Electric cars, digital attention spans, and the history of meal time are featured in this week’s round up.
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What would happen if the general consumer market suddenly made an attempt to buy items just once?
A car – just once. A bicycle – just once. Clothing and shoes – just once. How would this effect marketing and bottom lines for businesses? Below are a few interesting articles that helped me think about these ideas, all from varying perspectives: as the consumer, as the maker and as the entrepreneur.
— Taj Reid on Points of Interest
Big Ideas—New Website
So, I haven’t been posting for a while, but there’s a good reason for this. I’ve been working on a new website and business plan for Plannerzone, the consumer insights practice I work for.
If you’re a planner, strategist, marketer, creative, troubadour, etc. Please check out our site. I hope you enjoy!
"Euromonitor, a research firm, predicts that the world will add 48m new solo residents by 2020, a jump of 20%. This means that singletons will be the fastest-growing household group in most parts of the world (see chart). The trend is most marked in the rich West, where it has been apparent for some time. Half of America’s adults, for instance, are unmarried, up from 22% in 1950. And nearly 15% live by themselves, up from 4%. But singles are multiplying in emerging economies too—and are changing consumption patterns. In Brazil annual sales of ready-made meals—much favoured by lone-rangers—have more than doubled in the last five years, to $1.2bn; sales of soups have tripled."
One of the things we all know about advertising, PR, and marketing, is that people don’t make rational decisions. They think they do — people like to tell themselves they made a decision based upon price or quality, and people will post-rationalize and self-talk their way into totally…
Some ideas on adopting more accurate decision models in consumer research.
Recently, among a number of leading policy and economic think tanks, research has been pointing to the fact that irrationality can often be code for “incompatible with the observer’s view point.”
Taking an objective (or rather, dispassionate) view that the world conforms to a classical economic model, one composed of rational actors behaving in their best interest, may prevent the development of deeper levels of empathy and understanding between people (which is out business, after all).
Maybe “irrational” is just a way to avoid the hard work of developing a deeper understanding of another person’s perspective.
Inventing New Products (and stuff)
Writing begets writing, so I’m getting back on the Tumblr train.
I posted this on Quora and thought it would fit here as well. Some thoughts on new ways to structure market research:
Applying Product and Service Design Methodologies
A small idea …
Turing machines are theoretical computers used to solve problems in mathematics, formal logic, and computer science. They form the basis of the modern concept of a computer, one with rewritable memory and programs. And as you’ll see below, they can be made from many things, especially very small things.
image via Wolfram Math
This is a Turing machine constructed using something nerds lovingly refer to as an “elementary cellular automaton,” meaning that it is a discrete model of interacting cells with “on” and “off” states.
The model shown above, known as Rule 110, is said to be “Turing complete,” it is capable—in theory—of modeling the behavior of a Turing machine and running any calculation or computer program.
Is it amazing that these little blocks can run any calculation or computer program? Is it elegant that we can do so much with so little? Does the similarity between simple computers and simple organisms point to something larger? How can you tell?
If you ever run out of storage space in the cloud, remember: there’s always rule 110.
"It may seem crazy for an ad man to assert that we really don’t “persuade” anybody to do anything. I believe, however, that pitches are won — and people are willing to follow you — not because you’ve twisted someone’s arm, but because people see that you understand them, that you’ve applied the time and the sensitivity to do so, and that you possess a special gift that can help them reach their heart’s desire. And that, my friends, is priceless."
— Win the Pitch: Tips from Mastercard’s “Priceless” Pitchman - Kevin Allen - Harvard Business Review
