driven shifts), and Better Place (shifts in government policy and regulation). The chapter also contains a nice table including the industries and infrastructure of each technological revolution, from Carlota Perez' Technological Revolutions and Financial Capital.

6. Designing a New Business Model
In the chapter Mark discusses the business model innovation process from identifying a job-to-be-done to creating the customer value proposition, and compares the new business model that would be required with the existing model. When searching for unfilled jobs-to-be-done Mark puts emphasis on not only functional aspects of a job but also its social and emotional aspects, together with a short reflection on that Web 2.0 tools give businesses the ability to deeply understand their customers through increased interaction, with Threadless as an example. He introduces a way to use levers to contrast offerings, and mentions the reverse income statement to working up the projections for a business with a new profit formula. This chapter also contains an original and interesting case study from a project undertaken by Innosight with the customer name changed for purposes of confidentiality and a table with business model analogies.

7. Implementing the Model
For the implementation of a new business model, Mark describes three stages: incubation (1-3 years), acceleration (2-5 years), and transition (1-3 years). Incubation is the process of testing (early, cheaply and often) to identify and verify the assumptions most critical to success. Once the new model is proven viable, the Acceleration stage focus on setting up processes, together with rules, norms and metrics, to make the business model profitable. The final stage addresses the question if the new business can be integrated into the core or if it must remain a separate unit in order to thrive. Mark also discusses acquisitions and some successful and less successful examples.

8. Overcoming Incumbent Challenges
In the final chapter Mark describes three dangers incumbent face when implementing new business models: 1) Failure the allocate resources, 2) The Urge to cram new opportunities into the existing business model, and 3) Impatience for growth. He also briefly addresses the problem of the existing rules, norms, and metrics used by the company something that would be very interesting to dig deeper into.

My main questions after reading this book:
Why do Mark ignore existing body of knowledge and obvious references when defining the White space and his business model framework, and instead almost exclusively refer to his own or colleagues' work? Why does he focus so much on old examples, already covered in other books and articles, without using his frameworks to provide more depth into the cases? Why not look at modern examples of companies pushing its core business into new areas? Why are several included figures not referenced in the text, nor referenced for source?

A quick comparison with some other popular books on business models:

* Business Model Generation: A Handbook for Visionaries, Game Changers, and Challengers by Osterwalder and Pigneur is the obvious book to compare with. It also aims to introduce a standard language, a business model framework, and ideas on how to develop, test and implement new business models. In contrast to Seizing the White Space, Business Model Generation uses many sources and refers to popular management concepts, including Blue Ocean Strategy when looking at new market opportunities. Osterwalder focus much more on the customer and customer segments, and have that as a very explicit element of the business model framework. For me, Business Model Generation is a more original and content rich book. See separate review of this book.

* Getting to Plan B: Breaking Through to a Better Business Model by John Mullins and Randy Komisar focus more on the financials and the start-up situation. It defines the business model slightly different from the two books above but shares the idea to experiment and adjust the business model as you learn new things. See separate review of this book.

* The Profit Zone: How Strategic Business Design Will Lead You to Tomorrow's Profits by Slywotzky, Morrison and Andelman, has a heavier focus on profitability and the changing areas in which high profit is possible to keep, it is a quick read. See separate review of this book.

* Open Business Models: How to Thrive in the New Innovation Landscape by Henry Chesbrough has a heavier focus on technological innovation in the context of business models and also covers the important area of Intellectual Property in relation to open business models.

All in all, Seizing the White Space is a good book, containing many valuable lessons. It will not WOW you, and it presents surprisingly few new case studies. One of the most important (implicit) lessons from the book is that business models need to be consciously designed and that companies must always stay on their toes looking for new opportunities around their core business, but also in the white space.

//Anders, The Business Model Database

Addition April 4th:
After reading Mark W. Johnson's comment on my review, I read several parts of the book again, and I want to add that the case study in the beginning of the book on Lockheed Martin's Hybrid Airship, not mentioned in my book review, is really novel.

