Driving Trial to Drive Sales

by Paul Williams

Mocha Valencia Frappuccino, was the one of the new beverages in the summer of 2002* at Starbucks Coffee. I was the marketing manager in charge of the summer promotion.

The beverage team described the taste profile like eating pieces of "chocolate orange" - like that made by Terry's. (Which is interesting - because Terry's Chocolate Orange wasn't / isn't a universal flavor the way Oreo Cookie or Orange Creamsicle are).

Anyhow, it became a featured beverage.

I don't know about you... but orange + chocolate isn't one of my favorite flavors.

I don't know about you... but I would never order that flavor... I wouldn't even try it because it was new and different - it is not a taste that sounds appealing to me.

However, sales of Mocha Valencia Frappuccino did fairly well that summer.

Why?

Because partners (employees) in stores sampled it morning, noon, and night. That summer, you couldn't walk into a Starbucks without a tray of mini-Frappuccino samples being thrust at you.

Long story short - trial led to purchase. Through trial you drive sales.

Allowing me to try your product or service prior to purchase reduces the anxiety I have about buying your product. The risk is gone. I'm not going to fork-out $50 for your software to find out it doesn't do what I want. I'm not going to buy that phone without first trying out the buttons.

Which leads to this great direct mail ad.


Neat Idea No. 1

How does a phone company get you to try their product before purchase? They get you to try it at the retail store. But how do they get you if you're not visiting the store?

Below is a way to creatively solve the problem of "how do we get trial of our expensive device."


[click for larger view]

The purple area is actually cut out... The idea is to put your thumbs through the holes and "try" the BlackBerry...



I'm not sure if this ad for this "groundbreaking new phone" drove sales and exceeded expectations. But it was a clever way to engage the customer. I wouldn't be surprised to find out the mail carrier tried it - just for fun - before he delivered it.


Neat Idea No. 2

How do you get people to try grape juice? You could sample in-aisle at the grocery store. Or, maybe have a booth at the mall. But how do you get them in their home? Short of shipping small bottles to customers?

Welch's used a flavor strip in print ads. Peel up the tab and lick to taste. (I wouldn't recommend this if you found the ad at the doctor or dentist office).

I used to drink grape juice all the time as a kid. I can't recall ever buying it myself. Perhaps the taste is enough trigger the memory of that flavor as a kid and prompting the addition of "grape juice" to this week's grocery shopping list?


So, what are ways you can get your customers to - taste, smell, feel, see, touch, hear - experience your product?


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*I'm pretty sure it was 2002 that the Mocha Valencia drink launched, it could have been 2001 or 2003...

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Paul Williams is a professional problem solver at Idea Sandbox. He can help you create remarkable ideas to grow your business. You may read more at his website and find him Twittering as @IdeaSandbox.

Discovery (and Innovation)

by Paul Williams


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Paul Williams is a professional problem solver at Idea Sandbox. He can help you create remarkable ideas to grow your business. You may read more at his website and find him Twittering as @IdeaSandbox.

Out with the New, In with the Old

by Paul Williams




Today in Amsterdam, in a park near my home, I saw city workers replacing the new, contemporary lights [pictured, left] with this old-school style [right].

While this small image is a big grainy, you can see that these 'new' lights are styled after old gas lamps. They have more charm than the contemporary lamps. Atop the fixture is a crown. Decorative crowns adorn fixtures and architecture throughout Amsterdam to celebrate Dutch royalty.

It is pretty neat that the city is embracing this old style look. Just goes to show ya, newer isn't always better.


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Paul Williams is a professional problem solver at Idea Sandbox. He can help you create remarkable ideas to grow your business. You may read more at his website and find him Twittering as @IdeaSandbox.

Boosting Sales for Beginners

by Paul Williams

Ah... "Drive Sales." Is there a company that doesn't have 'sales driving' as a key strategy?


It can't be much simpler than a choice of three levers.

1. Find New Customers
   
   • Create a New Market with a new product or service, or
     
   • Go deeper with your existing targets
   
   
2. Increase Frequency - Get existing customers to use your business more often.


3. Increase Average Ticket - Get existing customers to spend more when they use your business.

While simple doesn't mean easy. It helps to know that these are your three launching points.

