创业传奇：Zipcar创始人转战新市场

    了解自己的弱点，通过招聘进行弥补。虽然我成立了一家汽车公司，但我对汽车却是一窍不通。于是我聘用了一位曾在赫兹租车公司（Hertz，《财富》500强）管理北美车队的人，担任公司运营副总裁。

    要有前瞻性，即便这可能会带来伤害。Zipcar成立初期，我将汽车租赁费定得过低，于是不得不两次提价。人们说提高费用会给公司品牌带来风险。但如果继续执行不合适的价格，我们可能已经倒闭了。

    要有自己的特色。我希望强调Zipcar不同于汽车租赁公司，所以我们没有使用汽车租赁公司使用的任何车型。我选择了最新上市的绿色大众甲壳虫作为β测试用车，因为这款汽车不仅外形可爱，而且有良好的口碑。为了吸引注意力，我在车身上加了的公司标识，结果证明，这是非常有效的营销手段。

    译者：刘进龙/汪皓

    Know your weaknesses and hire to fill them. I started a car company, yet knew nothing about cars. So I hired for my vice president of operations a man who had managed Hertz's (HTZ, Fortune 500) North American fleet.

    Be proactive, even if it hurts. Very early with Zipcar, I put too low a price point on the car rental, and had to raise it twice. People said raising the rate would put our brand at risk. But if the price didn't work, we'd have gone under.

    Stand out from the crowd. I wanted to emphasize that Zipcar was different from car rental companies, so we didn't use any vehicle that could be found in a car rental fleet. For the beta car, I chose a newly introduced green Volkswagen Beetle, which was cute and had cachet. I put our logo on the car because I wanted to draw attention to it, and it worked as great marketing.