In the business war, competing for the market with competitors is always one step ahead, taking the initiative, and when the opponent catches up, he is one step ahead of other markets, so as to win. This is what Sun Tzu calls "striking half-effort" in the Art of War. "Striking half-effort" is aimed at taking the initiative in the war base, and can achieve twice the result with half the effort.

□ read the newspaper Amer and sold pork

Getting information from clues outside the market, discovering the value of the information, and applying it to business warfare in a timely manner can be wonderful.

Philip Yamer, the founder of the American entrepreneur "Amerer Company", has a surprising keen eye.

Towards the end of the American Civil War, pork was very expensive on the market. Yar knows that this is all caused by the war, and once the war is over, the price of meat will plummet. One day, he picked up a copy of the day's newspaper and saw an ordinary news report: a priest met a group of children in the district of the general of the Southern army, they were the children of officers under General Lee, and the children complained that they had eaten bread for several days, and that the horse meat that their father had brought back was difficult to swallow. Amer immediately came to the judgment that General Lee had reached the point of slaughtering his horses to satisfy his hunger, and that the war would not be fought again.

Yamer immediately signed a contract with a local seller to sell a batch of pigs at a lower price, on the condition that the delivery would be delayed by a few days.

Sure enough, the war ended, the price of pork plummeted, and Yamer made $1 million from the deal.

In the spring of 1875, Amer read another news in the newspaper that there was a suspected case of plague in Mexico. Yamer, who runs a meat business, thought: "If there is a real plague, California and Texas, which are the main meat supply points in the United States, will be the source of the plague." Without hesitation, Yamer led his family doctor to Mexico, confirmed the authenticity of the plague, returned to the United States, and bought pigs and beef cattle from all over California and Texas and drove them to the eastern United States.

Soon after, the plague in Mexico hit the United States, and the U.S. government ordered the closure of meat markets in California and the state, prohibiting all food shipments from the two states to prevent it from spreading to the whole of the United States.

Suddenly, in the market across the United States, the price of hunting meat and beef skyrocketed.

In just a few months, Yamer made $9 million.

By reading the newspapers, Yamer found out about the "suspected case of warm epidemic in Mexico", and immediately analyzed that there would be a shortage of meat in the near future, and set out to seize the market and finally make a huge profit.

□ trust each other and Christie excels

Mutual trust is the source of motivation and the foundation of success.

In the United States, almost everyone knows about the flamboyant Playboy magazine. Its founder, Hugh Hefner, is also known as the "Playboy". No matter where he appears, there are always beautiful women by his side. However, this sexually emancipated father had a very uniform daughter. His daughter, Christy Hefner, is a very simple girl, and girls like her are very rare in wealthy families in the United States.

Born in 1953, Christie was deeply aware of the shadow her father's flirtatious voice on her family and her personal life from an early age. Originally, Hugh Hefner's miscellaneous society was set up in his own home. After making money, he bought an office building, moved the magazine into it, and often did not go home, living a life of spending all day drinking. His wife could not bear her husband's vices and separated from him. After 5 years, they went through the divorce hand, and Christie was educated by the mother's custody. The divorce of her parents made Christie develop a strong personality from an early age.

Long before Christie went to college, Hugh Hefner discovered that her daughter had a high talent for literature and was suitable for running a magazine. In 1975, she enrolled in Brondis, USA, and her father praised her academic performance very well. At that time, he secretly made up his mind: in the future, his career would only be handed over to Christie, so he was interested in his daughter's cultivation and education. He also knows Christie's opinion of the magazine, but he has already created a huge family business, and if he doesn't give it to his beloved daughter, what can he hand it over?

Although Christie picked up the magazine, and the nude jade photos in it still made her blush, as she grew older, she began to face up to her father's career, serving as a director and vice president of the company. By 1982, Hefner had completely handed over power to women. At this time, it was the time when "Playboy" was dying.

In the more than 20 years since the magazine was founded, Hefner's personal assets grew from scratch to hundreds of millions in 1975. This period was the golden age of Hefner's life. New York Times reporter Dudley Freeman once wrote a report on how Hefner became a super-nouveau riche, calling the magazine the most popular and best-selling pornographic magazine in the red-light district of the American publishing industry, and it brought a huge fortune to Hefner, who had nothing.

