I recommend this book.

The cover also informs us that the author is founder and ceo of Hayes Inventive Research Corporation.

It is an interesting book. Personal stories are mixed with information and advice. Some diagrams, some photographs, some charts and drawings. The format is similar to How I Made $1,000,000 In Mail Order (and you can too) by E. Joseph Cossman.

The book contains a variety of topics and writings; and this leaves me with 2 thoughts to express. 1-You probably won't like the entire book. 2-You will certainly like some of the book, and that may be all that is relevant to you.

Robert M. Hayes promotes and is upbeat on the idea of obtaining patents and using patent attorneys. In those areas, some of the harsher realities seem left out.

Distribution is discussed, as is the idea of sales, and both of these are handled well. The book is interesting and inspirational, though you will probably need more technically candid information to fully implement such business activities. Nonetheless, the book is good.

"Price wars can create economically devastating and psychologically debilitating situations that take an extraordinary toll on an individual, a company, and industry profitability." And according to the authors most managers will be involved in a price war at some point in their career. But the authors believe that managers have an arsenal of weapons other than price cuts at their disposal. They believe that the first step in a price war is diagnosis. Or asking yourself why the price war is taking place. The authors introduce four key areas: Customer issues, company issues, competitor issues, and contributor issues. This diagnosis should provide companies with a few different options. The first option is to stop a price war before it starts or revealing your strategic intentions, using tools such as price-matching policies, everyday low pricing, and other public statements. The second option is to respond with nonprice actions. This option builds on the fact that different customer segments have different degrees of sensitivity to price and quality. The authors use price sensitivity on the Web as an example for this strategy. The third option is to use selective price options. These are mostly complex options such as multi-part pricing, quantity discounts, time-of-use pricing, bundling, etc. Common classic tactics in this option is to change customers' choice, modifying only certain prices, and the use of fighting brands. The fourth option is to fight it out. This should be used as a last resort and you should realize that this option has several long-run implications. When you choose this option, the authors recommend quick and umabigious implementation. The fifth and final option is to retreat. "On rare occasions, discretion is the better part of valor." It means giving away some market share rather than prolong a costly battle. For each of these options the authors provide examples.

The authors provide some insights into the options and their tools available to prevent a war on price. This prevention of a price war builds on the notion that price wars can often harm an entire industry, so companies should have a hard think first before they enter one. It builds on traditional strategy thinking, but also on game theory. The authors use simple business US-English.

My biggest complaint about the book was that at least once it refers you to another book in this series for information and a form.

The book is getting a little bit old (1998), but it does mention a couple URLs on the web for things.