When choosing one - or perhaps all three - of these strategies. The next step is to ask "How?"

• How can I find new customers?
  
• How can I get existing customers to come more often?
  
• How can I get them to buy more?

From these base questions will branch new, potential solutions.


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Paul Williams is a professional problem solver at Idea Sandbox. He can help you create remarkable ideas to grow your business. You may read more at his website and find him Twittering as @IdeaSandbox.

Creative Environmental Integration

by Paul Williams

Over the past several years, I've had the good fortune to be able travel around Europe. I've taken tens of thousands of pictures.

I love this shot below.

Terra cotta roof tiles, and lush, greens hills a patchwork alternating vineyards and olive groves. This is Vinci, Italy. Where Leonardo was born and grew up - you know - Leonardo da Vinci (of Vinci).

However, in the middle of this great shot - is a mark of the late 20th Century - the satellite dish. You can also see mid-century old-school antennas.


[Fig. 1 Vinci, Italy View]

You can click the image above for a larger view. Take out the tv equipment, convert to black and white, and you'd enjoy the same view from over 200 years ago.


Environmental Integration

While it's not perfect, I spotted this solution to disguise dishes in Amsterdam. They've covered the dishes with a 'picture of brick' to blend into the building. This is an apartment building above our grocery store. While not perfect - the dishes aren't as obvious.

[Fig. 2 Amsterdam Dish Disguise]

This reminds me of the 'environmental integration' being used to conceal cell and communication towers are being decorated to look like trees.

[Fig. 3 Faux Phone Pole Pines]

I've had that Amsterdam shot in my pictures folder for a while - waiting to share it with you. Thought you'd find it interesting. However, there are business lessons these disguises and concealments may teach us. I'll post another article tomorrow! Until then, take care.


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Paul Williams is a professional problem solver at Idea Sandbox. He can help you create remarkable ideas to grow your business. You may read more at his website and find him Twittering as @IdeaSandbox.

Disney's Berms and Contradictions

by Paul Williams

The Imagineers at The Disney Company, the folks who dream-up theme parks and make them a reality, have created their own terms that allow quick understanding.

The Imagineer Terms

Berm - A raised earthen barrier, typically heavily landscaped, which serves to prevent visual intrusions into the Park from the outside world and block the outside world from intruding inside.

When you're in the fantasy world of a Disney theme park - Disney didn't want the outside world to break that spell.

Contradictions - Elements that could break the spell and ruin the experience. Walt Disney taught his team to be attentive to details and to think things through to the very end. They don't leave the experience to chance, it is all calculated.

The Disney Imagineers go to great lengths to eliminate contradictions. They have taken care to ensure you can't see the future of Tomorrowland while standing in ye olde Frontierland. Cowboys and Astronauts don't mix. They built 'utilidors' - a basement beneath the Magic Kingdom in Florida - that allows cast members (employees) to travel directly to their attraction from beneath the scenes in their themed costume. The guy wearing his silver Space Mountain costume would look quite alien strolling to his shift along Victorian Main Street, USA.


Broader Marketing Interpretation

While we may not worry whether customers can see the outside world, we do have to be attentive to visual intrusions and contradictions within our locations.

Typical examples may include:

Smoking employees - especially if your business has anything to do with food. Yeah, maybe your wait staff or chef needs a break to chill with a smoke... But don't let your customers see it. And for Pete's sake as a courtesy - please make sure they wash their hands before returning to work.

Incentive posters - Customers don't care or want to see employee-targeted posters for your 'extended warranty incentive'. How genuine do you think it's going to sound to the customer - who spots the partly shaded "Warranty Sell to Sail" bar graph - that the warranty is really in their best interest?

Sales awards - Don't let the manager post their 90% secret shopper score award in customer view. Doing your job right is not something to boast to your customers. It's an expectation. That's meant for backstage. Note to self... do a post about 'backstage'.

