“Today it’s important to be present, be relevant and add value.”
Nick Besbeas

Growth marketing is not just about the growth of your business and maximizing profits.

It is also about benefiting the environment that provides us resources for our business and the growth of human values. That is what real growth and real profit means.

Nature can teach us a lot of lessons on how to create an adaptive marketing strategy that enables the growth of human values and benefits both our business and environment.

“Biomimicry is innovation inspired by nature.And it's a new way of inventing by looking to the natural world for inspiration.And asking, before we design anything, what would nature do here?”
Janine Benyus

---

This article is a continuation of a previously published one:
“Crowdfunding in DeSci. Toward a Resource-Based World Economy“

---

Now, it was the time for the H. to return to his village and share his innovation in 3D world.

The Hedgehog was met by the Dragon that took him to the exit. There, he saw a Rainbow Road that could allow to move from 5D to 3D world:

“Now, it is the time for you to move and share your innovation with your 3D world,” said the Dragon. “However, you need to remember that the consciousness of the inhabitants in your world is «poisoned» by centralization and monetary system which are represented as two types of fog in your village. You managed to get rid of these illusions with the help of the wise animals you met on your journey to the mountain that happened to be a launchpad for a spacecraft which helped you to get here. But the rest of your village and another villages are still under control of these illusions.

“You need to know that the aforementioned fogs are generated by the witches in your world. You will find the one that generates the fogs in your village deep in the forest, where there is almost no any sunlight. She lives in a hut on chicken legs and flies around in a wood mortar. This ball of thread will help you to find the witch,” said the Dragon, and gave the ball to the Hedgehog.

“The fogs enable the witch to promote the innovations that allow to grow her business and suppress any innovations that possess a threat to her profits,” the Dragon explained. “That is why you will need to get rid of the witch in your village first. It will take a lot of skills and wisdom for you to do this.

“All I can say is that the witches are afraid of light, especially sunlight. Hence, there are fogs. Use your brain, and you will find a way to get rid of her. That is when your 3D world will become a place for all amazing innovations developed there to flourish. And share your approach with other villages, so that they could also get rid of the witches. For that, you will need to develop an effective and adaptive growth marketing strategy for your innovation. You will learn how to develop the one on the Rainbow Road.”

The Hedgehog stepped into the boat and moved down the Rainbow Road.

Attention

The first animal he met was the Peacock that spread his feathers greeting the Hedgehog:

(The image above was composed by me with the help of the hedgehog, boat, rainbow, dragon, and peacock images)

The Hedgehog greeted it as well and talked for a while about the development of the best possible marketing strategy for his innovation.

“You see, the first thing you should think about is to draw attention of potential customers to your innovation,” the Peacock explained. “This is what we do. We spread our feathers to attract our mates. We also use it for communication purposes and to scare predators. By the way, you might need to pay a special attention to the latter as well in your 3D world to protect your innovation from witches. But remember that drawing attention is just the first step. The rest of them are much more important.”

So the Hedgehog said goodbye and went forward down the Rainbow Road.

Responsiveness

The next organisms he met were the Sunflowers. He greeted them and had a little chat.

“Well, your marketing strategy should be adaptive in order to survive in the «toxic» context of your 3D world,” said the Taurus. “Adaptability is the key for your strategy to evolve. It is ensured by 5 patterns, namely: responsiveness, heterogeneity, decentralization, redundancy, and cooperation. Together they form the PROTECTION (resPonsiveness, heteROgeneity, decenTralization, rEdundancy, and CooperaTION) framework [1].

“I will give you some information about the first pattern, and you will learn about the rest of the patterns from other organisms down the Rainbow Road.

“Heliotropism is what helps sunflowers to optimize their ability to photosynthesize. This movement is an example of the first pattern - responsiveness. Your marketing strategy needs to be responsive and change dynamically according to the market conditions in order to ensure that your innovation «survives» them.”

The Hedgehog thanked the Sunflowers and moved further.

Heterogeneity

Soon, he found mounds with ants:

(The image above was composed by me with the help of the hedgehog, boat, rainbow, sunflower, and ants images)

The Hedgehog greeted them and talked for a while about the marketing strategy he needed.

One of the ants explained, “You see, ant colonies act as a superorganism. The colonies consist of different types of specialised groups: workers, soldiers and others. Specialization of roles is what helps us to increase diversity. The greater the diversity, the higher the chances to survive an attack. It is an example of the second pattern - heterogeneity. Your marketing strategy has to be heterogeneous. It should be implemented in different layers to ensure resiliency in the face of different attacks.”

The Hedgehog said goodbye and went forward down the Rainbow Road.

Redundancy

The next animal he met was the Lizard:

(The image above was composed by me with the help of the hedgehog, boat, rainbow, starfish, and lizard images)

The Hedgehog greeted it and talked for a while.

“You see,” the Lizard said, “the excessive resources help to survive critical events. Lizards can afford to lose their tails to escape capture. The new one can be regenerated over time. Your strategy serves different functions. There must be several mechanisms to perform the same function. This is another way to ensure resiliency.”

The Hedgehog said goodbye and moved further.

Cooperation

Soon, he saw a school of fish and talked a little.

“Well, swimming in groups helps fish to find food and protect itself and its eggs against predators. This is what cooperation is about,” said one of the fish. “ Grouping together helps to overcome problems, that would otherwise be impossible.”

The Hedgehog thanked the fish and moved further.

Interconnection, mutual benefits and motivation

The last organism he met was the Lichen:

(The image above was composed by me with the help of the hedgehog, boat, rainbow, pond, school of fish and lichen images)

The Hedgehog greeted it and talked for a while about his marketing strategy.

