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On Wednesdays, we’ll reflect: See below for some some of what I’ve learned from the week to inspire reflection, a well-being soundbite, and a view of my wish list / recs / things I’m currently obsessing over. 🙂
Note: A quick reminder that as I soak up the final moments of wedding planning, I'll be keeping our newsletters a bit shorter over the next few weeks. I appreciate your patience and can't wait to share more aspects of the day with you all soon!
W.I.L.T.W (What I Learned This Week)
Clever vs. Complicated
Sometimes, the most effective growth moves are the quiet ones.
The below post showed up on my LinkedIn feed (see here) and sparked a thought.. The author, Manali Deshpande, tells the story of an interesting choice Colgate made when they faced a plateau in growth. While I tried to find an official source to back up the story, I couldn't, so I'll be taking this one with a grain of salt. Regardless of whether it's 100% accurate, though, it's a powerful reminder of an important lesson.
Innovation is exciting, it's sexy, and it often feels like when we don’t know the answer to a problem, we need to push ourselves to find a completely unprecedented solution. We tend to think that if a problem is big, the answer needs to be byzantine and unique.
While there's certainly a time and a place for ideation and innovation, it's also a good reminder to take a step back and look for the simple, clever answer that might be right in front of us. It's an answer we might be discrediting simply because it feels "too easy."
The best place to start is to really get to the root of the problem you're solving or the need you're meeting. Sometimes the answer to that is fairly simple, and while it may not be as satisfying because it doesn't feel "novel" enough, it's likely just as impactful. Sometimes, clear and simple is king. Don't be afraid to look for opportunities to approach things more head-on.
To bring the Colgate example to life, they could have explored a costly new redesign of the brand image that would likely take a while to perfect. Maybe they could have added in seasonal 'colors' to toothpaste to inspire parents to purchase more for their children. Or what about having the color of the toothpaste match NFL teams to drive sales during football season? (This is just me ideating... but these seem more difficult to get across the line with multiple stakeholders.) Most importantly, while these solutions might be creative and 'sexier' than "let's widen the hole from which toothpaste is released," they don't actually satisfy the core consumer need for why people buy Colgate toothpaste in the first place: to brush our teeth. Widening the hole of the packaging supports more efficient brushing; a new logo or colors to match the Dallas Cowboys doesn't.
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