Drive-Thru Dumpster/Grease Buckets - Garbage, trash and used frying oil are realities of most fast food restaurants. But, when is someone going to invent a drive-thru design that doesn't parade drive-thru customers past a kid dragging an oozing bag of restaurant waste to the dumpster? A dream I had, while working at Starbucks, was to be part of the Drive-Thru Development team and make the drive-thru experience like no other. A challenge I proposed was: How would Disney do a drive-thru? (My dream was to make it operate like a car wash where you put your car in neutral, and you were guided by the drive thru like a Disney attraction)

Decompression Zone - Paco Underhill the cultural anthropologist and author in his book "Why We Buy wrote" about 'decompression zones'.

This is offering an area at the entrance of a store/business where the shopper can make a transition from one environment to the next. For example, from the main mall to the entrance to your retail store. Think about the first time you entered a new store; the lighting is different, the decor, the music, the smells, and sometimes the temperature. You're not taking time to read a sale banner or want someone asking, "May I help you?" As a customer you're simply trying to get acclimated to the new space - get your bearings.

Back to Disney for a great example of a 'decompression zone'. And for this one, I've even provided an annotated illustration diagram below.

Disney knows the reality of the world doesn't wear off easily. So, when entering the Magic Kingdom theme park at Walt Disney World in Florida, after you pass the ticket entrance you have to enter the park through two short, slightly dark tunnels. These run underneath the railroad station. When you emerge you are on Main Street USA. However, you still don't see Cinderella's Castle yet - the icon of the park - until you've started to head down Main Street.

These tunnels serve as a final buffer between the outside (reality) and the fantasy of the park.

[Fig. 1 Magic Kingdom Entrance - Walt Disney World Resort, Florida]

Are you giving your customers the experience they deserve?


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Paul Williams is a professional problem solver at Idea Sandbox. He can help you create remarkable ideas to grow your business. You may read more at his website and find him Twittering as @IdeaSandbox.

Role of Social Media in Creating Word of Mouth and Customer Experience

by Paul Williams


What's the role of social media in creating Word of Mouth (WOM)?

You could say there are two parts to WOM - the analog and the digital.

• Analog is person to person... face to face. I'll also put written and print media into the analog category.


• Digital WOM is converted and stored in a format that can be sent and re-sent electronically.

Social media refers to tools that allow us to easily spread the story electronically, digitally. Like a pyramid marketing scheme I tell my network, and they tell theirs, and they tell theirs... Social media tools (blogs, Facebook, Twitter etc) make the spread easy.

In fact, I may have to contradict my earlier statements indicating that Malcolm Gladwell and Seth Godin are the father's of Word of Mouth (WOM).


The REAL Originators of Word Of Mouth

I think the folks who wrote the Faberge Organics Shampoo commercials in the 80s invented it.

Do you remember those ads?

If you tell two friends about Faberge Organics shampoo with wheat germ oil and honey, they'll tell two friends, and so on... and so on... and so on...

Sorry about the poor quality - this is all I could find.


(Feed Link For Faberge Commercial)


Has the focus of Social Media had a negative effect on the Customer Experience?

I'll say potentially, YES. Marketers dazzled by the shiny object that social media is, may think they've solved their communication problem - or are engaging in a 'meaningful' way because - for example - they've created a Facebook Fan Page for their business.


False Sense Of Security

Let me pick on one of my favorite brands, Starbucks Coffee, as an example. Specifically, their "My Starbucks Idea" website. Through this site, Starbucks welcomes everyone to submit product, program, design, service, or ANY idea.

The My Starbucks Idea home page declares:


"You know better than anyone else what you want from Starbucks. So tell us. What's your Starbucks Idea? Revolutionary or simple - we want to hear it. Share your ideas, tell us what you think of other people's ideas and join the discussion. We're here, and we're ready to make ideas happen."

• Starbucks thinks they are listening.


• Customers think Starbucks is listening, and taking action.


• Starbucks thinks they've "checked the box" (to some extent) in being a social media player by having this site.


• Power to the people!

However, if you look at the "milestone" of the 50 Ideas Launched and Still Counting! - celebrating customer ideas implemented - Starbucks has technically only implemented six (6) ideas submitted by customers. If you dig into it - as John has on his Brand Autopsy site in his Tough Love For Starbucks post - you'll see that most ideas were already in the works, would have been done anyway, or aren't even customer-facing ideas (e.g. Employee discount on work clothes).

