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The holidays are here. Get within 500 feet of a mall and you will be bombarded with sales signs, overwhelmed with Christmas carols, and swallowed by crowds of seasonal shoppers. While all of this may be overwhelming, there is one very good thing that comes with the hustle and bustle of the holidays – cookies.

I love cookies and there is no time of year more cookie-centric than the holidays. I have many fond memories of baking cookies with my mom, gleefully squishing Hershey’s kisses into the center of peanut-butter cookies and carefully painting icing on sugar cookies. This is why I was so fascinated by Arrowhead Mills’ “Bake with Me,” a line of baking mixes designed to encourage interaction between children and their caregivers. In addition to the baking mix, each box contains a promotional item, such as a cookie cutter or decorating stencil, to carry the interactive element from the box to the baking sheet.

Like most other baking products, there are sumptuous shots of sugar cookies, brownies, or cupcakes on the packaging, but what makes this packaging stand out on the shelf is that it also features a photo of a child in a chef’s hat happily mixing a bowl of batter. “The idea behind the package design was to develop a look that would really stand out on shelf to deliver the unique proposition; a fun activity for mom to do with their kids...,” explains Martha Seidner, a vice president at Smith Design, the agency responsible for design of the “Bake with Me” packaging.

All baking companies target functional jobs around taste, attractiveness of the food, nutritional value, and preparation time required. Arrowhead Mills has nailed the emotional jobs of parents, such as:

• Feel like a good parent
• Establish/reinforce my relationship with my kids
• Create lifelong memories with my kids

By targeting emotional jobs, “Bake with Me” effectively overcomes traditional resistance to baking mixes as less authentic (and lower quality) than baking from scratch by satisfying other (and arguably more important) jobs related to the parent-child relationship.

Well done! Now, let’s gather the family and friends and start baking some cookies.

On Tuesday Starbucks launched a nationwide promotion to boost its business during slow afternoons. The company is offering $2 Grande-sized cold beverages after 2 pm to people who bought something in the morning.

There are three things about this innovative approach that we like:

• It's creative and focuses on a non-consuming occasion: Starbucks is focusing on a non-consuming time of the day. The Job of "provide me with an afternoon treat and break from work" competes with snacks in the office, a walk outside, or a call to a friend on your cell phone, not just the Dunkin' Donuts next door
• It's relatively low-risk and easy to implement: Having people bring a receipt back in the afternoon for a discounted beverage is a less risky strategy then putting lots of money into new product development and equipment (which Starbucks did with their breakfast sandwiches and special ovens). The marketing costs are insignificant because they are focused on existing customers who walk through the door; this is less costly than attracting brand new customers through expensive television and radio advertisements
• It started with a small experiment: This particular promotion started on a small scale in three cities (Seattle, Miami, and Chicago) before going national

While we overall like the approach, we hope that Starbucks explicitly laid out the assumptions underpinning the success of this promotion and is keeping track of them, namely: 

• Customers will change their behavior and come back to a Starbucks the very same day for a cold (probably more calorie-laden) beverage
• Customers remember to use coupons and like to use coupons; there is no stigma associated with bringing back your receipt as a coupon at Starbucks
• Baristas will consistently tell people about the offer (this just reminds me of the “save 10 percent on your purchase credit card offers,” which I decline before the salesperson can even finish their sentence)
• The offer will create positive (not negative) buzz for Starbucks
• The promotion will grow the volume of business in both the morning and the afternoon, and neither group will be turned off by the long lines

The most important assumption in the list above is that neither the morning or afternoon group of customers is turned off by the long lines. Starbucks was not built as a volume business. How does a business built on “the Italian coffee house experience” manage the transition to meeting growth through volume? Could this be the start of a conscious shift in the Starbucks strategy from providing high-priced treats in a delightful experience to a lower-priced, higher volume business? What do you think? We’ll be looking to see how this pans out.

I have to give credit to the folks at advertising agency Modernista! for dismantling the company’s existing website in favor a “site-less” approach. In this disruptive move they’ve done much more than simply save on site design.

By foregoing the breadth of information available on a traditional site, they focus viewer attention on the company’s art and creativity. It’s a big win (and just plain cool).

The company’s new homepage consists only of a small menu that floats over the viewer’s referring site or over the Modernista! entry on Wikipedia. Click on the “Print work” menu tab and you’re directed to the company’s work as presented on Flickr; click on “TV work” and up pops a You Tube page with videos of Modernista!-created ads.

