The Table Stakes of Visual Thinking
Marketing researchers would do well to brush up on their poker skills. Although recognized for their left-brain analytic skills, marketing researchers would do well to apply skills associated with poker to the process of creative thinking. In his book, “The Back of the Napkin” author Dan Roam addresses the four steps of visual thinking and how this process can help marketers develop new ideas, solve problems in unexpected ways and improve their ability to share their insights.
Roam notes that the four steps of poker correspond exactly to the four steps of visual thinking: look, see, imagine, show. As in poker, marketing researchers need to look at their hand, see what it offers, imagine the possibilities and then show what they have. Paying attention to these steps can help marketers solve problems in unexpected ways.
Like the game of poker, there is a process to visual thinking with rules that govern it. Roam adds that visual thinking also requires researchers to make decisions with less than perfect information. And, like poker, a small set of visual cues represent an infinite number of problem-solving options.
However, unlike poker, solving problems with pictures allows researchers to go back and make changes, an invaluable element of the process.
Marketing Research, Spring 2008
View Table of Contents