Episode #2: How To Make Your Ideas More Toyetic
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WHAT EXACTLY IS TOYETIC?
The term toyetic is thrown around a lot in the toy product development industry. In this episode, we break down the true definition of toyetic and pull out 4 guiding Toyetic Principles and show you how to make your toy inventions or game ideas more toyetic and ultimately more marketable. You'll learn about the man who coined the term, you'll learn about a successful toyetic property, and what the term means today! So push play and listen, you'll master the development of a toyetic product in no time.
DO YOU KNOW THE 4 GUIDING TOYETIC PRINCIPLES?
In this episode you will learn toy product development skills revolving around the 4 toyetic principles by analyzing the most toyetic property of all time, The Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers! After identifying 4 key principles with The Toy Coach, you’ll understand how to apply those principles to enhance your existing toy or game ideas. Here’s a quick overview of the 4 toyetic principles that you will learn.
Distinct Character Personalities - A good toyetic property has a developed backstory remember, designing toys and games is storytelling.
Scalability by Theme - Is your idea expandable? Is this a one off toy or if successful can it be a brand.
Character Specific Accessories - The development of a character and ultimately their world to enhance the play pattern and build upon their story.
Surprise Conflict - Does your toy character or game introduce a villain or some sort of conflict to keep the play surprising, exciting, and engaging?
I go into much more detail explaining and analyzing each of these toyetic principles inside this episode, so don’t forget to hit that play button above!
With the help of the 4 principles, toy product developers can better engage with their audience and further enhance their experiences. Overall, one can successfully gain valuable insight into how to effectively apply these principles.
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This episode is brought to you by thetoycoach.com
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Azhelle You're listening to Making It in The Toy Industry Episode number two. Jingle + Intro Welcome to making it in the toy industry. A podcast for inventors that entrepreneurs like you and now your host Azhelle Wade. Azhelle Hey there, toy people! Azhelle Wade here and welcome back to another episode of Making It in The Toy Industry. This is a weekly podcast brought to you by thetoycoach.com. So today we're gonna talk about an industry buzz word that you'll definitely hear if you're attending the upcoming New York Toy Fair in Manhattan this February. And that industry buzz word is one that I love...and that word is toyetic. I want to talk to you about the origins of the term toyetic because is actually a really interesting history lesson. But then we're gonna talk about what makes something toyetic and how you can apply toyetic principles to your own toy inventions and game ideas to make them even more salable. Understanding the meaning of toyetic is really gonna help you refine your product and know what to focus on in your presentations when you pitch to the big toy companies. Azhelle All right so to get started we're gonna talk about Bernard Loomis. If you don't know who that is, don't worry. I'm gonna clear that up right now. But we can't have a conversation about the term toyetic without first introducing you to the name Bernard Loomis. Loomis was an American toy developer and marketer whose name is tied to some majorly notable brands. So tell me, have you ever heard of Chatty Cathy, Baby Alive, Hot Wheels or Barbie? Yeah, I'm sure that you have. Well, those are just a few of the brands that Loomis introduced during his toy career. So yeah, he was a pretty big deal. Bernard Loomis worked at Mattel, General Mills, Hasbro, and seemingly just brought along with him the title of world's largest company to every company he moved to. So in 1977 Loomis was said to have coined the term toyetic in a conversation with Steven Spielberg about translating his movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind into an action figure line. Now Loomis was overheard telling Spielberg that the movieitself wasn’t toyetic enough. And if you don't know, Close Encounters of the Third Kind is a sci-fi adventure movie about a group of people who attempt to contact alien intelligence. So if Loomis deemed that close encounters was not toyetic enough, he likely couldn't find a good character based or a storyline strong enough to support the development and sale of a toy product line. Azhelle So what does that mean Azhelle? You still haven't told me! What exactly is toyetic? Tell me! Okay, Okay, here it is. Textbook definition. Traditionally, the term toyetic is used to talk about a media property, for example, a TV show or movie whose story content and characters are just designed so perfectly that they easily translate into a sale-able and marketable toy product. Today, in the age of social media, the term media property has actually expanded to include media personalities like reality TV stars, YouTubers, instagram influencers and, in those cases, the social engagement of the media property. The existing social engagement of the media property is extremely important to toy companies and deciding, um, to factor in their sale-ability of a product line. Azhelle Now I've taken a look at a successful toy property and pulled out four Toyetic Principles for you that you can keep in mind as a checklist when developing your ideas. Let's think about the traditional term of toyetic. We're looking at a successful, immediate property that has a story and character base that is perfectly suited for a toy product line. So we're going to dive in today to a successful media property from the past that was most certainly deemed toyetic, one that was eventually produced into a highly successful toy line for the American market by Saban Brands and Bandai toys and it’s a property that is now owned by Hasbro. This toyetic media property that I'm talking about is known as the Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers. The Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers was a TV show about high school students who were chosen by a larger, benevolent character named Zordon. To receive powers and become the Power Rangers, they defeated evil forces trying to destroy or take over the world on a weekly basis. Okay, so here is what the Power Rangers had that the Close Encounters of the Third Kind movie did not have. Azhelle Number one distinct character personalities. So the Power Rangers were differentiated by race and gender, and this offered a broad appeal to the wide, multicultural American market. They also had a mix of males and