Ideas are powerful. Ideas change things. Ideas don’t create themselves—they come from you. So how do we come up with the next best idea? It might come on the fly, but many good ideas come after you have had time to ponder, dream, think. As a marketing leader, are you taking the time you need to think up the next best idea to help your cause move forward?
Some people seem to have all the very best ideas. They solve problems and ooze creativity. They come up with ad campaigns like “Got Milk?” or “The man your man could smell like” by Old Spice—just some of the other great ideas we hear about. But these are just simple ideas that a team developed. Sure they are clever, but I would suggest that they are more thoroughly marketed and funded than they are necessarily spectacular. The point is, we are all capable of really good ideas, but they don’t grow on trees. They need to be cooked up in your brain and developed by a team.
The simple thought here is, are you taking time to think? Are you sitting down with a set of opportunities and thinking about ways to make the most of them? Or are you running from one project to the next without giving yourself any time to be creative? Maybe your system is broken. Many of our systems are, and we are trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. The best minds in the world couldn’t do any better unless they pushed the stop button every once in a while so they could think.
We could go into how to think, how to write down and organize your ideas, and a host of other thoughts, but this post is simple. Just make sure you have time, or you are making time, to think. Your next bright idea is probably just below the surface of that thinking time—you just need to give it time to come to the top.
The other thought here is to make sure that once you have a set of ideas, run them past a team. Most of our ideas need to be vetted by a trusted team. They might even take a little part of a idea and blow it into a really good idea. Be willing to let your ideas inspire others, but don’t try and push only your ideas. Don’t try and take the credit, just make sure the team is coming up with winning ideas. If you succeed, everyone is going to end up happy in the end.
A passion to get the job done is how to solve most marketing issues. If you are determined to figure it out and relentless in that pursuit, you will probably make it happen. Where there is a will, there is often a way. An early step to that success is probably going to start with a good idea. Protect your time to think and protect the atmosphere in which you think.
Practical Points:
Keep it natural: Figure out where you naturally think best.
Make it regular: You are probably going to need more than one good idea per week.
Quality time: Create an environment that will be conducive to thinking.
Other resources:
http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/77-catchy-and-creative-slogans/