The best business books provide fresh thinking on a relevant topic - and add practical action plans for how to implement those ideas. As a strategic marketeer in a Silicon Valley venture-capital backed startup, I find that content in Seizing the White Space. It will occupy space on my bookshelf next to "Crossing the Chasm".

The first third of the book discusses a framework for evaluating a business, breaking it into boxes to aid in exploring the fit of an idea. Fairly pedandic stuff, b-school 101, but useful to force one into fundamental and disciplined introspection.

The latter parts of the book are where the real value emerges. Three critical lenses emerge - (1) how do you evaluate a novel concept (which, for me, offered thoughts on how to find a new concept to begin with - not a core mission of the book), (2) how do you appropriately construct a business model to support that innovative idea, and (3) how to launch and test that plan. Tons of case studies examine how businesses have gotten the business innovation right, then have either succeeded or failed in lining up a winning business model to make it run.

There's a fair amount of discussion about how to protect innovation from the incumbencies within a large organization. This is to be expected, given Mark's decade in collaboration with Clay Christensen of "Innovator's Dilemma" fame, which examines in part how corporations smother internal innovation and lose their technology leadership to emerging businesses. I would expect that to be of high relevance for corporate types, though us startup guys have escaped those bureaucratic hurdles

Author Mark Johnson is to be congratulated on writing a book that provides invaluable insights for businesses on how to thrive in today's marketplace, and to address the inevitable "growth gap."

Many talk about business models but this is the only book that made it clear what a business model is, and why getting your business model right is so important for success. Among the many lessons I learned, one that stands out is that the four key elements of a business model must be integrated together and congruent with each other--and that many businesses don't get this right. It also helped me to better understand why so many companies have a tough time changing their business models even when threatened by disruptive innovation of other companies--especially by start up companies.

The author assures us that conceiving an innovative new business model is not a matter of good fortune--it requires an orderly process for design and implementation. One of the many insightful points in Seizing The White Space was the discussion about why so many mergers and acquisitions fail to create value. It's related to business models.

This is not a book you should buy and put on your shelf with your other business books. It's a book you should read, highlight the key parts that apply to your situation, and refer back to it as you innovate your business model. I definitely recommend this book.

Vern Burkhardt, Author for IdeaConnection

Business Model Innovation (BMI) is the key to unlocking transformational growth. Yet, few executives know how to apply BMI to their businesses. Articles and courses on the topic are numerous but generally theoretical in nature and lacking practical insight into how to spark BMI into action.

However, Mark Johnson brings both theory and practice to the table. Not only has he written extensively about innovation theory during his career but he also continues to lead Innosight, the innovation consulting company created by Johnson and Clayton Christensen--the world's most famous authority on innovation. Intimately involved in guiding clients' large scale transformations, Johnson presents in his new work "Seizing the White Space" how organizations can drive BMI. Through his use of compelling case examples, he presents both the means for inspiring innovation in organizations as well as the practical framework that identifies four fundamental building blocks to make business models work.

We have known for quite some time that BMI is the secret sauce to innovation and growth. While a main focus of discussion in business schools, large corporations and other business platforms, how to readily apply these ideas in practical programs, new strategies and products is often overlooked. Thankfully, Johnson and his company have shown a consistent ability to put theory into successful practice. In many respects, Johnson is much more than a consultant; he possesses a real talent for teaching as evidenced in the way he addresses highly important topics in "Seizing The White Space" including how growth comes from the fulfillment of unmet customer needs in markets, how to serve entirely new customers and create new markets, and how to respond to the shifts in market demands, government policies and new technologies that affect entire industries.

A highly readable and well-written business book, "Seizing The White Space" engages the reader from the very first chapter. Eye-opening and educational, the book transports the reader to feeling like a member of a new, top secret Lockheed Martin program and identifying with the business unit leader who must decide whether to undertake the challenge of making a new product a marketable game changer or ignore the possibilities. The dilemma is a fascinating one and comparable to the choices any business manager faces at key points in his or her career.

