Expressed And Implied
A little more on Frequency and Urgency, which I wrote about last week. Clearly, using such a tool helps designers to prioritize the functions and features of a product, by analyzing the ways in which the consumer will use it. But design isn’t only reactive–we don’t design products only in response to how a consumer wants to use them. Sometimes, a feature that may never be used is given the “Primary Feature” treatment. Doing this changes the consumer’s perception of the product, on the shelf or in use.
For example, Continuum once designed a blender that features buttons labeled not with speeds (high, med, low or descriptions of chopping styles (blend, chop, puree), but with types of food. The idea was that the consumer could put in some ingredients, select food that had the texture he was looking for (eg. Salsa, or Smoothie), and the blender would move the blades in a complicated dance and then stop. Presumably, the food would have the right texture. This has some usability advantages–it eliminates the “is it done yet?” aspect of blender use, and it lets the user press the button and walk away instead of demanding constant attention.
But this method also had some ongoing marketing advantages. Before the advent of the food processor, blenders were commonly used for food preparation. After the food processor, the blender was relegated almost completely to drink mixing. By labeling the product’s buttons with a variety of foods that could be made in the blender, the device was (hopefully) reminding the user of the other things she could be doing with the product. Even if she never made soup in the blender, she would know she could, which in turn would change her perception of the product.
Marketing is a mix of giving consumers what they want, what they need, and what we want to tell them. Product design is the same.
