Ms. Knutson

Sales & Marketing

Twist & Tweak - Two Principles for Innovation

By Bonnie Knutson, Professor, The School of Hospitality Business/MSU

Who would have thought it? You click on the TV, start channel surfing, and suddenly see a commercial in which a couple wanting to "eat better", sits down with a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken. You continue surfing and, behold, there is another commercial touting fried chicken as part of a diet for people counting carbohydrates. An oxymoron? Perhaps. But it is also an example of the Twist Principle in action. You see, in a world of Atkins, South Beach, and weight-consciousness, in 2003, KFC simply took a popular trend and bent it around its core product to come up with an innovative advertising strategy.

KFC is not alone in taking advantage of the Twisting Principle. When the low-fat craze hit the market, Wonder Bread splashed fat-free in blazing color across every package. (There was never any fat in Wonder Bread to start with!) A few years earlier, when people started grazing 24/7 instead of eating 3-square meals a day, the orange juice industry launched a promotional campaign hyping the beverage as a drink for any time; it was "not just for breakfast anymore."

And when our lives started getting too busy and we wanted to de-stress, Teledyne reinvented itself not as just a showerhead, but as the ultimate at-home tension-reducing body-relaxer. Their commercial featured a frazzled, fully clothed executive so eager to de-stress that he jumps into the shower (under his Teledyne Shower Massage, of course) still dressed in his business suit. Sales soared.

The secret of the Twist Principle is that the actual product does not change. The chicken is still fried (actually, it is pressure cooked) with 11 herbs and spices, the bread is baked, sliced, and wrapped the same way, the orange juice is squeezed and packaged as it has always been, and the shower head is still manufactured, distributed, and sold in the plumbing department. What does change, however, is how the product is position and advertised. The innovation lies not in the product but in the promotion. In other words, you do not have to invent a new mousetrap for people to beat a path to your hotel's door. You just have to develop an innovative way of twisting a trend around your mousetrap and communicating that to your potential guests. The key is discovering what the trends have in common with the basic qualities of your hotel. Once you discover that, you can wrap them around your promotional strategy.

For example, one of the hottest trends going is the "greening" of America. Fostered by media's attention to global warming, everyone is jumping on the conservation bandwagon. "Greening" has probably been part of your operations for years as a cost savings measure. But have you used your conservancy to its full marketing potential for your hotel? Are you, contrary to what Kermit the Frog might say, touting the fact that it is easy being green? Similarly, with the trend towards healthy living, many hotels are already using organic foods in their restaurants but are not twisting the trend around their advertising.

There are two caveats to the Twist Principle, however. The first requires that the bent trend must be believable to consumers on some level or they just will not accept it. A case in point: remember when Oldsmobile came out with the "It's not your father's Oldsmobile, anymore." campaign? The younger target market just did not buy it because, when they looked around, the only people they saw driving an Oldsmobile were their father's age. A major promotional faux pas. The second caveat necessitates that the bent trend campaign be truthful. Another case in point: the KFC healthy campaign only lasted about four weeks. The company discontinued commercials touting its fried chicken as part of a healthy diet after the Center for Science in the Public Interest filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission claiming the ads were deceptive. Not only was this a promotional faux pas, the brand got hit with a rash of negative PR to boot.

The other principle of innovation is Tweaking. When you tweak, you first look at the trends, then change one aspect of the product itself in order to turn something that the consumer is comfortable with into something new. Think about Bite Size Oreos where the only thing changed was size. What about green catsup, where the variation was color? And then there is every mom's favorite, juice paks, which took kid-loved drinks and made them more portable, more convenient, and more spill-proof. Here, only the packaging was altered.

The fundamental premise of Tweaking, then, is that there are no absolutes in the marketing world. The key is to challenge assumptions, the status quo, and ask "what if" or "why not". Why can't shampoo come in bars, like soap? Why can't adults have margarita or martini popsicles? Why, as futurist Faith Popcorn once asked, can't the handy-dandy shape of an ice cream cone be made out of tacos and filled with chili? Or made out of rice cones and piled high with chow mein? Or made from English muffin mix and packed with peanut butter and jelly or cream cheese and chives

So what can a hotel twist? Think of the opportunities afforded by the Baby Boom generation. Not only are the 76+ million members of this cohort aging, they are becoming grandparents. And what is the most important thing for grandparents? Of course, it is their grandchildren. So why not twist the concept of a Mother's Day Brunch, change the date to coincide with Grandparents Day and launch a memorable event for Grandma, Grandpa and the grandkids? Ditto for getaway weekends.

Tweaking is a way of building on what your guests already know and like about your hotel. It is a great way to ease them into new product/service areas and build revenues. It is watching trends and then taking a good look at every aspect of your hotel to see what can be reshaped for the future. Without tweaking, we would not have diet soft drinks, chicken fingers, or mini skirts. There would not be ATMs, all-suite hotels, or courses online. And without tweaking, we would not be watching CNN, reading USAToday, or laughing at "Queer Eye for the Straight Guy".

More than a century ago, author Wendell Phillips (1811-1884) reminded us that "we are all wholesale borrowers. In every matter that relates to invention, to use or beauty or form, we are borrowers." Translating into today's highly competitive hotel world, you do not have to literally re-invent the wheel to innovate. With the trends to guide you, you can turn to the twist principle and bend the trend around your hotel's promotions, or you can tweak some aspect of your hotel to build your guest base. In either case, you will develop a product or service that will be right for the time, the place, and the target market. Or as Wayne Gretzky, the famous hockey player, once said, "I follow the puck to where it's going, not where it is or where it's been."

And your REVPAR will thank you!

Bonnie J. Knutson is a professor in The School of Hospitality Business in the Broad College of Business at Michigan State University. She is an authority on emerging lifestyle trends and innovative marketing. Her work has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and on PBS and CNN. She has had numerous articles in industry, business, and academic publications. Bonnie is a frequent speaker for executive education as well as business and industry meetings, workshops, and seminars. Dr. Knutson is also editor of the Journal of Hospitality & Leisure Marketing. Ms. Knutson can be contacted at 517-353-9211 or drbonnie@msu.edu Extended Bio...

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