The Personal MBA

Master the Art of Business

A world-class business education in a single volume. Learn the universal principles behind every successful business, then use these ideas to make more money, get more done, and have more fun in your life and work.

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What Is 'Duplication'?

Duplication is the ability to reliably reproduce something of value.

Duplication allows you to make copies of your offer quickly and inexpensively, making it more widely available in a cost-effective way.

To create something that doesn't require your direct involvement, you need to be able to duplicate effectively.

If you have to be personally involved with every customer, there's an upper limit on how many customers you can serve.

Josh Kaufman Explains 'Duplication'

Duplication is the ability to reliably reproduce something of value. Factory production is the quintessential example of duplication: one design, many copies. Instead of "re-inventing the wheel" over and over again, duplication allows you to design the wheel once, then make as many of them as you wish.

The better your ability to duplicate your offer, the more value you can provide. The more time and effort it costs to make something, the less available it tends to be.

Duplication allows you to make copies of your offer quickly and inexpensively, making it more widely available in a cost-effective way.

Consider this book. In the olden days, books used to be copied and bound by hand. It would take a scribe months (sometimes years ) of full-time work to copy a single book. As a result, books were extremely expensive and difficult to obtain.

How times have changed.

This book was written only once, but via the wonder of large-scale printing equipment, it can be reproduced quickly, reliably, and inexpensively. As a result, tens of millions of copies can be made and distributed all over the world, and can be purchased for a few dollars.

That's the magic of Duplication.

The Internet has made Duplication of some forms of value even easier. As Kevin Kelly remarked in his essay "Better Than Free," the Internet is essentially an enormous, inexpensive copy machine.

When I write a post for my Web site, it can be duplicated by my web server for next to nothing, and delivered to a reader on the other side of the world almost instantly.

Duplication of information-text, images, music, video-is essentially free. The value of this information, however, can be quite significant.

If you want to create something that you can sell without your direct involvement, the ability to duplicate your offer is essential. If you have to be personally involved with every customer, there's an upper bound on the number of customers you can serve in a given amount of time.

Combining duplication with Automation allows you deliver value to more people-and close more sales as a result.

Questions About 'Duplication'


"The problems of this world are only truly solved in two ways: by extinction or duplication."

Susan Sontag, author and political activist


From Chapter 4:

Value Delivery


https://personalmba.com/duplication/



The Personal MBA

Master the Art of Business

A world-class business education in a single volume. Learn the universal principles behind every successful business, then use these ideas to make more money, get more done, and have more fun in your life and work.

Buy the book:


About Josh Kaufman

Josh Kaufman is an acclaimed business, learning, and skill acquisition expert. He is the author of two international bestsellers: The Personal MBA and The First 20 Hours. Josh's research and writing have helped millions of people worldwide learn the fundamentals of modern business.

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