About a week or two ago, I had finished reading "The Big Moo", written by Seth Godin, but because of the many other things I had going on I decided to just shelf the book and Blog about it when my schedule freed up a bit. Well, as it turns out, I had some time last night and so I put together this review.

If you're a regular reader of this Blog, than chances are you've already read my review of Godin's "Purple Cow"... a book which I highly recommend. Although "The Big Moo" is not an official sequel, as it could be read with or without first reading "Purple Cow", I believe they compliment each other very well and to the point where I'm now calling it the unofficial volume II.

"The Big Moo" is a unique look into the minds of 33 of the boldest, brightest, and most pioneering people in business. It's an idea book... a call to action type book.

As Godin had first outlined in Purple Cow, companies need to stop being a brown cow, roaming in a field with hundreds of other brown cows, and dare to be purple... or in other words dare to be different, innovative, and remarkable. However, after a while, being 'purple' won't be enough to stand out. Companies will then need to develop a 'big moo', an extreme purple cow, an innovation that completely changes the game.

Godin cleverly explains that a 'Purple Cow' is what you need to be successful, but a 'big moo' is taking success one step further. In order to grow at the pace your market demands, you and your colleagues must find the 'big moo', the insight that is so astounding that people can't help but remark on it.

An example would be FedEx. Shipping was just shipping... until there was FedEx. FedEx is the now purple cow of shipping. FedEx's 'big moo' is when they changed the world by popularizing overnight shipping.

To explore the idea of the 'Big Moo', Godin recruited stories from The Group of 33... a gathering of bestselling authors and business superstars like Jay Gouliard, Lisa Gansky, Mark Cuban, Guy Kawasaki, and Seth Godin himself. Together they outline some of the best secrets for creating a sustainable and remarkable company. "The Big Moo" focuses on their stories... stories about memorable customer service, amazing dedication, daring design standards, and legendary leadership.

This book is about the why, the what, and the how to make a remarkable idea more remarkable. It highlights many of today's 'Big Moo' ideas, and shares in-depth ideas and concepts of how a company can create one. To be completely honest, I didn't get a lot out of this book, like I had with "Purple Cow", however I did very much enjoy reading about many of today's 'Big Moos' and how they changed the companies who created them.

Here is a quote from one of the many pages I had dog-eared:

"In the old days, showing up was 95 percent of success. If you offered a good product at a good price in a reliable way, you'd do fine. Being local was a good thing. Having a long track record helped. Decent quality and personal service mattered as well.

No longer. Good enough isn't good enough, because now everything is good enough. Our expectations of quality are unrealistic - and are being met every single day. We don't just want to be satisfied, we want to be blown away."

Are you looking to create a 'Big Moo' in your industry? If so, you may want to take a close look at "The Big Moo", written by Seth Godin, for ways to create one. Creating a 'Big Moo' could help you to drive growth and change in your organization, from the mailroom to the boardroom to the front lines of your company.