Today’s post comes from marketing wizard and dealmaker Spin Williams, who is always in residence at The Meeting That Never Ends.
Because we’re interested in collecting piles of money, we’re always on the lookout for the next big weight loss fad!
Telling other people how to drop pounds off their frame is one of the great growth industries of our time, which is both true and ironic!
And there are thousands of ways to (supposedly) do it. You can use mechanical devices or take pills or buy a CD or watch a show or adopt a diet with ready-made food in carefully measured helpings.
Fortunes have been won with each of these.
But at The Meeting That Never Ends, we took on what I think is the most difficult weight loss / marketing challenge out there – figuring out how to make money off of simple walking. Because if you don’t sell high-end shoes (and we don’t), there isn’t a lot of equipment needed to go out for a stroll.
At first we thought we’d buy a company that sells electronic step-counters. This works especially well on people who have bought in to the idea that taking 10,000 steps a day is all you need to do to become thin and sexy.
The problem is there’s very little sexy-time left in your schedule when you have to walk 10,000 steps a day, especially if you’ve spent all that time counting quietly in your head. Sex requires a lot of imagination and the fanciful part of your brain takes a bit of a holiday when you have to count up to 10,000.
But that’s where the step-counting devices come in!
And the sky’s the limit on price point – because people will pay a lot for a thing if they think it will dramatically improve their chances of getting lucky.
We were all set to go but then a bunch of killjoy researchers came along and said 10,000 steps is too much and you can get the same effect with only 6,000 steps. Suddenly our Pricey Love Pedometers were looking less necessary! And then some other prudish lab rats weighed in with the idea that walking won’t help you lose weight at all. All it does is improve your strength, mobility, mood, sleep and overall health.
But what good is that if there’s nothing to sell as part of the bargain?
Fortunately, a lightning bolt struck and I think we’ve stumbled on the next big exercise fad! It happened when I read this article about prehistoric kangaroos. It turns out ancient kangaroos walked around on two legs pretty much like we do. They were big, and the bigger they got, the less hopping they did until they got so huge they had to give up hopping completely!
So in the kangaroo world, walking is what biggies do and hopping is for little cuties. See?
But hopping is complicated. That’s why we’re just about to go to market with wearable kangaroo tails that will provide a counter-weight and balance for body-conscious people who are going to start jumping their way to work, or to the store, or just around the neighborhood for recreation!
Look for it. It’s going to happen! We think getting smaller through hopping is going to be huge.
Again, ironic.
Yours in marketing,
Spin
What makes you jump?
Trail Baboon 