A problem with social media is that companies may think - simply by participating in the trend - that they're meeting customer need. Starbucks has invested in this suggestion site and believe they are checking the "we care and listen to customers" box. They think they've fulfilled the portion of their strategy, that supports the objective: to "Develop enthusiastically satisfied customers all of the time."

Starbucks isn't being as democratic with ideas as they claim (and think) they are. It really isn't "power to the people." Social media (or maybe improper use of social media) is giving Starbucks a false sense of security.

Social media isn't for everyone. To "engage in meaningful conversation" may actually mean a conversation. A face-to-face, human-to-human dialogue. For example, the kind a barista can have with a customer at Starbucks.


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Paul Williams is a professional problem solver at Idea Sandbox. He can help you create remarkable ideas to grow your business. You may read more at his website and find him Twittering as @IdeaSandbox.

Don't Demolish Your Own Innovation

by Paul Williams

Innovative ideas - the kind that can transform your company - are inadvertently being demolished. When first presented, many ideas meet wrecking-ball comments such as:

• "How's that going to work?"
  
• "Good luck getting that done!"
  
• "We don't have time for something like that." And the classic,
  
• "Doesn't work... Trust me... We tried that years ago."

We've all heard (or perhaps said) killer phrase comments like these. These are offered as a "public service" to the team to prevent us from going off track and wasting time.

But, what have we really accomplished?

• Yes... we've kept the meeting on schedule.

But we also,

• have made the suggester feel stupid,
  
• are causing people to hold back their creativity, and
  
• may have destroyed the next big idea.

Instead of immediately leveling them, what if we built on new ideas?

Ninety-nine percent of innovative ideas aren't simply blurted out in their final form. They need development to reveal their full potential.

Instead of destruction, try construction. Use the idea as a foundation and see how tall we can build the framework. If we want to be as innovative as possible, instead of saying "Yeah, but..." try "And, if..."

What's the worst that could happen?

We've wasted 120 seconds on a thought that, in the end, won't work?

But what's the best that could happen?

Perhaps we construct something that does solve the challenge. Even better, maybe it morphs into something completely different - something incredible!

As a bonus, we've made the suggester feel valued and perpetuate creative, open thinking - the stuff that leads to future innovative breakthroughs!

In these competitive times, when innovation is considered one of the single most important factors to the continued success of a company... Spare the "Yeah but..." wrecking ball, use "And if..." to construct your own innovation.


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Paul Williams is a professional problem solver at Idea Sandbox. He can help you create remarkable ideas to grow your business. You may read more at his website and find him Twittering as @IdeaSandbox.

Simplifying the Complex

by Paul Williams

Some call it a matrix, others a two-by-two diagram. I call them awesome.

Two-by-twos allow you to plot complex information in a matter that allows you not only to see the relationship between two things, but also to make better judgments and decisions. I often use these during brainstorming sessions with clients as a way to filter our stacks of great ideas to the fewer, bigger, and better solutions.

How to Use Them

1. Determine the two important qualities you want to use to measure or filter your ideas.

For example: We want to better understand the relationship between employee sales and their customer service scores. This two-by-two would begin something like this:



2. Next, I'll plot where each team member according to both their sales and their service score.



We can see Julia ranks where we hope all of our employees would be - she is making high sales and earning a high customer service score.

We can also use two-by-twos as a diagnostic tool to understand where adjustments are needed. Looking at the diagram, we can see that Winston needs help with customer service. O'Brien needs both sales and service help.



You can plot anything. Other measures you may find helpful include:

Product Measurement
Which products are profitable to which customers?
PLOT: Product Profitability -and- Customer Type

Customer Service
Which aspects of our service needs to be worked on?
PLOT: Degree of Importance to Customer -and- Satisfaction Levels

Television Ads Ranking
Which commercials are connecting with customers?
PLOT: How Memorable -and- Relevance

Marketing Promotion Logistics
Which marketing promotion is easiest to implement?
PLOT: Ease of Implementation -and- Investment

Innovation Gauge
Let's prioritize our innovative ideas.
PLOT: Remarkability of Idea -and- Difficulty to Implement

Two-by-twos are simple, effective, and versatile - they make it possible to plot nearly anything. Give them a try!

