ing one thing with another until you find the right idea. Ask: • What can be substituted in your selling process? Can you substitute someone else or something else?
• Can you change the place? • What would happen if you used another approach? • What if you used a different procedure? • Can you change the rules about selling in your organization?
• Can you use other materials to help you sell? • Can you change your viewpoint about the way you sell? Example: Can you substitute someone else? Garden
Way, the manufacturer of high-end Troy-Bilt rototillers, substituted customers for part of its print advertising program. The company recruited them, at the time of their purchase, by offering them a special deal on their purchase. Garden Way then listed them in a directory and put prospective buyers in touch with a volunteer neighbor who owned a rototiller so the buyer could test drive the machine and query the customer.
COMBINE?
Much of creative thinking involves combining previously unrelated subjects and creating something new. The printing press was created by Gutenberg when he com- bined the coin punch with the wine press. Mathematics was combined with biology by Gregor Mendel, creating the discipline of genetics. This process of combining ideas or elements (or parts of ideas) is called “synthe- sis” – regarded by many to be the essence of creativity. Ask: • What different ideas about selling can be combined? • Can you combine purposes with someone or something else?
• Combine units? • How about a combination in packaging? • What can be combined to multiply possible uses? • Can you combine appeals with something else? • Can you provide an assortment, an ensemble, a variety?
Example: What can be combined to multiply the pur- poses? A salesperson bought a failing retail store that sold video cameras and VCRs. The salesperson then contracted with the local amusement park to operate a small booth next to the main ticket booth. There, for a special price, you could buy a ticket to the park and rent a video camera. He demonstrated how to shoot video and gave the customer a blank tape. The customer spent the day filming his children. Later, the salesperson provided refreshments, showed the video, praised the customer’s talents, counseled the customer on how to improve, and asked for the customer’s phone number. A few weeks later, he called the prospect and announced
a special discount sale. If the prospect still failed to buy, he waited two months and then came to his house bringing a toy for the prospect’s child and shot another demo around the house. Finally, he showed the video on the prospect’s own television. By combining a retail operation with an amusement rental service, he turned a failed operation into a successful one.
ADAPT?
One of the paradoxes of creativity is that, in order to think originally, we must first familiarize ourselves with the ideas of others. Thomas Edison put it this way: “Make it a habit to keep on the lookout for novel and interesting ideas that others have used successfully. Your idea needs to be original only in its adaptation to the problem you are working on.” Ask: • What else is like your product? How is it sold? Does it suggest any new ideas?
• Does the past offer a parallel you could use? What has worked before?
• What could you copy? Is there something similar you could partially copy?
• Whom could you emulate? What have others done? What have experts done?
• What different or unusual contexts can you put your product in? Historical context? Future context?
• What ideas can you adapt from the world of sports? Television? Books? Politics? Movies? Religion? Example: What could you copy? A Princeton, New
Jersey, salesperson, who sold magazine subscriptions, figured out how to make subscriptions an impulse item by adapting an idea from the way stereo accessories were sold in colorful packages that hung from retail racks or spinning racks. She boxed her gift subscription forms with greeting cards and displayed them on spinning racks in shops. Retailers got a new impulse item, publishers got a cheap way to add new readers. Sales exploded.
MAGNIFY?
An easy way to create a new idea is to take a subject and add something to it. Computer manufacturers are constantly adding more features, promoting greater speed, and extending warranties. Gas stations sell groceries and fast food. Initially, Tom Monaghan of Domino’s Pizza obliterated his competition by providing faster, guaranteed delivery service. Ask: • What can be added? More time? Greater frequency? Extra features?
• What strength can you add? Can you maximize SELLING POWER FEBRUARY 2018
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