WRONG!
If everyone thinks it’s a great idea, it may be a good idea. But it won’t be a great idea. You may be able to make it work for you, but it won’t make you rich. Let’s face it: All the ideas that everyone thinks are great have already made someone else rich.
The truly great ideas sound crazy until somebody makes them work.
1850’s:
Colonel Edwin Drake felt that it was too time consuming to skim for oil by dragging cloth across ponds where oil had seeped to the surface. He decided to dig for oil.
Everyone laughed at him because they thought it was a crazy idea. His early efforts failed because water tended to seep into his “oil wells.” He ignored the laughter and tried something else.
Drake invented a kind of drill that would pump oil but would keep water from seeping into the pipes. In 1856, near Oil Town, Pennsylvania, he successfully drilled for oil and became rich. His critics stopped laughing.
Drilling for oil is no longer considered a crazy idea, but the barriers to entry are so high that it’s no longer a “great idea” for starting businessmen.
1950’s:
A Hollywood movie producer invested large sums of money to build—of all things—an amusement park that the whole family could enjoy. Amusement parks were fairly common, even in those days, but they were just—well—for amusement. This man’s park would have a theme; it would be built around movies he had produced.
That seemed like too expensive a way of amusing people, and the price of admission seemed too high. After all, who would want to spend a lot of money at an amusement park with any thought other than simple amusement? Why should an amusement park have a theme?
He named the theme park Disneyland. Today, almost everyone expects amusement parks to be theme parks.
1959:
A new singing group was unable to get an audition from recording studios. They were told, “Groups with guitars are on the way out.”
The name of the group was the Quarrymen. They changed their name to the Beatles.
1960’s:
A young man named Ted Turner inherited a small, outdoor advertising company from his father. After growing the business, he gambled everything on an idea that everyone thought was crazy.
In an era dominated by broadcast television, he would start a cable station. What was really crazy was, his station would offer no entertainment—just news. For 24 hours a day, his station would broadcast news and nothing else. His cable news network is now known as CNN.
During the Gulf War (1991), CNN called the Pentagon for war news. A Defense Department spokesman told CNN that Pentagon war planners were getting most of their war news by watching CNN. Ted Turner’s crazy idea had gained worldwide respect.
1970’s:
A student working toward a Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree came up with a crazy idea for his MBA dissertation.
In his dissertation, he proposed a private business that would compete with the United States Postal Service. According to his model, this business would deliver packages any place in America in less than 24 hours. His dissertation advisor told him that the idea would never work.
Using money from his rich parents, he started just such a business. He called the business Federal Express. Today, FedEx delivers packages all over the world.
1970’s:
A young movie director with a modest track record—George Lucas—is trying to get a major studio to back his idea for a movie. Two major studios turn him down. Both tell him that science fiction movies are no longer popular. Besides, since science fiction movies had always been low-budget movies, his movie would be far too expensive to make.
The name of the movie was Star Wars.
Some popular quotes of the 1980’s:
“Nobody needs a personal computer.”
“Nobody needs a computer with more than 100 kilobytes of memory.”
“There is a market for no more than 100,000 computers in the whole world.”
(In 1979 Bill Gates and a few friends founded Microsoft.)
True or False?
“Necessity is the mother of invention.”
False.
Before they were invented, no one felt that they needed air conditioners, washing machines, dishwashing liquids, personal computers, the Internet, the electric light, gasoline, or a host of other of today’s “necessities.” Since people got along without them for thousands of years before they were invented, people didn’t really need them.
It would be more accurate to say that invention is the mother of necessity. Even closer to the point, we should say, “Marketing is the mother of necessity.”
Remember what you learned about Social Exchange Theory, in Lesson One? People give up money for a product or service because they place more value on the thing they’re receiving for their money.
Marketing is the art of convincing people to place more value on what you have than they place on what they have.
Entrepreneurship:
Entrepreneurship—the art of turning bright ideas into a money-making business model—isn’t usually about filling a need. More often, it’s about creating a desire and then offering a product or service to satisfy that desire. Sometimes that desire is for a new taste. Sometimes it’s for a more convenient way of doing something. Sometimes it’s for something else. How do you come up with money-making ideas, and how do you make them work?
Niche Marketing:
Suppose you come up with a marketing plan, and only 5% of the people in Taiwan buy your product. Is your plan a success or a failure? Since 5% of Taiwan’s population of twenty-five million comes to a million, it would be called a success. A million people have bought your product.
Don’t compete with established businesses. Find an area of opportunity that has not yet been exploited—especially if the idea sounds strange.
How to Think Like a Genius
1. Come up with an idea that sounds crazy.
2. Ask yourself, “To what extent do people already do it or want it?”
3. Build a marketing plan around Point #2—not Point #1.
As an example, what about the idea of greeting cards for dead people? Nobody sends greeting cards to dead people, do they? What do people do with greeting cards? They tell other people that they’re thinking of them. Do we express our thoughts for dead people? Yes, we do. We tend their graves and put flowers on their graves. It doesn’t benefit the dead for us to do this; it benefits the living. People can experience similar benefits by placing greeting cards on the graves of their loved ones.
Remember: A marketer doesn’t sell products or services; he sells benefits. For example, people don’t buy air conditioners because they want air conditioners; they buy them because they want comfort. SELL THE BENEFIT!
Ideas for Discussion:
1. Marketing soybean milk as a health drink.
2. Home stays with poor people as a vacation opportunity.
3. Free drinking water (minus the bottle) as a loss leader at a rest area shop.
4. Free service maps of the area (as a means of cooperative, targeted advertising.
5. Organically grown Taiwan coffee. (Taiwanese prefer its taste to that of other coffees; BUT they don’t ask for it because it’s not available; it’s not available because customers don’t ask for it.
Item:
Under American patent law, a patent expires after 16 years. Pharmaceutical companies have found a way around the law. Before their patent on a drug expires, their researchers find a new use for the drug. Then they patent it as a new product.
Lesson:
As a creative way to find marketing ideas, you may find a product that has passed into the public domain, find another use for it, make some changes in it, and market it as a new product. Pharmaceutical companies discovered this fact, but anyone can take advantage of it.
None of these ideas is likely to make you rich, but they’ll give you a leg up on the competition.
Your Assignment for This Academic Year
You and your team will decide on a business marketing project for the year. No two teams will choose the same project.
First Semester Mid-term exam project: Present your business plan.
First Semester Final exam project: Present your plan for branding your business.
Second Semester Mid-term exam project: Present your advertising plan.
Second Semester Final exam project: Present your complete marketing plan including completed advertisements.
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