We smuggled the ‘silent disco’ out of the music world and into our approach to business growth. It is the most anticipated and fun part of our process, the Coherence Method.
Typically, “a silent disco is an event where people dance to music listened to on wireless headphones. Rather than using a speaker system, music is broadcast via a radio transmitter with the signal being picked up by wireless headphone receivers worn by the participants. Those without the headphones hear no music, giving the effect of a room full of people dancing to nothing.” To outsiders, it might look like nothing. But those in the disco sense coherence forming.
Here’s what goes down at a Room 214 Silent Disco:
- Mid-way through the customer interviewing process, our insights team will pull either one complete interview or pertinent segments from a few into an audio file.
- We set a time where our team — with experts from our channel, strategy, content, and creative groups — gather with the client team.
- We all throw on headphones and listen to a customer interview at the same time on our own.
- Each participant listens to the same audio, BUT everyone “hears” differently based on their domain of knowledge.
- The creatives might hear grand vistas, bright colors, and the emotion of love.
- The media buying team listens for new target audiences and ad placement strategies.
- The content team may envision articles or infographics.
- The strategy team picks out campaign ideas.
- The SEO team may jot down a slew of long-tail keywords.
- Our clients often hear innovation or customer service opportunities.
That’s a lot of brainpower. And in just a few moments, we can capture a multitude of unique perspectives from one single audio track.
Yet most of these people would not usually get to hear these inspiring customer stories. We know one person cannot “hear” everything of value to an entire marketing team alone. What is more: the Harvard Business Review found teams solve problems faster when they’re more cognitively diverse. We bring in others from our Growth Studio to add dimension, contradiction, and consideration.
Seth Godin captures the essence of our Silent Disco with this quote:
What happens next is powerful.
Each disco participant shares what they heard and what they found surprising. The opportunities become clearer with each perspective as the group begins to coalesce these ideas into a marketing program.
The Silent Disco is a connection point for the team — both for our clients and our Growth Studio. Reach out to our Co-Founder, James Clark, at jclark@room214.com to see how you too can groove your way to growth.
Sources:
Harvard Business Review: Teams Solve Problems Faster When They’re More Cognitively Diverse, Authors: Allison Reynolds (LinkedIn) and David Lewis (LinkedIn)
Justice and Dignity Too Often in Short Supply, Author: Seth Godin (Twitter)
This blog was originally published on the Room 214 blog.
