Well, I'm going to talk about the rainforest in South America, a huge 7,000,000 square kilometers of jungle spanning a few countries.
The other Amazon is huge too, in the online world. In fact, Amazon takes up the top 4 to 5 spots when you do a search on the word.
Both Amazons provide lessons that we can learn for our business. But much have been written about the online portal.
So let's talk about the jungle.
The other day, I was watching a documentary on the Amazon forest. It shows all the weird plants, faunas, animals and insects that you can only find there. The Amazon forest is so thick and dense that very little sunlight gets to the ground. The sunlight is blocked by all the big trees and all the small plants growing on the ground have to fight for whatever is available. Isn't this like the market place where every business is fighting for customers?
In order to get to places where there's sunlight, each plant develops its own strategy or unique characteristics. For example, there's a creeping plant that grow towards places where its dark instead of sunlight. Another species grows on top of trees where it is not blocked. Yet another plant has a hollow filled with water that acts as a home for tadpole for its own survival. Some plants rely on insects or animals to help them in pollination and vice versa.
So what has it got to do with your business?
1. Do you know your strengths and weaknesses? The creeping plant knows that it won't be able to compete with other plants based on its size.
2. Strategy. Every plant, insect and animal has its own strategy to survive in the forest. They develop their own method of survival unique to themselves. Do you have a unique strategy that no one can copy?
3. Go where there's no competition. Knowing that everyone is fighting for sunlight, the creeping plant choose to grow towards the dark areas where there's no competition.
4. Work with others. Once you know where your strengths and weaknesses lie, you can then work with others to compliment yourself.
5. Give before receiving. The plants have to provide food to the insects or animals before they will help the plants in pollination.