After the mid-70s, many magazines with similar content to Playboy, such as Playgirl, The Promenade, and Rooftop House, came out to compete with them for readers. In such competition, the sales of "Playboy" plummeted. In 1972, 7 million copies were sold per month, and by 1978, only 4.8 million copies were sold per month. Advertising revenue has also plummeted. Another ripple effect was the company's stock falling on Wall Street from $25.125 per share in 1972 to $2 per share.

In an effort to salvage the company's decline, Hefner hired Delic Daniels as president in 1976 with an annual salary of $500,000.

Derick Daniels, 47, is a knowledgeable and familiar with the magazine and newspaper business, having been managing editor of the Detroit Free Press and vice president of Knight-Reed Newspapers. After becoming president, he overhauled the company's business. Christie was already a senior member of the company at this time, and she was involved in the change. They expanded their pay-per-view cable television service, enriched Playboy magazine, and published its sister magazine, Otto.

In addition, Daniels has further expanded his business by opening up luxury hotels, record labels, casinos and book edition companies. Playboy has become a huge conglomerate, especially the operation of casinos has brought great economic benefits to the enterprise. Among them, casinos in London, England and Atlantic City, USA, brought money to the company, much to Hefner's delight. Atlantic City's casino is the most expensive, known as the jewel in the crown of Playboy, with a $130 million investment and 500 luxurious hotel rooms. London's casinos are the places where dignitaries come and go, making more than $13 million a year.

During this period, sales of Playboy magazine also recovered, reaching 5.2 million copies in 1980. Advertising revenue has also increased. The price of the stock recovered to $9.125 per share.

However, for various reasons, the casinos in London were forced to sell, and then the "Oye" magazine, the Grand Hotel in New Jersey in the United States, and the Geneva Hotel in Wisconsin were also sold one after another. Soon after, the "jewel in the crown" Atlantic Hotel & Casino was shut down by the U.S. government for violating New Jersey's economic regulations, and faced the bad luck of having its license revoked.

Hugh Hefner saw that the playboy corporate empire he had created was about to be ruined, and he made a desperate decision to make Christie president.

Hefner issued a statement announcing that on April 28, 1982, Playboy Corporation's new president, Christie, and vice president, Marvin Heston, took office. Marvin S.

Heuston was originally the head of the company's finance department. Hugh Hefner's appointment provoked a strong reaction within the company and from all walks of life. People in the company are also very different about whether Criti is up to the task.

Christie's appointment as president of Playboy Enterprises, Inc. has aroused a great deal of interest in the community. Most remain skeptical, on the grounds that the company is making money and that it needs someone more experienced and bold to turn the tide.

Hugh Hefner ignored all the talk and questions inside and outside the company, and he was full of confidence in his daughter.

The trust of her father and colleagues gave Christie a great encouragement, and she was determined to prove her worth to those who were still skeptical. She was well aware that this was a difficult task, and given the limited amount of experience she had, she offered to share the responsibility of managing the business with Marvin Heuston in the newly established head office.

As president of Christie, she struggled to escape the threat of collapse, and she ran Playboy magazine and two other publications. She actively invites singers and movie stars to appear in her magazines to talk, and uses the star effect to attract customers.

At the same time, she changed the erotic image of "Playboy" that only pleases customers with naked beauties, adds new fashionable and interesting content, and strives to improve the grade, winning the popularity of new readers.

Christie has also been active in the development of pay-per-view cable television, reassuring the potential of television newspapers. Through her unremitting efforts, Playboy Enterprises' pay-line TV business has been fruitful and has brought great benefits to the company.

Playboy Enterprises, which ceased to be a monolithic company in the 70s, has become more diversified and larger after the reorganization of Rick Daniels. After Christie took over, he continued to develop this diversification, actively organizing manpower and increasing the production of its products. She sent a group of quite capable salesmen to sell products under the "Playboy" trademark. Nowadays, in the United States, many large commercial houses have products with the "Playboy" trademark abounding on the shelves. As a result of Christie's humble listening to the opinions of all sides, the company's internal rationalization suggestions were adopted in large numbers, and the company's business performance rebounded significantly, and in less than three years, it became vigorous again, with an annual revenue of more than 100 million US dollars, far exceeding the performance of similar journals in the United States. Christie was appreciated and respected.

Thanks to the trust, Christie has the status of president of Playboy; Because of the trust, Christie managed to send competent marketers; Thanks to trust, Playboy has a new page.