Zoom Out and Accomplish More

One of the best ways to tackle a big idea is to look at it from the top, down. The 50-30-10 brainstorming technique can help, providing a framework to both understand big picture concepts, while also narrowing your focus to determine ground-level applications. Here’s how it works.

Sky-high

Start with a big goal or a pie-in-the-sky lofty idea. Put this at the top, like you’re viewing it from 50,000 feet in-the-air. Next, break that goal down into potential strategies to address it. These are your 30,000-foot views. Lastly, take each of those 30,000-foot views and break them down into lists of specific tactics or actions to implement those strategies. These lists are your 10,000-foot view.

For example, let’s say your 50,000-foot goal is to launch and generate sales for a new product. At the 30,000-foot level, the strategies you might use could include targeting a new audience, refreshing your existing communications to promote the new offering, or updating your brand image to be more relevant and reflective of your new offering. At the 10,000-foot level you could break down the first strategy—targeting a new audience—into a list of tactics like conduct audience research, develop targeted messages, or engage in new marketing channels to expand your reach.

Multiple applications

You can use the 50-30-10 technique for solving a problem, creative idea generation, or even planning a content strategy for your marketing efforts. Just start with the big ideas at the top and work your way down until you get to specific topics. If you have something at the 10,000-foot level that is still too broad, go ahead and break it down further until you come up with a list of specific tasks that are on the ground level.

Once you’ve gone through this exercise, you’ll have dozens of ideas, all within your reach.