The Art of Profitability
by Adrian Slywotzky · first published 2002
69% recommend31% neutral
Why HN recommends it
Business strategy told as a story of a master and student, packed with real deal examples on pricing and profit models. It is an engaging, very practical read for founders and managers.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
An extraordinarily new business slant on how companies can generate greater profits. Presented in 23 compact lessons, "The Art of Profitability" features an ongoing tutorial between two fictitious individuals.
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Most of the talk is very directly from the book "The Art of Profitability" by Adrian Slywotzky. Notes here: http://sivers.org/book/ArtOfProfitability Very highly recommended reading.
on “Derek Sivers on Business Models and Profitability (LessConf '09 Video)” ↗For a more interesting (yet still incomplete) rundown of business models, check out The Art of Profitability by Adrian Slywotzky: http://sivers.org/book/ArtOfProfitability
on “There are seven online business models” ↗The Art of Profitability http://www.amazon.com/Art-Profitability-Adrian-Slywotzky/dp/... Revenue Management http://www.amazon.com/Revenue-Management-Robert-G-Cross/dp/0...
on “Ask HN: What book changed your life in 2014?” ↗I totally agree. If the co-founder is putting in the hours, there is still hope. He just needs to get better at his job. My first advice would be for both you and him to read "The Art of Profitability" by Adrian Slywotzky. It's essentially an encyclopedia of deals and a very good book. (Derek Sivers summarizes it here: http://sivers.org/book/ArtOfProfitability)
on “Ask HN: My co-founder sux. What can I do ?” ↗I don't know that any one book exactly changed my life, but a handfull of titles do stand out in my mind. Zero To One by Peter Thiel The Art Of Profitability by Adrian Slywotzky The Singularity Is Near by Ray Kurzweil After Dark by Haruki Murakami
on “Ask HN: What book changed your life in 2014?” ↗…had read the book a while ago, but don't remember the hedgehog concept from it. Forgot, maybe. But I do remember the same concept from another book I read, maybe by Adrian Slywotzky, I think it was The Art of Profitability. Found it good. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adrian_Slywotzky
on “Why we prefer founding CEOs (2010)” ↗- The Growth Hackers book - The books from Steve Blank - The Art of Profitability - The Checklist Manifesto - iCon - The Second Greatest Act in Business - The Narrow Road - A good book on Copywriting - The Mythical Man-Month - Peopleware - No Silver Bullet - Death March by Edward Yourdon -…
on “Ask HN: Recommend books for a software developer opening a business” ↗…Within - you can motivate yourself to do anything via the "Pain Pleasure Principle" Bold: How to go big, make wealth, and change the world - some strategies from Musk, Bezos, Diamandis/Singularity U The Art of Profitability - Coca-cola from a 2-Liter costs $.02/oz , Coca-cola from a restaurant costs $.20/oz my full list here: https://goo.gl/9SD8b6
on “Ask HN: What books have made the biggest impact on your mental models?” ↗Shantaram Power of Now Go Giver Art of Profitability Challenger Sale Sapiens Player of Games Rogue Warrior
on “Ask HN: What is the most mind expanding book(s) you have read till date?” ↗…literature works at all, 95% of my reading has been things like modern business books. Just practical reading. There was one book I read that I really enjoyed that was done as a literature work. "The Art of Profitability". Another one was "Five dysfunctions of a team" which I'm not sure if it could be classed as a true literature work or not, not to mention the fact that the ideas hit too close to hoe at the time I was…
on ““A book is a sneeze”” ↗…acquisition costs? I haven't read it, but have heard that a great book on this topic is Monetizing Innovation (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01F4DYY1I). Another good book to think about business models is The Art of Profitability (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000FA5TTM, brief notes: https://codingvc.com/the-art-of-profitability) 3) Finally, think about marketing and customer acquisition in parallel with product. After almost 5…
on “Ask HN: Best business advice for software developers” ↗This story reminds me of the book "The Art of Profitability" which is told in the same master-student setup. Well worth a read!
on “What K. Told Me About Starting Up” ↗…dichotomy of not being about adding value vs. gaming the system but about creating something new versus optimizing and tinkering with an established system. As an example all the protagonists in "The art of profitability" (http://www.amazon.com/The-Art-Profitability-Adrian-Slywotzky...), for instance, deal mostly in a similar problem space as described by my friends' professional war stories.
on “Before the Startup” ↗"The Art of Profitability" by Adrian Slywotzky "The Myth of the Rational Voter" by Bryan Caplan "Fanatical Prospecting" by Jeb Blount "Fooling Some of the People All of the Time" by David Einhorn "Confidence Game" by Christine…
on “Ask HN: What books have you read in the first half of 2016?” ↗There is an interesting book by Adrian Slywotzky, The Art of Profitability, that goes over various profit models. I think the above example falls into 'Multi-Component' profit, in that the same product (water) is priced differently in different businesses (super market, convenience…
on “Took me more than 2 years to get 200 paying customers for my Web App” ↗