Selling in a new concept

When presenting new brand concepts to clients, I begin by first explaining that some of the ideas they may find uncomfortable. That's normal. Concepts which are new, and have never been tried before, are so foreign they make us feel uncomfortable.

I advise clients to substitute the emotion 'uncomfortable', for 'unfamiliar'. The unfamiliar needs time to grow on you. Snap judgements don't work. You have to play with them, stare at them and keep talking about them.

Unfamiliar concepts provide opportunity for change. I once presented to a group of financial advisers, two names for their new capital lending business.

As I expected they liked the familiar name (the one I presented first), but fell silent when I presented the second name. The name was so different, they had no frame of reference to measure it by. At the end of the meeting they thanked me for my time, and said they would get back to me later in the week.

Later that week I got a call. Although the name initially shocked them, it had begun to grow on them, and the more they talked about it, the more they could see how it would work.

One art director I knew from Mojo Sydney used to say, 'whatever you say, make it very'. A well known copywriter in Singapore tells his clients that 'it's okay if the concept does not resonate with all people. Every new idea ostacises a few people.'


Herman Miller and the chair nobody liked

Take the Aeron chair, design by Herman Miller. All the feedback they got from the industry and market research told them people hated the chair. Despite the negative feedback, in the 1990s it became Herman Miller's fast selling chair.

It wasn't that people didn't like it. It was just so unfamiliar, they were going to need some time to get used to it. The market research and opinions of others in the organisation were falsely interpreted.

Now the chair looks passé, because this unfamiliar chair, is now familiar. Since its debut, there have been hundreds of copies made. The elastic material, integral to the Aeron has been introduced into chair design by other chair manufacturers.


Ideas need bold people to champion them

Every day new ideas get born because someone was bold enough to back an unfamiliar idea. That risk pays off. The idea gets noticed immediately, is printed in newspapers and talked about on television.

In this competitive business world, there is no space for mediocrity. If you have a well-known brand name, you can survive on mediocrity for a while. However, if you are a start-up business, you can't take the risk.

For different reasons, some clients are more risk-adverse than others. If you believe you have a strong idea, and want to see it become adopted, try giving the client tangible materials they can touch, hold and share.