Page 97 - 100 Great Business Ideas: From Leading Companies Around the World (100 Great Ideas)

SUMMARY OF STEPS
I < on.,trtict a four- 'ell matrix with axes related to levels of cus-

tomer involvement and customer perceptions of product char-
acteristics. The involvement axis ranges from high to low. Prod-
uct characteristics are described in terms of whether the customer
would be more likely to have to think about the product or to
have some feeling about it.
2. Place existing products in the market on this matrix.
3. Determine where the holes in the market are and create products
to fill them.

41115. THE FOCUSED-OBJECTTECHNIQUE
The focused-object technique contains elements of both free
association and forced relationships. 26 It is especially useful
in situations requiring high levels of creativity, such as ob-
taining ideas for advertising layouts or copy. The principal
difference between this technique and the other
forced-relationship techniques is that one object or idea in the
relationship is deliberately chosen, not selected at random.

The other object or idea is selected arbitrarily. The attributes
or qualities of this second object or idea are then used as a
starting point for a series of free associations. An attempt is
made to adapt the resulting stream of associations to the cho-
sen object or problem. In the case of advertising copy and
art ideas, the deliberately selected object is usually the prod-
uct to be advertised.

The example in Table 4.2 shows how the forced-relationship
technique was used to associate with an automobile. (The
automobile was the preselected object.) The attributes of the
lampshade were the starting point for a chain of free asso-
ciations that led to other ideas. The third column shows how
the associations were applied to the problem of obtaining
copy and layout ideas for the automobile.

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