Entrepreneurial Small Business 4th Edition by Jerome Katz ,Richard Green

Exercise 13

GOING VIRAL MAKES FOR A HEALTHIER FIRM 52
Dr. Bob Wagstaff (a biochemist and nutritionist) developed the Orabrush to scrape bad breath-causing particles off of our tongue. He got the Orabrush patented and approved by the FDA. He got it manufactured and worked hard to get it onto the shelves of drugstores and supermarkets. He had some success with smaller chains, but sales were below his expectations. He tried making an infomercial, which cost him around $40,000, but it produced only a few hundred more Orabrush sales. Thinking bigger marketing clout would make the product into a success, he tried marketing the patent to oral hygiene companies, but no one took him up on his offer.
He went to a marketing class at Brigham Young University and received advice from students in the class. He hoped that the young people could tell him how to sell more Orabrushes over the Internet. A survey a class team conducted showed 92 percent of the respondents wouldn't buy an Orabrush online, and the students on the team concluded that the Internet approach was not workable. However, another student in the class, Jeffrey Harmon, had a different interpretation. Jeffrey suggested that with millions of people watching videos on the Internet every day, getting 8 percent of that group to buy an Orabrush would still be an enormous market. After class "Dr. Bob" asked Jeffrey to help him market Orabrush on the web, giving Jeffrey his old motorcycle as payment. Jeffrey recruited a coworker named Austin Craig to be the video's pitchman for $100. He got scriptwriter friend Joel Ackerman to write the script and film major Devin Graham to film the video. Total cost About $500. It was actually recorded in the back room of a pool hall-so that really is a clinking sound in the background of the video. The video went viral on YouTube, racking up millions of views and igniting sales of the Orabrush, with close to 1 million brushes sold over the next 2 years.
Note: Videos related to the case:
Story of Orabrush: www.youtube.com/watch v=p4tuTi8_z6Q feature=relmfu Original YouTube Video: www.youtube.com/watch v=nFeb6YBftHE feature=list_related playnext=1 list=SPB73276F 91DD26C78
CASE DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
1. Why do you think a YouTube video worked better than a professionally done infomercial
2. How were Dr. Bob and Jeffrey able to get so much done for so little money How could you apply this in starting your own business
3. Dr. Bob had tried traditional media and pursuing traditional outlets for the Orabrush. Why do you think his sales were not up to his expectations
4. Explain how having 8 percent of the potential market to draw from could still be a worthwhile strategy for a small business.