“You see, everything in Nature is interconnected,” said the Lichen. “Lichens is a composite organism that consists of algae / cyanobacteria and different fungi species living in a mutually beneficial relationship. The former provides nutrients produced via photosynthesis, and the latter provides protection, nutrients and moisture from the environment.

“The soil provides us some nutrients. Once we die, our bodies turn into nutrients for other organisms living in the soil. Nature provides mutual benefits. Just like that, the real growth marketing is not just about making everything possible to grow you business and maximizing profits. Your business should be beneficial as for you, as for our environment. We need to care about the environment that supports us. Also, your business should help our inner world to grow as well. That is what the real growth means.

“Also note, that the monetary system you have in your 3D world is an artificial motivator. We don't use it in Nature. There must be some powerful intrinsic motivators for your business to succeed, because building it requires a lot of creativity. And money as a motivator dulls thinking, narrows your focus and blocks creativity [2]. Plus, true motivation will make any attempts to bribe you useless.”

The Hedgehog thanked the Lichen and moved further down the Rainbow Road where he finally got back into 3D world:

(Source: Pixabay)

Once he got into his village, he started working on a device that would help to get rid of the witch in his village. The Hedgehog remembered that the witch was afraid of sunlight. The idea was to throw the witch up high enough above the fogs, so that she would be exposed to direct sunlight and get destroyed. For that, the Hedgehog built a special catapult:

(Source: Pixabay)

It required a lot of energy to function. That's where his free energy device built in the 5D world came into play.

The Hedgehog moved deep into the forest and found the hut on chicken legs and the wood mortar with the help of the ball of yarn given by the Dragon:

(Source: Pixabay)

He quietly set a trap in such a way, so that the mortar would get catapulted high above the fogs once the witch got there, exposing her to direct sunlight. The trap worked perfectly, and the witch got destroyed. The Hedgehog came to the remnants of the mortar and the witch and said the following:

“Those that seek to create in this world, those who embrace change as a natural force, helping to unify humankind as one entity in one shared direction, realizing that injustice anywhere is injustice everywhere, will always be one step ahead of the traditionalist, the preservers, the elitists, who in defence of their separatist identities and egoist fears, seek to divide, conquer, oppress and destroy.
The pursuit of livingry will always be one step ahead of the pursuit of weaponry.”
Interreflectionsmovie

Once he said that, the fogs disappeared, and the village was not under control of monetary system and centralization anymore. It became a healthy environment suitable for Resource-Based Economy implementation:

(Source: Pixabay)

Now, that the Hedgehog got rid of the witch, he had to share the information on how to destroy the witches with other villages. The problem was that the witches in other villages got warnings about the potential threat. So, they started doing different magical tricks to prevent the Hedgehog from sharing his ideas with the inhabitants of other villages. Thus, the Hedgehog tried to develop a powerful resilient and adaptive growth marketing strategy for his device based on the lessons learnt from the organisms he met on the Rainbow Road.

The main task of his marketing strategy was to spread the message on how to build the device.

So, the Hedgehog united with different animals in his village: moles (to spread the message under the ground), other Hedgehogs (to spread the message on the ground), and pigeons (to spread the message over the ground) (heterogeneity, redundancy, and cooperation). The network of these animals acted in a decentralized manner, there was no any hierarchy (decentralization). All of them were equipped with special little balls that could create protective bubbles around them upon activation to withstand different attacks (responsiveness). The message itself was supposed to be delivered via a hologram (so that inhabitants of other villages could get familiar with the instructions on how to build the device in 3-D space) generated by a special little device that was given to all animals. The hologram was very bright, so that it would draw attention of the inhabitants and scare the witches (attention). Also, all of the inhabitants were motivated by intrinsic motivators, not by money, which helped them to demonstrate high level of creativity (motivation).

The main magic that the inhabitants had to deal with while applying their marketing strategy was weather modification. The witches created a powerful hurricane that blew away all the pigeons, and they managed to freeze temporary all the Hedgehogs. But they couldn't stop all the moles with weather modification, because they acted in a decentralized manner. So, the witches tried to bribe them with money, but failed, because they were motivated by something bigger than that. Some of the moles managed to reach other villages and deliver the message. What's more, the bright holograms scared the witches away. Ultimately, all the villages managed to build the device that helped them to get rid of all the witches the same way as the Hedgehog did. There were no any fogs in any village anymore.

This change helped all inhabitants to get rid of illusions that they were under control of and create a healthy environment based on TheVenusProjects to reach their full potential:

(Source: Pixabay)

The real growth marketing helps to grow our business, improve the environment that supports us, and grow our inner world. That is what the real growth means.

"What nature has to teach is more than we have ever imagined."
John Lanie

This post was inspired by the "The Adventures of Sinbad (Episode 12 - The Village Vanishes)" (1996) and the "Hedgehog in the Fog" (1975).

The headline image was composed by me with the help of world map, witch, dragon, catapult, beacon, peacock, ants, starfish, lizard, sunflower, lichen, school of fish, pond, boat, and hedgehog images.

All other images sourced from Pixabay.

The divider was created by me.

Reference

1. Rzeszutko, Elzbieta & Mazurczyk, Wojciech. (2014). Insights from Nature for Cybersecurity. Health security. 13. 10.1089/hs.2014.0087.

2. GLUCKSBERG S. The influence of strength of drive on functional fixedness and perceptual recognition. J Exp Psychol. 1962 Jan;63:36-41. doi: 10.1037/h0044683. PMID: 13899303.