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If there’s one thing my time in archery proves, it’s that performance in any activity can be improved through marketing.
I’m being facetious, of course. I don’t mean to pick on archery, because this applies to any business, but it’s where I see some of the most obvious examples. Some of it is just honest marketing, too, so I don’t mean to be critical of everything.
Still, what my experience shows is that you don’t necessarily need a good idea, you just need a new idea. Sometimes, you don’t even need a new idea, you just need an idea old enough people have forgotten about it.
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With archery, as with golf and several other activities, nothing improves performance more than practice, practice, practice. It’s axiomatic that amateurs practice until they get it right while professionals practice until they can’t get it wrong.
It’s a lot of work and a lot of time. So if someone comes along with a shortcut, people will eat it up.
In the days of Vince with Sham-Wow! or Ron Popeil with his spray-on hair, pocket fishing rod or Veg-o-Matic, it would take a long time for word to get out if people didn’t like your product. In today’s connected world, today’s innovation is tomorrow’s has-been very quickly.
At the recent Archery Trades Association show in Indianapolis, a company called Revolution Bows introduced the “world’s first static cam bow.” Except it isn’t.
A detailed description would be beyond the scope of this newsletter, but let’s just say the engineering of the bow has merit. So much so that Martin Archery did the same thing in 1970. It’s perhaps instructive that bow was largely forgotten until Revolution’s launch.
My friend George Ryals IV is a well-known archery coach in Georgia, the one next to Alabama, not Turkey.
His Thing A Week videos on archery are must-see for anyone trying to get better at the sport. Notable is that with few exceptions, his videos focus on the archer: form, technique, tips and tricks. Few are the segments that push any kind of product and he’s no fan of quick-fix gimmicks. Where his videos do feature a product, he’s quick to say you can make your own out of a cardboard box and kraft paper, or some such.
None of this is to be critical of businesses looking for new products to sell.
If anything, it’s a combination of a warning to consumers — snake oil takes different forms and there are no shortcuts — and a suggestion to businesses — never stop looking for a new idea. When a new idea leads to lasting, measurable gains, that’s the point business longevity is born.
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