This new approach is different, budget and very simple. To many, it would be a leap down in terms of the traditional metrics that define good website design. The company’s “conventional” website was a resource-intensive, complex site that resembled a kooky (yes, I said it) haunted house. It was impressive yet overwhelming, flexing the firm’s creative muscle with more animation than most viewers could handle. The new site is perhaps less user-friendly for those expecting a traditional website structure, and offers less context for the depicted company work. The new format could also yield negative user-generated critiques of Modernista!’s work on the social media pages that serve as its website.

The trade-off for these drawbacks? A cleaner site that demonstrates the firm’s creativity, confidence in letting its ads speak for themselves and comfort incorporating Web 2.0 platforms in its work. The site has generated more blog traffic and buzz in a wider range of forums than a traditional website with fancier features would have done, with this blog post as a case in point. Isn't that the goal of a website as a marketing tool? And the move isn’t one that other leading advertising agencies are likely motivated to follow. Voila! Disruption.

But that’s just the web site. The real disruption will be if Modernista! applies a similar leap-down approach in developing client advertising campaigns that have worse performance on some traditional dimensions but are, perhaps, simpler and more affordable relative to conventional advertising.

Stuttgart is “going green.” The German city recently signed a letter of intent with Ultra Motor to implement an infrastructure to support eco-friendly scooter-bikes. Launch is expected in 10 months and the idea is catching on; according to BusinessWeek, Ultra Motor is currently in negotiations with 12 other major European cities.

Driving this effort is Ultra Motor’s new A2B Light Electric Vehicle (LEV) — a scooter-bike with a conscience. The tagline even has an anthropomorphic ring to it: “The heart of a bicycle. The soul of a scooter.”

Experience LEV technology: Hop on a comfortable seat surrounded by a lightweight, aluminum frame. Enjoy as much exercise as you choose by pedaling or cruising at 20 mph. Want to ride further? The standard range of 20 miles can be extended to 40 with the addition of a lithium ion battery pack. New technology provides one-third more force than electric motors; helpful when ascending hills or darting through traffic. A dashboard indicator signals energy remaining. Dwindling charge? Simply plug in.

Current customers of the A2B vehicle include commuters, students, employers, fleets, and local authorities. However, through our lenses, jobs define the marketing strategy and are linked to attributes:

Social job: “Have a positive impact on the environment”
The A2B is a zero emissions mode of transportation, powered by a lithium ion battery. The vehicle efficiently functions at approximately one-tenth the running cost of a gas-powered scooter.

Emotional job: “Allow me to enjoy my commute”
The rider is able to enjoy the outdoors and a quiet ride. The extended driving range provides freedom and the vehicle is easier to handle than a gas-powered scooter. Modular storage options are also available.

Functional job: “Provide a way for me to reduce transportation costs”
Savings are self-evident — no gas required. The A2B model is currently available in 20 states across the U.S. for about $2,200. In Stuttgart, a monthly subscription will cost $23; a mass transit pass costs $84.

In the spirit of business model innovation, Ultra Motor is exploring new networks of transportation, one of which will be utilized in Stuttgart. The “LEV City Initiative” outlines this potentially disruptive system featuring charging stations; purchase a subscription, locate a station, swipe your card and enjoy the ride.

We applaud Ultra Motor for encouraging consumers to “go green” in new ways. Learn more from the source at www.ultramotor.com. You’ll notice as the website loads, the screen cleverly notes: “Charging up.”

In almost all companies, market research is a critical part of the innovation process. Market research helps companies identify attractive opportunity areas, compare innovation initiatives, and fine-tune their strategic approach. It’s a pity then that companies frequently stumble when using market research to guide innovation decisions.

It’s not that market researchers are bad people. Almost all the market researchers I have met are good, thoughtful people. The tools of market research are—when used properly—good, useful tools. But something comes off the rails when innovation-seeking companies organize, execute, and use market research.

The four biggest flaws I see with traditional market research approaches are:

1. Talking to the wrong customers. It’s been more than a decade since Clayton Christensen described how the root of the innovator’s dilemma is a myopic focus on the most demanding customers in the market. Yet, many companies still spend a disproportionate amount of their time trying to understand the wants and needs of existing, demanding customers. Innovation opportunities almost always come from understanding a company’s worst customers or customers it doesn’t serve.

2. Asking the wrong questions. Many companies will ask customers, in essence, “What do you want?” Academics and practitioners more eloquent than I have described how customers can’t reliably answer that question. The focus has to be on the problem the customer is facing—and even that can be tricky because customers can’t always articulate problems that aren’t directly targeted by existing solutions. ...

Read the rest at Scott's Harvard Management blog, Innovation Insights.