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Paul Williams is a professional problem solver at Idea Sandbox. He can help you create remarkable ideas to grow your business. You may read more at his website and find him Twittering as @IdeaSandbox.

Four Perfect Situations for Brainstorming

by Paul Williams

While there are innumerable reasons for hosting a brainstorming session, the purpose for meeting can be summarized with four situations. They are the need to meet to:

1. Fix Something Broken / Problem Solving
   
2. Grow Something
   
3. Get Ideas / Fill Idea Pipeline
   
4. Innovate / Make Something New

(1) Fix Something Broken / Problem Solving

This is what is traditionally thought of as Creative Problem Solving (CPS). You've identified that you have some sort of problem (or 'opportunity' as some prefer to call it), and need to brainstorm some solutions. Perhaps you need to drive sales by x% in Q1? Determine ways to raise money to put a new roof on the church? Find ways to stand apart from your competition? You'd identified something that needs to be addressed (the problem) and need solutions.

Think About: Are you sure you're solving the right problem, and not simply addressing the symptoms? What are the assumptions? Constraints?


(2) Grow Something

Your franchise has reached a certain size and you want to grow bigger. Your new company has a steady flow of clients - now you want a "brand" - a logo, website, long-term goals, etc. You've got something already established and want to make it bigger.

Think About: Where are you now? Where do you want to go? Is this an ultimate goal, or a next step? Are you ready to manage the responsibility associated with the growth? What do you feel you "must keep", or can growing mean starting over from scratch?


(3) Get Ideas / Fill Idea Pipeline

You're tapped for ideas. You need to come up with a series of new product flavors for the next year. You want to determine your FY'10-11 promotional calendar. Your idea bank is near zero and you need to replenish the account.

Think About: How refined do you need the new ideas to be: sketch ideas or near-final proven concepts?


(4) Innovate / Make Something New

Combine ideas in a way that hasn't been done before. You want to do something innovative in your business category. Something above and beyond (a) your competition and/or (b) what you have done in the past.

Think About: Do these ideas need to be truly "new" or just new to your category? (You may find a practice in another industry can become your best practice.


Conclusion

As I've looked across the clients I have served, and meetings I've attended with employers; the reasons for brainstorming always boil down to these basic four situations. Even if - at times - the reason may be a combination of one or more of these... these are still the root situations.

Understanding these four situations will help you define clear objectives and the desired outcome of the meeting.

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Paul Williams is a professional problem solver at Idea Sandbox. He can help you create remarkable ideas to grow your business. You may read more at his website and find him Twittering as @IdeaSandbox.

Rules of the HP Garage

[The garage where Hewlett and Packard started HP, 1939 photo]

by Paul Williams

Founders Bill Hewlett and David Packard had the right idea when they first built their company. They believed if you had passion for what you did - and did it with quality - the money will follow.

This was a pretty radial idea back in the 1940s, 50s and 60s. Their approach to business became known as the "HP Way." And later the title of the book David Packard wrote about building HP. (The HP Way).

They started their business in a one-car garage in Palo Alto, California. (That garage has been dubbed the birthplace of Silicon Valley).

In 1999, HP CEO Carly Fiorina, summarized the spirit of that HP Way with her Rules of the Garage:

• Believe you can change the world.
  
• Work quickly, keep the tools unlocked, work whenever.
  
• Know when to work alone and when to work together.
  
• Share tools, ideas. Trust your colleagues.
  
• No politics. No bureaucracy. (These are ridiculous in a garage).
  
• The customer defines a job well done.
  
• Radical ideas are not bad ideas.
  
• Invent different ways of working.
  
• Make a contribution every day. If it doesn't contribute, it doesn't leave the garage.
  
• Believe that together we can do anything.
  
• Invent.

While HP has had ups and downs in the past years, you can't take away from the original spirit, values, and soul of the garage.

Did you know their first substantial sale was to Walt Disney. They sold him eight audio oscillators.