Any thoughtful business person will learn a great deal from Johnson about growth and innovation through his new practical and insightful work. Any leader or teacher who wants to impress on students the art of strategy and innovation or instill a memorable set of lessons should carefully study this book.

Foster and Kaplan, McKinsey researchers write, "Corporations are built on the assumption of continuity; their focus is on operations. Capital markets are built on the assumption of discontinuity; their focus is on creation and destruction. The data present a clear warning: Unless companies open up their decision-making processes, relax conventional notions of control, and change at the pace and scale of the market, their performances will be drawn into an entropic slide to mediocrity." Another way to look at it is the fact that the average length of time a company remained on the S&P 500 in 1958 was 57 years, in 1983 it was 30 years and in 2008 it was 18 years. You get the idea...the rate of change is only increasing and a business that doesn't reinvent itself is likely to become obsolete and invalid quickly. What does it mean to reinvent a business? Business model innovation. This book presents a nice framework to tackle business model innovation as a repeatable process.

"You shall not plow with an ox and a donkey together." -- Deuteronomy 22:10 (NKJV)

Few important business subjects offer less literature than business model innovation. Those who understand the critical importance of this management task will welcome Seizing the White Space as a helpful addition to the limited shelf of resources.

What is White Space? Author Mark W. Johnson displays a key definition in figure 2 on page 8 with a two dimensional matrix concerning the nature of the opportunity as one axis and the nature of the customer as the other axis. "White space" is where the opportunity is a poor fit with the existing organization and the customers are either new to the organization or "existing customers served in fundamentally different ways."

If that seems abstract, it is. The book provides a number of concrete examples that put flesh on the bones including Amazon.com, Apple, Dow Corning, Hilti, Hindustan Lever, Tata Nano, and Whole Foods.

What is a business model? The book offers a four-box definition illustrated in figure 8 on page 24: customer value proposition, key resources, key processes, and profit formula. If those aspects are unclear to you, the examples are used to flesh out each element.

Business model innovation is defined in this way: "These companies need something more fundamental than new growth: They need renewal. They must evolve into companies that deliver new sorts of value . . . It calls for the ability to innovate something more core than the core, to innovate the very theory of the business itself."

While the book's subtitle proclaims "Business Model Innovation for Growth and for Renewal," be aware that business model innovation can also occur in the other three quadrants of the matrix. Consultant Johnson is addressing the most difficult types of business model innovation. The good news is that many of the same lessons apply to the business model innovations in the other quadrants.

Mr. Johnson is an advocate of creating a process for innovation, rather than relying on serendipity. He doesn't discount serendipity, but he wants to increase productivity for such innovation.

I thought that the best chapter in the book was Chapter 8 where the stalled thinking of those who don't think about business models and strategy very much was well and humorously displayed in a way that anyone who has worked in management of a large company will quickly understand. Chapters 6 and 7 are also good on the subjects of designing and implementing new business models. I concur with the observations there. I wish that more of the book had been focused on those subjects rather than making the case for doing this kind of innovation. For instance, I think that many readers would benefit from more time explaining how to uncover new customer value propositions, the starting point of the innovation process described here.

Peter Drucker once pointed out that "Eventually every theory of the business becomes obsolete and then invalid." Mark Johnson in his "Seizing the White Space" adds that the average life span of those theories is growing shorter - in 1958 the average length of time a firm was on the S&P was 57 years, and in 2008 it had fallen to just 18. Thus, long-term survival requires that a business be built to transform. "Seizing the White Space" outlines how this can be done, using both conceptual models and examples.

