Consumer Focused vs. Consumer Driven

I recently found myself in an interesting dialogue with a colleague. I mentioned that successful innovation stems from being focused on the consumer. He agreed but within moments mentioned the phrase “consumer-driven”. I pointed out that I disagreed with him on this, and a perplexed look immediately crossed his face. “But you just said…”, he stated, thinking he was merely restating my original premise. After much discussion, we agreed that this is much more than semantics.

Voice of the Consumer (VOC) research is consumer driven. Purists of this tool insist that anything spoken by a consumer be captured verbatim, and maintained as such throughout the ideation and development process. The belief here is that if you deliver on what consumers say they want, you will be wildly successful. In other words, develop a process where the consumers “drive” what it is provided to the marketplace.

I don’t buy it. I have seen too many focus groups and one on one interviews where the researcher asks consumers “If you could have anything you want, what would you ask for?” That “ground-breaking” question is more often than not met with a room full of blank stares. If answers are provided, they typically reflect an existing product that has been seen by the respondent, but not owned.

The fundamental flaw with “consumer driven” is that your average consumer is not an inventor, a dreamer, or a visionary. Unlike product managers, their world does not revolve around specific products or categories.

Now contrast that with “consumer focused” innovation. To focus on something is to pay it special attention and to understand it from as many perspectives as possible. That still involves interaction with the consumer, but it is not limited to their exact requests. I can learn as much about a person sometimes from what they don’t say as from what they do say. I seldom conduct a contextual interview but what I see people contradicting their own words with their actions. Seeing what they own, how they live, how they entertain themselves, how they interact with their families or communities can all be very telling in understanding what new product or service would best resonate with them.

As product developers and marketers, we need to embrace this. If we allow consumers to drive our efforts, we will be limited to the types of incremental improvements that they can readily envision. We’re the experts on our businesses. Let’s understand our consumers and the true needs they have. Then we can develop breakthrough products that truly delight them!

Sometimes it's about the journey

I'll admit it. I'm an impatient person. I like to get to where I'm going as quickly as possible. That's true for my Vision, my goals, and typically - even my road trips. So I was not initially excited when my wife "kidnapped" me this past week and told me we were going on a road trip.

Work has been stressful for awhile, and I've probably been less jovial than usual. Our 27th wedding anniversary is coming up, and she told me that we were going to escape life for a few days and head out to Gatlinburg, TN. I couldn't imagine what could be in Gatlinburg that was more important than what I was facing at work, but she persisted and we went.

My first reaction was to pull up Google Maps and determine the most direct route to get there. But along the way she insisted that we leave the Interstate and just drive through the countryside. Despite my discomfort in doing this, I went along with her request. And after awhile, it occurred to me that it was the journey that was important in this case. The experience of getting there. We stopped at a winery, toured a distillery and even ate at the birthplace of KFC.

Unlike most things I do in life, there was no agenda, no start or finish time and no due dates. It was just a time to be together and to take in the scenery. Why is it that this type of experience is so rare in our time-stressed culture? I have European friends that regularly take the entire month of August to just explore a new country or region. But we're so busy being busy that it seldom occurs to us.

We work with consumers all the time. They all complain that there is not enough time in the day to get everything done. Products that make them more efficient are highly desired, as they imagine gaining more free time through the use of them. In reality, if we could free up 30% of a person's time, how long would it stay unstructured?

Maybe the biggest unmet need people have is not simply a new product, but a change in perspective. Maybe we should focus on helping more people just enjoy the journey...

Consumer Transparency

Social Networks are changing the way we present ourselves and the way that we interact with others. It was not that long ago that we "presented" the image that we wanted to portray in a given situation. We had our "work-self", our "family-self", our "church-self, our "country-club-self", etc. Because each of these contexts were relatively self-contained, the persona that we conveyed could be (in some cases) quite different.

In the 1990's team-building became a big drive in corporate cultures. The thinking was that if you could get to know a person outside of a work setting, you would have a new appreciation for that person. In other words, if you came to see your co-worker as a devoted parent, a loving spouse or a community volunteer you could come to appreciate that person in a more holistic way. In fact, you might even detect skills that are not currently utilized in the work place and be able to put them to good use.

But today, more and more people are putting their entire lives on display for all to see. Rather than separating and projecting multiple images, people are becoming comfortable being who they are and not trying to be who people expect them to be.

When it comes to understanding consumers in the marketplace, we need to take this perspective into consideration. It is great to understand a person's opinion about a given concept or idea. It's even better to watch how they interact with a product to surface their unspoken needs. But how well will that predict their buying habits? What role do their political views play in their day to day lives? How about their spiritual nature? How much better could we do in developing new products if we understood the "whole person" that we were targeting?

It appears that people are putting their entire lives on display through twitter, facebook, myspace and other networks, depicting themselves as a "total person" with many aspects and attributes. That's the perspective that product & service suppliers must begin to consider when developing new offerings.

A new world of insight

I've spent my career trying to understand consumers, their lifestyles, their needs and their passions. I've watched people play paintball, take showers, plant gardens and cook gourmet meals. I've traveled the world to understand how consumers in different cultures differ in their desires and preferences.

But last week, I had a brand new experience. I spent 8 days in northern Haiti. Our charge was to capture video that could be used by a mission group to promote their ministry, solicit donations and encourage child sponsorships. Unlike past international trips, I didn't stay in a 5 star hotel and venture from my air conditioned cab into a recruited home.

This was immersion. We worked side by side with locals, conducted interviews with people that had no clothing in villages that had neither electricity nor running water. We traveled in a taptap, essentially an open bed truck with a steel insert for passengers to hang onto.

Haiti is the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere. Having spent a lot of time in India, I've seen poverty before, but never in such a beautiful setting. Haiti reminded me a lot of Hawaii, or of many of the other Caribbean islands, but with poverty spread all across it.

In spite of the poverty, I've never encountered a culture so warm and friendly as what the Haitians were. As we walked or rode around, children would run out to wave yelling "Hey Blanc, Hey Blanc" - translating to Hello White.

It was both sad and beautiful at the same time. Seeing children with nothing that could laugh, smile and play with stones made me realize how spoiled our culture truly is. Our nation is in a panic because our 401k's have dropped in value. In Haiti, people wonder when they will eat again.

I spoke with a couple of civic leaders about the state of their nation. They made a comment to me that they truly appreciate what America has done for Haiti, and that the generosity of money has been considerable. However, if Haiti is to ever rise out of it's current state, it's time to do more than send money. It's time to send "teachers". People that can teach people how to farm, how to run a city, how to teach children, how to run a small business.

It will only be through education that the economy will be able to turn around and begin to grow from it's current third-world status.

I know in my own life it's often easier to open the checkbook and write a check to a good cause than it is to commit my personal time and energy to something. But checks alone are not going to improve our world. This was my first trip of this nature. I've got a feeling, it won't be my last.