Friday 22 January 2010

Creating Rapid Opportunities From Random Ideas




Being enterprising is about creating opportunities, often out of nothing. These are the opportunities that don’t appear on any plan; they’re more likely to arise from a chance mention in a lift or from an idea you had in the shower.

You just need to be tuned in to what your client’s needs are, and good at reacting fast.

I emailed a client congratulating her on an industry award and suggesting an announcement out to their clients. We’d need to be quick. I assembled a copywriter and designers, got a print firm on stand by and a few days later, a special edition newsletter landed in the in-trays of their clients. It was a great success. Then last week another client mentioned – in passing - an upcoming conference where the management team needed to communicate key messages to staff. “Why don’t you do something on video?” I suggested. We came up with some ideas, filmed and edited this week and the results are now sitting on dvd, just 10 days after that notion.

There was no brief for these projects, they were unplanned (and unbudgeted). But if your ideas are good enough and you can be quick at execution, there’s a stack of unforeseen opportunities out there.

It’ll take innovation on your part, flexibility and vision on your client’s - and sweat from everyone. But it’s always satisfying to come up with a random idea and see it come to fruition just days later.

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