Product Behavior

Many products communicate like apes do: they tell me what to do next. Better to treat me like a person: give me the information I need to understand the job at hand and participate in getting it done.

I’ve written previously about using the idea of “hiring a product” as a way to think more broadly about the relationship between consumer and product. Here’s an example.

Another simple tool to help calibrate a project team, or elicit interesting information from a consumer: personification.

It couldn’t be more simple. Just ask something like: if this product were a famous actor, who would it be? Pick a product and ask a few people - I guarantee you’ll get interesting responses.

Must business growth mean “do more of everything”? Why do companies seem to believe that the only way to extend their value is to do everything they can, in every direction?

I’ve written a bit about Starbucks before, about how, over time, the unique Starbucks experience has become watered down to the point that it’s no longer special. Today, though, I was struck by several further dilutions of whatever it is Starbucks thinks it is.

Often when clients come to us with a “consumer segmentation,” they’re looking horizontally. This type of consumer has these issues to address; that type of consumer has these other issues. The product is designed to speak to both groups, or mainly to one and only opportunistically to the other.

But they forget the vertical segmentation.