It's Gotta Be The Socks!

"I'm not very materialistic - I don't have a whole lot of stuff. But I do always like a pair of really weird socks." - Taylor Kinney

WAY back in 1991, Nike hired famous director Spike Lee to create commercials for Air Jordan sneakers.

In case you are too young to remember them, the commercials featured Lee as 'Mars Blackman asking Michael Jordan what made him the greatest basketball player in the world.

Throughout the 30 second spot, 'Blackman' kept saying to MJ,

"It's gotta be the shoes!"

(Watch below)

The title of this Newsletter is borrowed from that.

After getting to know the Founder of Spirit Sox , Lisa Riggs, and inspired by the memory of that iconic commercial, it occurred to me that, in today's world,

"It's gotta be the socks!" ??

I'm proud to say that Spirit Sox ready-to-ship designs as well as custom socks are available via our company platform.

You can check the ready-to-ship designs in our eCommerce Store here and learn about custom socks here.

Last week, Spirit Sox Founder Lisa Riggs was a guest on the LinkedIn Live show that I co-host with Chad Johnson , Thriving in the Modern Economy.

And, as I do with each of our guests that come on, I created unique ideas for how her company could sell even more socks.

As you will see below, the ideas I created for Spirit Sox could be adapted to fit other items.

The Ideas

These ideas were created using the Anchor Term method of Purposeful Creative Thinking.

That method combines random words with and Anchor Term (in this case, Sock Sales) to stimulate imaginative thought.

With each idea below, I am including both the random word drawn from the creative thinking game I invented, What's The BIG Idea? as well as the Anchor Term.

Hospital / Sock Sales

This combination inspired two distinct ideas.

1.?Compression socks versions of the most popular ready-to-ship designs.

Also, major health care providers would be a good candidate for custom socks whether they were compression socks or just regular socks.

?

2.?What if each person who is a patient is given a pairs of socks as a take-home when they are discharged from their hospital stay?

It would be a fabulous way for hospitals to brand themselves because, every time the person wore those socks it would generate conversation. And, assuming they had a good experience, would inspire that person to extoll the virtues of that medical center.

Arithmetic / Sock Sales

This made me think of the Spirit Sox Crossword Puzzle design socks. And, it occurred to me that it would be a cool thing to have a Spirit Sox crossword puzzle that people could do online or as a downloadable/printable crossword puzzle.

?

Prominent Spirit Sox branding would be on both along with a QR code that folks can scan to get a discount and/or free shipping when they buy a pair of the Crossword Puzzle socks + any other two pairs.

Faucet / Sock Sales

This made me think, ‘why would socks be near a faucet?’ That made me think of Where’s Waldo which led me to think of something called Where are the Spirit Sox socks? – which led to this idea.

?

Post a series of pictures on social media in which you have people ‘spot the spirit socks’.

This could be for the ready-to-ship designs or custom designs. I am envisioning something like the cover of The Beatles Sgt. Pepper album; a collage of various interesting images and, in each collage, is a pair of Spirit Sox socks.

?

You could featured both the ready-to-ship designs and the custom socks that you have done. If you used the custom socks and did this sort of thing regularly it could become a point of differentiation in your sales efforts.

?

Everyone who participates is put into a drawing and a winner is drawn at random. People who weigh in on more than one posting are entered once for every time they comment. Those who comment on each and every one have their number of entries doubled!

The winner gets a prize and they get to pick a charity to receive a certain number of pairs of Spirit Sox socks to raffle off.

What do you think?

Which idea is your favorite?

Can you adapt any of the three to fit your company?

_______________

Btw, in case you missed it, check out this short clip from the interview we did with Lisa in which she reveals who Henry is.

_______________

Want to see how our Purposeful Creative Thinking Training can help your organization become more innovative and stand out in an increasingly crowded world?

Don't want to do it yourself? Our Strategy Design Services can help.

PM me?so we can discuss.

_______________

Thank you for reading! Not already subscribed? Join our community of subscribers and read previous Editions by clicking on the Newsletter logo below.

About?Bob Sager

The founder of SpearPoint Solutions, Bob’s professional background includes over three decades of experience in sales, leadership and training. Combined with Purposeful Creative Thinking, he uses that experience to develop business strategies that help organizations increase sales and margins. Additionally, Bob and his team of Certified Facilitators train individuals and organizations on these same methods of Purposeful Creative Thinking so they are better prepared to thrive in the modern?economy.

Among other accomplishments, Bob is the?inventor?of the Purposeful Creative Thinking game, What's the BIG Idea?? and author of the books, Discovering Your Greatness, 101 Freaking Brilliant Business Ideas and his latest, More Freaking Brilliant Ideas.