'White space' in typical business jargon refers to uncharted territory or an under-served market. Johnson, however, defines it to mean potential activities not addressed by the firm's current business model, that are outside its core and beyond its adjacency's and require a different business model. Sometimes they lie between two markets or industries. Apple provides an example. Once a major player in the PC market, its market share fell from 20% to < 3% in the 1990s. When Jobs returned to refloat the sinking ship, he began with product innovation and introduced the iMac (integrated the processor with the monitor) and the iBook low-end laptop. He also ensured that suppliers like Microsoft and Adobe continued developing software for Apple. Then, in 2001, Apple introduced the iPod, a digital music player, followed 18 months later by the iTunes Store that locked hardware, software, and digital music into a user-friendly package. In three years the combination became a $10 billion/year product and accounted for nearly half of revenue. Market capitalization lept from around $2.6 billion at the end of 2002 to $133 billion at the end of 2007, boosting the brand value at the same time. Apple is now the world's largest music seller.

Unfortunately, "Seizing the White Space" did not continue to also include Apple's 2007 introduction of the first iPhone in 2007, combining a camera phone with text messaging, voicemail, e-mail, and web browsing with a multi-touch screen and a virtual keyboard. Its value was further enhanced from the App Store (launched in mid-2008) that now has over 200,000 approved applications that include games, reference, GPS navigation, social networking. Four generations have been brought out, and the iPhone 4 now includes a compass, video, book and magazine reading, movie watching, and two cameras with high resolution. Sales of the iPhone 4 were estimated at 1.5 million the first day. Apple's latest white space innovation is the Apple TV, with similar plans to rent movies and TV shows. Its market value is now $241 billion.

Promising white space areas include transforming existing markets, creating new markets, and confronting industrywide upheaval. Changes in government regulation (eg. transportation deregulation under President Carter), new technology (eg. lithium-ion batteries, the Internet - Johnson claims that 30% of the innovations he's studied involved the Internet), new financial options (eg. leasing) are examples. Taking advantage of them requires a compelling customer value proposition, a winning profit formula, and key resources and processes. It is likely to also require overcoming internal resistance to change. Johnson also counts retail discounters like Target, Wal-Mart, and Amazon as white space innovators - they now hold 76% of the retail industry's capitalization. Similarly, low-fare discount airlines have taken 55% of market value. Dell originally provided another example, though its viability is now being tested.

Amazon was an Internet pioneer that lived through the dot-com crash and has moved from $15.7 million in 1996 sales and 158 employees, to nearly $25 billion and 26,100 employees in 2009. Initially it simply upended the retail book sales market. Then Amazon's Bezos became a sequential business model innovator, beginning even before the initial model was fully developed when moved into the white space again by offering commission-based brokerage service to buyers and sellers of used books, and also added all sorts of easily shippable consumer goods. Then Amazon moved into white space again by serving third-party sellers - eg. Toys-R-Us, and numerous clothes and shoe-sellers. Amazon has also gone international. Still another new area was expanding into providing IT on-line resources that include a relational database service, cloud computing. Then in 2008 Bezos brought out the Kindle e-book reader and Amazon became an OEM (original equipment manufacturer). Subscription services for magazines and newspapers were another line. Kindle sales hit an estimated 500,000 units the first year, and Amazon asserts that now when it has both hard-copy and e-book versions (460,000 books, 171 newspapers and magazines) it sells 60% as many e-books as hard-copy versions.

Another interesting book segment compares Southwest Airlines and Delta's short-lived imitator Song. However, it could not adopt the entire Southwest model (existing high-paid, work-rule protected staff wanted inclusion), and it failed.

One more piece of advice from author Johnson: "Business model innovation efforts should be focused on the pursuit of something grand" - creating new markets, transforming industries. Don't use a cannon to shoot rabbits.

Bottom-Line: Johnson's book is an extension and elaboration of the McKinsey award-winning "Harvard Business Review" article "Reinventing Your Business Model" with Clayton Christensen and Henning Kagermann. "Seizing the White Space" provides excellent material on prolonging and revitalizing the vitality of one's business.