This week's idea
From Alchemy: The Surprising Power of Ideas That Don't Make Sense by Rory Sutherland:
"The opposite of a good idea can be another good idea."
When everyone's solving the same problem the same way, the answer might be hiding in plain sight.
Useful takeaways
Logic isn't always the right tool. People are emotional creatures, and their behaviour often defies rational explanation.
Perception matters more than reality. What people think something is worth often has nothing to do with what it objectively costs or delivers.
Where people get this wrong
Most people read "the opposite of a good idea" and think it means "just do something contrarian for the sake of being different." So they start pitching wild ideas that ignore the fundamentals entirely.
That's not the lesson.
The principle isn't contrarianism. Instead, reframe the problem you're actually solving. There's a difference between being different and solving for what people actually care about instead of what you think they should care about.
How I've applied it
I've stopped assuming the obvious problem is the real problem. When I'm stuck, I flip the question. Instead of "how do we make this better?" I ask, "What if this weakness is actually its strength?" It sounds gimmicky, but it works more often than it should.
Storytime
Years ago, my team was assigned by Qantas UK to develop a campaign for their new Dreamliner flight from London to Perth.
Straight off the bat, it was a hard sell. It was one of the longest flights in the world (17 hours nonstop) and significantly more expensive than alternatives via the Middle East or Asia.
The rational approach was obvious. Sell the technology. The bespoke seating. The range of amenities. The comfort features designed to make the time “feel” shorter.
We kept workshopping these angles, and every time we landed on “It's still a fucking long flight.”
None of the benefits felt like a real hook. We were stuck, and we had 24 hours before we had to present to the client.
That night, I decided to go through the actual booking process. I listed the pros and cons of the Dreamliner flight versus the alternatives. And then I saw it.
The Dreamliner arrives in Perth at 5am. The competitor flights via the Middle East or Asia arrive late at night, around 10 or 11pm. Eureka.
You save a day's holiday by flying with Qantas.
I nearly dropped my beer. I ran to the creative war room and took the team through it. We nodded in agreement immediately that this was a goer. The work they produced brought that insight to life beautifully.
The client bought the idea without wanting to see the others. It was a great success.
We stopped trying to make the long flight shorter and instead made it worth it. The one thing anyone will pay a premium for is time, and so we sold it as buying back valuable time.
The answer was hiding in plain sight, and to this day, this flightpath is still a strong commercial performer for the National Carrier of Australia.
Thanks for reading, and see you next week!
Murph
PS. Apologies if you’ve seen this already… I changed the newsletter provider and didn’t realise this hadn’t sent. But the good news is, the next one is in a mere 2 days away, and is a banger.