6. Is this here yet? A few years back a wine company wanted to add a Scratch N Sniff element to their label. Imagine. You could "taste" a wine before you got the bottle open! Alas 3M (makers of Scratch N Sniff) said they could only do the concord grape smell (you know like grape jelly). Maybe someday in the future, they said. Well that was 15 years ago. Any progress? Any ideas from this for your product?
7. How to get more creativity for the budget. When you deal with creative people in advertising, marketing or the media its easy to experience misunderstanding about the ultimate cost of a given project. The creative person needs to make a living, you have a right not to hand them blank checks. Here's a way to accommodate both needs.
At the beginning of the project set a total budget. Be fair. Pick a dollar amount that is perhaps a shade above average. Now tell your creative types that is the exact total amount you'll pay for the final finished product. Next tell them you want no more than 30% of that spent on true production costs. You want the 70% spent on brain time developing a Big Idea that sells. If they get a great idea up front and can produce it for 20% of the budget, great! They win and you win! If they have to bang on it forever, then the two of you need to spend more time together to save everybody more time in the future, or you need to find different creative people.
8. Here's a solid reality check. Every quarter ask your company employees or your department folks to prepare a list of obstacles that prevent them from doing their jobs well. Wouldn't that be a powerful management tool and think of all the side benefits just this one exercise generates.
9. Less is definitely more. Is there any practical way of looking at your marketing problems this way? Take two examples from the transportation industry. Right turns on red lights are certainly an example of less being more--the only "cost" is some road signs telling drivers they can take the turn, the "more" is an awesome amount of time gained for motorists, gas saved, etc. Here's another example. Rumble strips on highways. Highway engineers cut away slight indentations in the roadway along the edge of the shoulder. When your car runs across the pattern it sets up a noticeable rumble and you steer back on course. Less is more? Yes, literally. So what can you do in your business by applying this concept?
10. To keep business appointments on schedule try this if you are setting a meeting. Set the time parameters in advance, saying for instance, "Can we meet from 9:30 to 10:30 Tuesday morning?" or how about, "Yes, we could have lunch from 12:30 to 1:30 tomorrow." You've laid some ground rules that generate efficiency without insult. Nifty, huh?
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About the author: This resource is (c) 1996 by
Tom Behan, President, Behan Associates. E-mail:
tbehan@wolfenet.com
