Page 95 - 100 Great Business Ideas: From Leading Companies Around the World (100 Great Ideas)

..tmr, products on the grid according to their characte•is-
tit and then to find the holes in the market, that is, places
‘vliere competitors don't have products.

For example, if we look at all the books on creativity tech-
niques—and there are at least twenty such books—we find
that they are, with few exceptions, low involvement/feel
books. This hook, 101 Creative Problem Solving Techniques, in
contrast, was designed to he a medium-involvement/think
and feel book. The "think" orientation is a rational choice
reflecting my perception of the market for such books. It's
the "hole" in the market, or at least part of it. But, I have
added some feeling characteristics in order to make the book
more visual, an important aspect of increasing creativity.

The beauty of the FCB grid is that you can put anything you
want on the axes. Such grids are common in marketing and
strategic planning analyses. For example, Michael Porter,
noted consultant, researcher, and author uses a similar grid
to plot the characteristics of competitors' strategies as well
as those of the subject firm. Using these strategic maps, he
determines where to position the subject firm relative to other
firms' strategies. 25

You can do what Porter has done, using whatever
continuums are meaningful. If, for example, you place on
one axis the number of creativity techniques described in
hooks like this one, you will find 101 techniques on one end
and 10 or so on the other. This book is positioned at the "101
techniques" end of that axis. (See Figure 4.2.) On the other

axis you might place the length of descriptions of techniques,
with long at one end and short at the other. This book mixes
the lengths, but the average is somewhere between the two
extremes. As this example reveals, more than one grid may
be necessary to understand the desired position of a product
or service in the market.

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