females, a ratio of 3 to 2. These distinct character personalities, also differentiated by race and gender, made it more likely that children were able to see themselves in the story and identify with a specific character, thus making the property just even more toyetic. The characters were also unified by their matching suits, but again differentiated by color, allowing children to connect with characters based on what theirfavorite color was. Okay, so that was Toyetic Principle number one. Their distinct character personalities. Azhelle Let's move on to Toyetic Principle number two, Scalability by Theme. Now the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, like I said, we're all high school superheroes defeating evil week after week and every season actually was focused on a theme. Now the theme, while you know, not always successful, allowed for the entire line of product to be completely revamped and refreshed year after year, just duplicating fan sales as the fans were eager to grab the latest version of their favorite character. So some examples of the themes that they went with were—they had Mighty Morphin Power Rangers Turbo which was all about their vehicles. They had the Power Rangers in space, which is just a space theme. Then Time Forces just all about time travel. All of these opportunities provided, ah, window to refresh the superhero suit and their weapons and vehicles. Azhelle So the third Toyetic Principle that I pulled out from doing this research is something that the Power Rangers did really well. And it's a focus on the development of character specific accessories, and in this case, it's weapons and vehicles. So the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers had characters specific weapons. So if a child didn't happen to identify with maybe a character's race or personality, or they didn't particularly loved the color of their suit, they might be drawn to a particular weapon of that character or their accessories and thus be drawn to the toy. So in the TV show, each character had specific vehicles also aside from their weapons, and these vehicles were called Zords that they would use to defeat the villain. Now what makes that a Toyetic Principle is that these individual vehicles can be sold separately, making for more product that you can put on shelf and sell through if the media property itself is a success. But they also had this transformative, even more toyetic quality. When combined in battle on the show, each character's vehicle would make an entirely new bad guy fighting weapon called the Megazord. And this Megazord itself was just a brand new, even higher price point and even more desirable product that could then be manufactured and sold. Azhelle Okay. And finally, our fourth Toyetic Principle is surprise conflict. In this case of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, that was villains. So the varied bad guy characters that are introduced and defeated episode to episode gave toy companies a wealth of villains to choose from when planning out the product line. Now with each villain comes a unique look. A backstory and new weaponry. So think about it. One villain alone could be translated into a multitude of products and price points, and in the TV show villains also sometimes actually zoned in on specific characters weaknesses. And they had to be overcome by may be using that character strengths or another character strength. And just this addition to the storyline could open up even more possibilities for deluxe action figure sets including the villain and the hero. So when you're looking at making your toy toyetic, you wanna look at the surprise conflict aspect or the introduction of villains so that you can improve your story in your world and expand the possibilities for a sale-able toy. Azhelle Okay, so really quick. Let's recap on the four Toyetic Principles that we identified by examining the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, So Toyetic Principle number one was distinct character personalities. Number two scalability by theme. Number three Character specific accessories. Number four, surprise conflict. Now that we understand what made the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers such a toyetic media property, it's time to apply those same toyetic principles to your toy invention or game ideas to make them even better. So I want you to try to keep the four toy attic principles we talked about in mind for the rest of this episode, so I'm going to simplify them each into, one word so they're even easier to remember. One, personalities. Two, scalability. Three, accessories. And four, conflict. Azhelle Now think about how you can utilize these four Toyetic Principles to improve your toy inventions and game ideas and develop them into something more valuable, a property. Now, listen, don't get afraid. I know you're like what? I'm not making a TV show. Your toy or game idea doesn't need to be a TV show to just be a well thought out property. It doesn't need to have a YouTube channel for you to build out a world that it could live in. I promised you your toy inventions and your game ideas will improve and your pitches will certainly benefit if you take the time to build and explore the world that your invention or your game could live in. Azhelle So now let's walk through how you can actually apply these Toyetic Principles to your ideas with our checklist. So here it is, Is My Toy or Game Idea Toyetic, the principal checklist. So number one, we're going back to distinctly different character personalities. So a good toyetic property has a developed back story like that of the Power Rangers. So remember, when you're designing a toy or a game, you're still storytelling. You need to feature a developed character. You want the child to feel like they're being told a story as they interact with your product. Play patterns are important. I am all about play patterns but theming them to fit in with your products. Character and story is just as critical. So here's an example. Let's say you have, like a spring loaded toy that when it's activated, it shoots out a ball and the goal is for the child to catch it. Okay, that's an idea. You could take this idea and the spring and as an invention and show it to a toy company. It might be fun, but without much story behind it, it kind of falls flat. It doesn't stand out. You know, the viewer might not be sure what the age demographic it's for, what the purpose of it is with the replay value will even be. But what if that spring was located inside of a chunky plastic well, and that character moved around on wheels and maybe the ball that popped out was shaped like a fish? And when the spring activated, the whale is shooting out of fish. Then maybe you could name him something like Larry the Whale. And there you go. You've taken your simple toy idea