OVERVIEW:
While learning to promote my own business, I've been thinking a lot about advertising... but anyone in the advertising business knows that simply THINKING about it doesn't do anything. In fact, it sort of contradicts the primary meaning of the word "advertising" ("the action of calling something to the attention of the public especially by paid announcements"). So, what does not advertising have to do with the famous quote about mousetraps?
ABOVE: According to Wikipedia, the form of the quote we've probably all heard was a "misquotation" of Ralph Waldo Emerson's original statement.
DID HE REALLY SAY "MOUSETRAP"?
The quote we all have heard is "Build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door." According to Wikipedia however (I know, not always a perfect source) Ralph Waldo Emerson never said anything about mousetraps. He did say something similar to the part about the world beating a path to your door, but the products and services he mentioned did not include a mousetrap. Even so, I think this saying can be misunderstood, and it "does not mean what you think it means" (to quote another, slightly less reliable, source).
IS ADVERTISING NOT NECESSARY AFTER ALL?
So then, for those of us who often emphasize the importance of advertising, this phrase seems to say that if we invent something special, new and great, we don't really need to advertise, because the automatic result is "...the world will beat a path to your door". This is almost completely opposite of what I've been learning about advertising, because if no one KNOWS about a product or service you have created or provide, then how can it sell?
WHAT'S THE REAL QUOTE (WHAT DID HE MEAN?)
Regarding this super popular quote, this Wikipedia article states what Ralph Waldo Emerson really said, compared to the quote that we all have heard:
"Build a better mousetrap, and the world will beat a path to your door" is a phrase attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson in the late nineteenth century.[1][2] The phrase is actually a misquotation of the statement:
"If a man has good corn or wood, or boards, or pigs, to sell, or can make better chairs or knives, crucibles or church organs, than anybody else, you will find a broad hard-beaten road to his house, though it be in the woods." — Ralph Waldo Emerson [2]
WHY DO I THINK THIS QUOTE CAN BE MISLEADING?
We know there are hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of ideas that have been submitted to the Patent Office but haven't been acted on.
We haven't heard of most of these ideas, and that proves just having a good idea doesn't make it sell.
Good ideas, like laws in science, can't be proven to be good without real-world testing.
WAS WORD OF MOUTH IMPLIED IN THE ORIGINAL?
I believe the second (and now, the most popular) version of the quote leaves out and/or fails to emphasize one (implied?) aspect of Ralph Waldo Emerson's original words: word of mouth advertising. So, when Mr. Emerson said "If a man has good corn or wood, or boards..." it was an assumption the audience would understand that word of mouth advertising would always be a part of the game. I think it was what CAUSED of the increase of traffic to the home of the inventor (the "broad hard-beaten road to his house...")
CONCLUSION:
So what do we take from all of this? I believe both versions of the quote can serve a similar purpose and together they emphasize two (2) things:
The necessity for your product or service to be "better" (though I think a non-saturated market provides sufficient demand for (or at least can tolerate) inferior products or services.
The necessity for people (at least a few, who can start the "gossip chain") to KNOW about your product or service.
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