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Paul Williams is a professional problem solver at Idea Sandbox. He can help you create remarkable ideas to grow your business. You may read more at his website and find him Twittering as @IdeaSandbox.

Creating Creative Meetings

by Paul Williams

Did use an abacus or slide rule to build your FY'10 budgets?

To prepare and distribute information about next year's Marketing Plan did you use a typewriter and make a duplicate with a layer of ink paper?

Or did you hand crank copies on a Ditto (or Verifax) machine?

Of course you didn't. That would be crazy and inefficient. We have invented better and more efficient tools.

With that said... while we are in the 21st century... there is a tool that is stuck somewhere in the mid-1900s: The Off-Site Meeting.

It is interesting we don't perceive meetings as a "tool" the same way we do a photocopier, computer, or even the coffee maker.

And, of all meetings, the "off-site" is critically important. So important, it warrants sending a hand-picked group away from the office, sleeping away from their families, huddled in a hotel conference room for three days, not allowed to return with out "the plan."

Yet we put no thought to the meeting room. It is a "people container."


Meeting Space = Commodity

Look up commodity in the dictionary, and there will be a picture of a hotel meeting room. Tan. Accordion folding walls. Wall to wall patterned carpeting. Sweaty pitchers of water dripping into black coasters. A small paper pad and hotel logo pen. Sums up 99.9% of the meetings and conferences you've attended, right?

And we don't care... when we book it. We ask the office admin to call around and find a cheap place that can hold the number of people we're bringing. If there was a preference, it would be something like: "Oh, let's stay at that place we were last time, so and so likes their Caesar salad."

Yet, as marketers and business people we intimately understand the importance of environment and ambiance and the affect it has on behavior and action. We create it for our customers everyday. Especially right now, the holiday season is when we pull out the stops! Christmas lights, holiday music, decorations, special programs and themes... All this to create a more pleasant environment mood and environment conducive for purchasing.


Pay Per Stomach

And the hotel doesn't care... what you do in the room. They just want to know how many stomachs will be present.

Catering Manager: "How many?"
Your Assistant: "18 maybe 20."
Catering Manager: "Okay, that'll be $45 per person for breakfast, buffet-style lunch, and an afternoon snack."

We literally pay "per stomach."

And, because the rooms are where hotels make their money - book enough rooms and there is no additional charge for use of the room - just the food costs. But, of course that does NOT include all the tools for the meeting itself. Add on fees for renting the projector, a mic, access to the internet, easels, flipcharts...

The room is tan to be generic. To accommodate yesterday's Bar Mitzvah, your meeting today, and the wedding reception this weekend.

That is the venue that we think will inspire the multi-million dollar strategy and "killer idea?"

Today's meeting spaces are the equivalent of using the Ditto machine. With hard work you can crank stuff out... But your results will be inconsistent, sloppy, and slightly blurry.


The Solution?

Hire A Better Space - If you're going to have an off-site where creative thinking, problem solving, and new ideas are involved - get yourself into a space that will inspire you - yet not be distracting for your work.

Below I've listed a few places throughout the United States and Europe built to be a creative space for creating thinking. But it doesn't have to be a 'meeting space' either. You could get inspiration from your local art museum, science museum, or zoo. Find a place that works for your particular group.

• The Boardwalk, Manchester, England


• The Boardwalk Creative Center, Ann Arbor, MI


• Catalyst Ranch, Chicago, IL


• Heineken - The City, Amsterdam, NL


• Idea Loft, Kansas City, MO


• Meet, New York, NY


• The Old Laundry, London, England


• SoHoSoleil, New York, NY


• SparkSpace, Columbus, OH


• Strategy Loft, Denver, CO


• Spaces, Amsterdam, NL


• Thinkubator, Chicago, IL

Hire A Better Lead - If you don't have someone on your team skilled at leading groups or drawing ideas out of people - hire someone. (This will also allow you to relax and focus on coming up with the "killer idea" instead of running the meeting).


What spaces have you found inspiration for you and your team?

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Paul Williams is a professional problem solver at Idea Sandbox. He can help you create remarkable ideas to grow your business. You may read more at his website and find him Twittering as @IdeaSandbox.