Key patterns for making your business fail

We all know how to make businesses fail, right?
This is a growing list of controlled folly business patterns …

Put profit over value

In the ever faster running war-work-western-culture-machine, your customers value their (recreation) time the most. You can use this to gain profit. For example, if your complaints department only opens in one location, and only between 10 and 11 am on monday, to allow people to fill in the complaint forms required for possibly making an appointment to actually launch their complaint and maybe have their problem solved (for a fee), your business is probably doing great.

Value meaning over significance

Your idea for a product or service is brilliant. You do not need marketing, and no compelling story to sell it – your idea is so brilliant, it will sell itself. This is, of course, because you are absolutely right. And branding is for unthoughtful simpletons and evil businesses.

Don’t ever be unconventional

Conventional patterns are good for others, and therefor for you and your business too. They’ve served mankind so well for so many millennia now. People everywhere really enjoy the tread-mill familiar and hate change. Besides, because we’re going for a single “bottom line” approach (see the first pattern “Put profit over value“), we can use that “built up over millennia recognition factor” to our benefit. Keep repeating the same mistakes over and over.

Go absolutely unconventional

No plan or recipe required. Ever.

Don’t ever verify or validate anything

Verification and validation are highly overrated. And don’t cross train and gain with your colleagues. Only learn from your own mistakes. And if you can, avoid that too. You already know what you need to know. You’re the boss! It is up to others to learn from you!

Wide language base

If you are starting an international business (or aggregate), do it in the 7 most widely used languages, right from the beginning. Chinese, Italian, French, Spanish, Japanese, German and English. Have ’em all. Really, it’s a definite killer.

Choose your name to raise awareness

If you are starting an international business (or aggregate), forget about other cultures entirely when choosing your business name. The truth is that no business name — regardless of how memorable or even how well-established — is critical to success. Making connections with your customers is for softies. For all intents and purposes, “Triad” is a fantastic name for consultant companies. So is “Butt Sweets” for a candy store.

Do it yourself, and alone

Never ever link a product that satisfies a need that hasn’t been catered to sufficiently (yet), to an ongoing development. For example, do not link your business to the free knowledge/open source economy. And never link controlled folly fun to Satir Workshops.