Pamper Passion at P&G
One of our principles is that you need passionate consumers who love your new product to make it a success. It’s not about appealing to the masses anymore with an average offering. It’s about finding a narrow segment of fanatics and giving them something to love. Do this and the social networks will sell your product for you.
Case in Point in Reverse: Pampers Dry Max. In theory, this was a great innovation for P&G. It represents a slightly better product for most consumers, a major cost savings for P&G and an environmental win. What could go wrong?
Plenty. Unless you’re a P&G bean counter there’s nothing to get excited about in this innovation. It’s a little thinner, a little drier, and the same price. Nothing worth blogging about… unless you don’t like it.
And guess what? There are a small number of Moms out there that don’t like it. They think the new technology may be causing rashes on their babies. Now we have passion!
Not only are these disgruntled consumers taking over the blogs. They even set up their own Facebook Fan page called “Bring Back the Old Cruisers.” While P&G may be reeling, they’ve got to love the passion that their core Pampers consumers have for the old brand.
Hey, maybe they just invented a new Buzz Marketing technique: Take away the original brand and replace it with something inferior. Get consumers riled up – demanding that the original product be brought back. Make them protest and blog and make YouTube videos about it. Then finally, when the protesting reaches a crescendo – admit you were wrong and give them the old brand back. Then sit back and watch how much more they love it than ever before. Oops, sorry – Coca-Cola already tried that.
How Consumer Passion Drives Innovation
So how do you find that big idea that drives consumer passion?
We can tell you for sure you’re not going to find it using traditional quantitative consumer research. Quantitative research is all about averages. P&G’s research told them there were only a few consumers that didn’t like Dry Max, and quite likely a large number that gave it a “top two box” rating.
We’re here to help you eliminate the “top two box” from your new product research. Almost any idea with the Pampers name attached could probably get a 65+% top two box rating. What’s the point?
The GameChanger new product process is all about tapping into under-served and un-noticed lifestyles with disruptive stimuli. You’re not going to find the next big idea by talking to your existing consumers or by morphing existing products.
When members of our team created Green Works for Clorox, we didn’t go to existing Clorox cleaner users and ask them what they wanted. We started with people who hated the brand.
Our Innovation Sourcing process uses a unique opportunity mapping tool that matches emerging Lifestyles with Trends, Technologies, Unmet Needs, and the global evolution of human need states. Many companies have great technologies, capabilities, and ideas, but haven’t found a way to turn them into new product “hooks” with the right lifestyles to drive passion.
Our process works on virtually every category – no matter how mature it may be. We’d love to help you reinvent yours.
Welcome to The Black Hole
Just in time for football season, GameChanger is expanding one of the ultimate social network marketing ventures – The Oakland Raiders’ Black Hole Fans. Check out our new website and the new Black Hole music video from the Hazmat Boyz. You can enter, but you may never leave!
http://www.theblackholefans.com [1]
The GameChanger Manifesto
The GameChanger Manifesto is the ultimate guide to creating successful breakthrough new products today. We have borrowed many of the best approaches from leading entrepreneurs. Read the manifesto at www.gamechanger.net/manifesto
GameChanger Manifesto Principle #4
Find creative ways to get your message out In small companies, marketing managers don’t have a lot of resources to get their message out, so they are forced to get creative. Every dollar spent needs to generate new business quickly and at an efficient rate or the company will soon be out of business.So small companies are very selective. The good companies try many things, but they’ll only commit real money once they are certain they have a winning approach.
A great example is NetFlix – the Internetstart-up that brought Blockbuster to its knees. During its early years, NetFlix never ran a TV ad. They were never on the radio. The bulk of their marketing campaign consisted of post cards for 10 Free DVD Rentals” that were inserted into boxes of new DVD players, as DVD player sales were just starting to takeoff. Talk about efficiently reaching your target!
To get their 10 free DVDs, people had to go to the NetFlix website, where they learned all about the NetFlix program. And once they did this, most people were hooked.