Lesson #5: Innovation is Your Invitation to Success
Lesson #5: Innovation is Your Invitation to Success
One innovation that hit Hall early on was in the range of products he was offering. Initially, he followed the rest of the crowd in offering greeting cards only for Christmas, Valentine’s Day, and of course, birthdays. But Hall felt limited by those options. What about when he wanted to wish someone with an illness a speedy recovery? What about when he wanted to wish a couple a happy anniversary? Or what about when he simply wanted to say hi to a friend?
Not one to be held down, Hall set out on a quest to manufacture cards that could express sentiments for virtually any occasion. To that end, he started to hire the likes of such writers as Ogden Nash and Norman Vincent Peale to help him accurately capture a wide range of greetings. He wanted to offer his consumers more choice than they could imagine.
On top of that, Hall quickly discovered that the vast majority of his consumers preferred cards that contained verse as opposed to prose, and so he immediately switched to using quotations and poetry from such authors as William Shakespeare and Ogden Nash. It was a first for the time, but it proved to be an instant hit. The practice has since become commonplace throughout the industry.
Another early realization was that customers enjoyed browsing and selecting their own cards, instead of simply being handed one for their desired occasion by the store clerk from the stack behind him (which was standard practice for the time). To that end, Hall hired a designer to build walnut cases that could hold staggered rows of cards and install them in all the retail stores across the country where his cards were displayed. This would allow customers to browse hundreds of cards and select according to their own personal preferences.
But Hall’s innovation went above and beyond the simple logistics of operations. He actively sought to build a brand for products that had up until then been regarded as generic. He began stamping the back of each card with the engraving, “Hallmark Card.” In 1928, he produced the industry’s first ever national advertisement, a small notice in the Ladies Home Journal. He then expanded into radio advertising, personally reading a verse from one of his cards at the end of a radio show. It proved to be a popular technique.
Beyond that, Hall worked hard to build an enjoyable workplace for his employees, another innovation for his time. He made sure employees received regular paychecks, and developed the “Joyce Hall Prosperity Plan” as a response to the Great Depression. The controversial plan encouraged customers and suppliers to buy materials in advance in order to provide working capital for companies. In the end, however, Hall never worried about recession because, “In bad times people send greeting cards instead of presents.”
Lesson 5 Innovation is Your Invitation to Success
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Hall succeeded not only by taking action when others refused, but by taking action in ways that nobody had yet imagined. His meteoric rise to the top is characterized by a willingness to dream and to dare.
One innovation that hit Hall early on was in the range of products he was offering. Initially, he followed the rest of the crowd in offering greeting cards only for Christmas, Valentine’s Day, and of course, birthdays. But Hall felt limited by those options. What about when he wanted to wish someone with an illness a speedy recovery? What about when he wanted to wish a couple a happy anniversary? Or what about when he simply wanted to say hi to a friend?
Not one to be held down, Hall set out on a quest to manufacture cards that could express sentiments for virtually any occasion. To that end, he started to hire the likes of such writers as Ogden Nash and Norman Vincent Peale to help him accurately capture a wide range of greetings. He wanted to offer his consumers more choice than they could imagine.
On top of that, Hall quickly discovered that the vast majority of his consumers preferred cards that contained verse as opposed to prose, and so he immediately switched to using quotations and poetry from such authors as William Shakespeare and Ogden Nash. It was a first for the time, but it proved to be an instant hit. The practice has since become commonplace throughout the industry.
Another early realization was that customers enjoyed browsing and selecting their own cards, instead of simply being handed one for their desired occasion by the store clerk from the stack behind him (which was standard practice for the time). To that end, Hall hired a designer to build walnut cases that could hold staggered rows of cards and install them in all the retail stores across the country where his cards were displayed. This would allow customers to browse hundreds of cards and select according to their own personal preferences.
But Hall’s innovation went above and beyond the simple logistics of operations. He actively sought to build a brand for products that had up until then been regarded as generic. He began stamping the back of each card with the engraving, “Hallmark Card.” In 1928, he produced the industry’s first ever national advertisement, a small notice in the Ladies Home Journal. He then expanded into radio advertising, personally reading a verse from one of his cards at the end of a radio show. It proved to be a popular technique.
Beyond that, Hall worked hard to build an enjoyable workplace for his employees, another innovation for his time. He made sure employees received regular paychecks, and developed the “Joyce Hall Prosperity Plan” as a response to the Great Depression. The controversial plan encouraged customers and suppliers to buy materials in advance in order to provide working capital for companies. In the end, however, Hall never worried about recession because, “In bad times people send greeting cards instead of presents.”
Lesson 5 Innovation is Your Invitation to Success
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Dianne CramptonDianne Crampton is an executive leadership coach, team culture consultant, author and president of TIGERS Success Series, Inc. Dianne has been helping CEO's and Executives connect their employees to their core values and goals for over 20 years using the trademarked TIGERS team culture process, which stands for trust, interdependence, genuineness, empathy, risk and success. To download a free white paper on behaviors that build strong teams and behaviors that will predictably tear them down go here. Dianne's contribution to the 2010 Pfeiffer Consulting Journal (an imprint of John Wiley and Sons Publishers) entitled TIGERS Hearted Teams is available in November 2009. Her new book TIGERS Among Us: 5 Winning Business Team Cultures And Why, Three Creeks Publishing will release in March 2010. To receive publishing discounts, subscribe to the free TigerTracks Newsletter here. - Visit Dianne Crampton's Website |
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Leanne Hoagland-SmithAre your sales where you want them to be? Will you be one of the few who achieves sales or business success or one of the many who have failed to change? Are you tired of being told you are like everyone else? Then you may find my first book on sales of interest. Be the Red Jacket in the Sea of Gray Suits, The Keys to Unlocking Sales available at Amazon or at http://www.processspecialist.com/red-jacket.htm. This book is a reflection of my no-nonsense approach to improving sales to overall business results. If you are truly committed to making sustainable changes, then I can help you secure a positive return on your investment because I focus on executable solutions not telling you the problems you already know you have. From training to corporate (group) coaching to executive one on one coaching, my approach is to assess, create awareness, build a goal driven action plan and then execute. The bottom line question is "Not do you or your employees know it, but do you or they want to do it?" Please call for a free strategy session at 219.759.5601. - Visit Leanne Hoagland-Smith's Website |
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Linda RichardsonLinda Richardson is the Founder and Executive Chairwoman of Richardson, a global sales training and performance improvement company. As a recognized leader in the industry, she has won the coveted Stevie Award for Lifetime Achievement in Sales Excellence and she was identified by Training Industry, Inc. as one of the “Top 20 Most Influential Training Professionals.” Ms. Richardson is credited with the movement to Consultative Selling and is the author of ten books on selling and sales management, including Sales Coaching — Making the Great Leap from Sales Manager to Sales Coach, and Stop Telling, Start Selling. She teaches sales and management at the Wharton Graduate School of the University of Pennsylvania and the Wharton Executive Development Center. Linda is a frequent speaker at industry and client conferences, has been published extensively in industry and training journals, and has been featured in numerous publications, including The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Nation’s Business, Selling Power, Success, and The Conference Board Magazine. Learn more about Richardson's sales training and performance improvement solutions at http://www.richardson.com web - Visit Linda Richardson's Website |
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