Dragons’ Den: Success From Pitch To Profit Book Review
By admin on Jan 11, 2008 in Blog Reviews
I think of growing a popular blog as the great way to experience and learn the fundamentals of business. Blogging teaches you all about branding, marketing, sales, public relations, advertising and planning. Success stories in blogging are common when compared to Dragons Den success stories!
Bloggers are fledgling entrepreneurs.
It wouldn’t surprise me therefore if many of you are just like me and love programs like the hit BBC show Dragons’ Den where aspiring entrepreneurs pitch their ideas to a panel of “dragons” that they have to charm or get flamed by. The Dragons who wrote a chapter each in the book are Duncan Bannatyne, Deborah Meaden, Peter Jones, Richard Farleigh, Theo Paphitis and James Caan.
It is my favourite TV show and the book, Dragons’ Den: From Pitch To Profit is currently my favourite book (I was given 2 copies of it at Christmas - by mistake, along with 2 bottles of Reggae Reggae sauce!).
I read the entire book in 2 days, partially because it makes fairly easy reading but also because I found the stories behind each of the multimillionaire Dragons fascinating. Everyone loves reading success stories and the Dragons Den success stories are what comprises the better half of this book. The Dragons and the entrepreneurs look back on what they learned and the Dragons explain how their pitch and business could have been improved.
Each Dragon tells their success story and then outlines the main lessons they have learned along the way. They each summarize their lessons in easily digestible bullet points at the end of each chapter. What I found most interesting is that each Dragon has formed their own set of rules based on their own experiences. It showed to me that there isn’t a hard line to follow in modern business and that creativity and innovation are essential.
I was pleased at the way the Dragons all openly admit and analyze their mistakes, rather than trying to hide them. Reading about the mistakes they made and how they recovered may prove invaluable to me one day.
Evan Davis, the presenter of the show wrote the most useful chapter in the book on, “the numbers”, where he outlines the core fundamentals processes all business start-ups need to go through. If you already have a degree in business this wont be anything new to you, but I lapped up all the information gladly.
Conclusion
If you are a fan of the show and/or want to be an entrepreneur and don’t already have a ‘proper’ education in starting a business then I strongly recommend buying a copy of Dragons’ Den: Success From Pitch To Profit. It is both entertaining and useful. You can pick up a copy from Amazon here
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Good review Matt. I don’t think we get the show in Australia but we have had a few of a similar genre.
Yes, we did have the show in Australia. But after 1 series, it just disappeared. Good show though. I for one thoroughly enjoyed it.
The Original Ripoff Report Text:
In 1999 the television company owned by Ziff Davis called techtv was asking for television submissions and I sent two and I never heard from them, However, in 2001 they were advertising my idea as their own! I wrote a little script that I called the Internet Pitch, A.K.A. The Big Idea. The show was played on the web and hosted by Mark Wahlberg. The shows concept was were budding entrepreneurs took their business plans or ideas to investors to win a web package and start up money and a grand prize for a million dollars. Well in 2001 when I learned of this I wrote to the Better Business Bureau and filed a complaint, however, techtv claimed I did not send that idea, however, I absolutely did! I do not know where my idea got stolen, in the mail room or from some damn secretary or a top Executive!!! However, some scum ball stole my concept and used it exactly as I wrote it, never changed a damn thing!!! They used the Original name as well as the Nick name to promote the show. It was my own fault for submitting an idea that I never got protected by a copy write……What really makes me angry is that Sony bought the Idea from ZDNet / Techtv and used it to create American Inventor As well as the Dragons Den and the newly soon to be released version the Sharks Tank. It is nice to know that this scumbags have no problem living high while I have suffered all these years… Ken Paradise, California
U.S.A.
This is one of my favourite shows too, it’s just brilliant and I’m going to definitely be reading this book once my brother has finished with it!
I’ve also read Duncan Bannatyne’s own book too, that’s a great read if you haven’t already got that one!
I thought about buying Duncan Bannatyne’s book as well… it is tempting but I think now I’ve got to press on with my new big project.
Thats a very good book, a lot of good concepts u can relate to your business, learnt a lot and can recommend to everyone!
There certainly is, I especially like the Dragons Den success stories section!