and just built a small world around it, and already it is 10 times more interesting. Azhelle So Toyetic Principle number two. Let's go back to character specific accessories for the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. That was weapons and vehicles. But for you, that could be something else. So let's go back to our an example of Larry the will. So you're looking at Larry the Whale’s world, and you're thinking like maybe instead of the kids just catching the fish ball as it pops out with their hands. Maybe I can explore things that might be in Larry's world, and maybe that thing might be a net. Maybe a child might have more fun catching the fish that pops out of Larry's, um, head or blow a hole with a net. And there your idea has gotten infinitely better, just with the addition of a theme and thinking out that theme and expanding it to touch all of the accessories that might be needed to play your game. So that lead to development of the character, ultimately their world and then eventually the accessories. So now you can continue this development to be: “Why is Larry shooting out this fish? Did he eat a bad fish. Is he sick? Is this you know —Maybe this is a game he plays with his new friends. But all of these details are crucial. One pitching your product but are not gonna come out if you don't take the time to explore characters world. Azhelle Okay, time for Toyetic Principle number three. Scalability by theme. So a great example of an inventor toy concept whose full potential was really only realized with the exploration of theme is Hasbro's game Don't Step In It. Now, this is an inventor game. I was recently on LinkedIn and I saw— I think it was the inventor posted about how the trilogy is complete. And so this is one game that was actually based around not stepping in poop. I believe the first game was dog poop and and now the line has expanded and includes a Don't Step In It Unicorn and Llama version. So last I checked the unicorn poop, I think, was the top selling game on amazon.com. So you have to think Is your idea expandable? Is it a one off toy or can it be so successful that it turns into a brand? I mean, think about it if you go to one of your pitch meetings with one idea but you also have three concepts based on themes. To show the scalability of your idea, they might be even more likely to jump into a partnership with you. That means they're kind of getting like a deal. It's almost three for one. So if one idea works, they know they're just a few short weeks away from creating an assortment of product. Azhelle And our final Toyetic Principle, number four. Let's go back and talk about surprise conflict. So when we analyze the Power Ranger series, we saw that the product lines really benefited from having ever changing villains or conflicts that were quickly resolved, um, and successfully resolved. So think about ways that you can incorporate that idea into your toy invention or your game concepts. So let's go back to our example of Larry the Whale and let's see how we can develop this idea further utilizing and thinking about the principle surprise conflict. So perhaps in this game, every once in a while, a red colored or evil or bad fish pops out from Larry, and it's a fish that you don't want to catch. Maybe it'll actually lose your points of the game. Well, that conflict peace can be varied by not knowing when or if the red fish will reappear, and it can be consistent by having it happened more than once. So just adding in some elements of surprise and conflict can help you evolve your world even further. Now that there's the introduction of this bad fish piece, it starts questions on why is there a bad fish? What does that mean? What happened to Larry? Things like that and those kind of explorations into the world of your character. What's really going to give your product life? Azhelle So let's review our Is My Toy or Game Idea Toyetic checklist. You're going to try to keep these four things in mind. Personality, scalability, accessories and conflict. Now remember, you're not always gonna be pitching to someone who can be creatively objective and visualize your invention or your game concept if it were better suited for their market, or if it was more well thought out and placed into a specific themed world. So if you want to be successful, your best bet is to make it as easy as possible for your viewer to envision your game. Having your viewer see the potential for your game could make the difference between landing a deal and not and don't think that expanding on the world and developing the character means that it won't change. Honestly, it probably will. These companies have entire design teams dedicated to flushing out concepts in making them perfect for the market. So your theme may change, But having this theme, having this world thought out is gonna help you develop your concept further and might make the difference between landing a licensing deal and not. So I really implore you to take the time, explore your concepts. I really believe that you're gonna find elements of play that you didn't think of before. When you take the time to to explore your ideas further. If you think about just Larry the whale. The person might that would come up with the spring loaded mechanism would never think to incorporate things like a net for the kid, too play with the toy until they take the time to develop the world. So those were just That's just an example of how developing this world can really benefit you and your toy product. And when you're heading to industry events like ChiTag or New York Toy Fair, keep in mind these toy companies, the big ones and the small ones see 100 or more submissions. So the ones that are going to stand out are the ones that are easy to envision sitting on a shelf, and that is going to be the toyetic ones. So I promise you, your inventions, your game ideas will benefit if you take the time to build and explore their worlds. Azhelle Okay, toy people. That was everything I have to teach you about making sure your products are toyetic and the history behind what toyetic means. So make sure you take your products and walk them through this mental checklist. It'll really help bring them to the next level. Azhelle I want to take a moment and personally thank you for listening to Making It in The Toy Industry, episode number two. Before you go, please leave us a review on iTunes. We would love to hear your feedback. It would really help guide future episodes. Come back next week on Wednesday when we're going to start talking about how to find your perfect factory. Until then. See you later. Toy people. Jingle + Outtro Thanks for listening to making it in the toy industry podcast with Azhelle Wade. Head over to the toy coach dot com for more information, tips and advice.
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