|
|
Marketing Materials
|
It is easier to gain support for ideas that other people can understand.
Business ideas -- models, concepts, visions, etc. -- can be difficult to explain and communicate. But, advancing new ideas often requires gaining support from customers, partners, and other stakeholders. To advance, new ideas must be described in a manner that their audience can understand.
Explaining new ideas with visual techniques like diagramming and illustrating makes them easier to understand and increases business process effectiveness and efficiency.
Keith Burtoft creates explanations of new ideas that their targeted audience will understand.
For example:
|
|
Visualizing New Products
|
|
|
|
|
Digital and Marker Illustrations |
Background |
New product ideas need to be "seen" before and during the Product Development process.
|
Diagnosis |
|
New product ideas are often described by language, drawn in diagrams, or defined by formulas.
Realistic illustrations of new product ideas can help customers and stakeholders understand and support the idea's ongoing development. |
Action |
|
Interview the client to learn about the product idea : how it will look, how it will be used, where it will be used, etc.
Create traditional media and/or digital media illustrations of the product idea. Create updated illustrations throughout the development cycle.
Keith Burtoft's illustrations have been used in several successful Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) proposals. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Explaining a New Business Idea
|
|
|
|
|
Generic Business Idea Diagram |
Background |
The client's new business idea was not receiving support from corporate decision makers. The client believed that the decision makers did not understand the new idea.
|
Diagnosis |
|
The new idea was explained in technical language, specific to its industry. The audience was not technically oriented or deeply knowledgeable about its industry.
The idea was complete, but complex.
|
Action |
|
Interviewed the client's team to learn about the new idea in their language, and to ask them questions that would help describe it in "conversational" language that other people would understand.
Created a "Business Idea*" diagram to explain the relationships between the key elements of the idea and using the conversational language derived from the interviews.
Designed a series of presentations that could be used in conjunction with the business idea diagram or by themselves to explain each key element of the idea.
The client was comfortable that the decision makers understood the new idea after it was presented using the new materials.
*The "Business Idea" is a system model template from "Scenarios, The Art of Strategic Conversation" by Kees Van Der Heijden. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Explaining a New Industry Vision
|
|
|
|
|
Generic Versions of the Emerging Environment and Emerging Transaction Process |
Background |
The client's vision of the emerging business environment was different from that held by many of the other industry players. The client was designing services aligned with the vision. But the vision was not receiving support from customers and stakeholders.
|
Diagnosis |
|
The client was very comfortable explaining ideas with words.
The client's vision was based on several patterns in the industry's recent history: Words alone were insufficient to explain these patterns. |
Action |
|
Interviewed the client to learn about the vision, the factors driving it, and its potential impact on the industry.
Created a series of diagrams to break the client's story into focused, understandable, pieces.
Integrated the diagrams into a cohesive, understandable story that the client used in blogs and briefings for customers. The diagrams became the client's standard to explain the vision. |
|
|
|
|