Million Dollar Red

Shhh!

admin — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 07:01:25 +0000

Ever been out to see a movie only to have a small group of patrons ruining the experience for everyone else by refusing to stay quiet during the movie. And you’re sitting there wishing they’d shut up, debating whether you should go tell security. Of course doing so will cause you to miss part of the movie, which is entirely unfair. So you sit there longer than you should, waiting and hoping that they’ll be quiet. Or that someone else will tell security. Maybe you hush the troublemakers. But they keep talking. Eventually the whole experience is so ruined you bite the bullet, leave the theatre and tell thr first employee you see. You can only hope that person relays the message to someone who will actually do something.

Or perhaps everyone is behaving themselves. But the screen is out of focus, or off center. Either way someone has to go find someone to fix the problem. And whoever the hero is, is also the person who gets punished by missing part of the movie.

What I suggest is so ridiculously simple that it actually irritates me a bit that no theater does it. I suggest that amongst the coming attractions the customers are shown a phone number that they may send a text to to report any problems that may be occuring during the movie. Those text messages could bypass the ticket tellers and go straight to someone who can actually address the issue.

I realize this idea is very specific to one industry and doesn’t have direct income increasing potential but it should lead to happy customers and that is always a good thing. Come on already. Be the first to implement this and people will talk about it to their friends. Free word of mouth and happier customers! What more do you want?

Would you like fries with that?

admin — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 07:01:16 +0000

From what I’ve read, charities have historically earned a lot of their fundraising dollars through direct mail campaigns. But those campaigns are earning less and less, and most charities have yet to figure out how to really capitalize off the online world. So I’ve been thinking about it, and here’s my very simple, but hopefully profitable suggestion: seek out partnerships with online merchants and ask them to ask their shoppers at checkout whether they’d like to add a dollar (or whatever amount) to their order to help your cause. That’s it. It’s done in the brick and mortar world but I haven’t seen it done online (although I haven’t looked hard either). In any case, it allows merchants to claim partnership with a charity without affecting their bottom line and it gives customers an easy way to feel good about themselves without going out of their way. Win-win-win.

Cat food for cats, not humans

admin — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 07:01:07 +0000

I know what you’re thinking: cat food is always for cats. Stop eating your cats’ food, silly. But while it is true that cat food is always for cats, the flavors are designed around humans’ taste buds. What I suggest is a brand of cat food that includes flavors only a cat would like, like mouse flavored (made with real mice) or pigeon flavored (yup).

Sure, a lot of people will be put off by these unique flavors, but a lot of others will buy them because they are unique. And because their cats might actually prefer them. As a huge added bonus, anyone who sees a can will almost certainly want to tell someone else about it. So the marketing is built in.

Line Eliminator

admin — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 07:01:01 +0000

One of the least enjoyable aspects of going to an amusement park is waiting for hours in ridiculously long lines to ride roller coasters that last only a few minutes. And the park ends up missing out on a huge opportunity. Have you ever been to the park when it starts to pour and all the rides close? Now that the people aren’t waiting in lines, what do they end up doing? Shopping, eating, and playing games! That’s right – they start spending money.

What I suggest is the creation of a system to eliminate the majority of the waiting in line. It would work in a similar manner to a deli or butcher shop where they require you take a number. The difference is that the number would be delivered electronically, either to your cell phone or to a device that you obtain from the park upon entering.

You wouldn’t even have to go to where the ride is physically located to join the queue, but could instead use your device to ‘join the line’. You could do this via text or via the device’s application depending on how the park sets the sytem up. You could also join more than one line at once, again depending on how the park decides to set things up. When your turn to ride is approaching you’d receive a message indicating that you should make your way over to the ride. The when it is your turn to ride the line operator can check your device which will now be displaying a secret code indicating to the operator that it is indeed your turn.

I’m sure there would be some difficulties in setting this up, but it seems lucrative enough to make it worthwhile. It would be great for an individual park but probably even better for a separate company which could then sell the solution to all the parks as well as anyone else dealing with long lines.

Free version of e-harmony/chemistry.com

admin — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 07:01:30 +0000

This idea seems so obvious I’m surprised that nobody has implemented it yet. Perhaps bandwidth is an issue? Okcupid has something slighty similar with their quiver option, but frankly, that’s one of their weakest features.

Starting a free dating site has it’s challenges, but both plentyoffish.com and okcupid.com have managed to surmount the difficulties. The big challenge is of course getting and keeping new members. First you have to reach critical mass and then you have to maintain by constantly attracting more members. This is particularly difficult without a lot of cash to spend on advertising and without the ability to implement an affiliate program. The one benefit a free eharmony/chemistry site would have over a regular free dating site is the lessening of the critical mass problem. When you visit a normal dating site you expect to be able to browse through thousands of profiles before creating your own. Not so with eharmony or chemistry. Instead you’re prepared to spend an hour filling out a lengthy questionnaire before viewing any other profiles. And then you only get to see 5. That’s great if you’re running a site that’s low on members.

As a side note, okcupid is by far the best online dating site there is – way better than any of the paid sites. They continuously add improvements while their competition remains relatively stagnant in comparison. It’s pretty ridiculous considering how much more money the pay sites have to work with. You unfortunately don’t hear much about okcupid because virtually every dating related site would rather send you to any of the many pay sites to fatten their affiliate payout. That being said, okcupid probably does have just as many active members as the big pay sites do.