Consumer Behavior: How to create tomorrow’s consumers
If you want to create the future of a market, look to the consumer behavior of early adopters, and test for what people don’t want.
User Experience design has been a hot topic over recent years, but it has an Achilles Heal that many overlook. Are you paying attention to the behaviour of lead consumers? In Clayton Christensen’s The Innovators Dilemma, this is a basic flaw of incumbents. Successful mainstream organizations have an established customer bases, most of whom are reasonably satisfied with the current product or service.
ある市場の将来を創造したいなら、アーリーアダプターの消費者行動を見て、何が望まれていないかを調べよう。
ユーザー・エクスペリエンス・デザインはここ数年ホットな話題だが、それには多くの人が見落としている弱点がある。あなたはリードカスタマーの行動に注意を払っているだろうか？Clayton Christensen氏は著書「The Innovators Dilemma（邦題：イノベーションのジレンマ）」で、それが大企業の基本的な欠陥だと記している。成功している主要な企業には確立された顧客基盤があり、その顧客のほとんどの人が現状プロダクトもしくはサービスに適度に満足している。
マーケットの未来を自ら作りだしたいのならば、アーリーアダプターの消費行動を調べよう。そして、人々が望まないことは何かを知るためのテストを行おう。
UXデザインがここ最近の数年間、ホットな話題となっている。しかし、そこには多くの人が見過ごす弱点が存在するのである。あなたは主要な消費者の行動に注意を払っているだろうか？Clayton Christensenの『The Innovators Dilemma』によると、これは成功中の企業が陥りやすい失敗である。成功を収めている主流組織というものはカスタマーベースを確立し、顧客の多くは現在のプロダクトやサービスについて十分に満足している。
Unfortunately, however, customers for firms serving the mass market, the offerings has ‘crossed the chasm’ and have largely of middle-of-the-road needs(Crossing The Chasm, Geoffrey Moore). These markets are not ‘lead users’ or early adopters, users who today want new solutions to leading-edge needs beyond the mainstream products or services on offer. These ‘lead users’ are often push the boundaries of current solutions.
Over the past decade we’ve seen multiple incumbents fall victim to living in naivety, as disruptive players transform entire markets in short periods of time. Incumbent displacement has happened so often that established firms are well aware of the potential for disruption. But it is hard to advise precisely what to do about it. Or is it?
Incumbents traditionally engage in an audience of validation, allowing them to prove they are right. While most of the modern disruptors look to invalidate assumptions amongst early adopter markets, thus quickly ruling out adoption risks. This gives disruptors a clear advantage, as they gain greater clarity on the future mainstream behaviours, preferences and choices of consumers. Such analysis and testing is done using one of Kotler‘s tools, the Black Box Model. A “black box” is a construct in psychology used to explain the unexplained. We can observe certain aspects of the process, but not the actual thought process and how it leads to action.
The parts that we can observe are what happens outside the mind. We can observe the outside forces acting upon a person and how the person responds as a result. The step in between is the “black box” of Consumer Behavior.
Consumer behavior is a fairly broad marketing term that essentially seeks to answer the question of why consumers act the way they do. If we can study and understand what makes people tick, we can better tailor our marketing messages to their wants and needs, even predict where they shift.
「消費者行動」とは比較的大まかなマーケティング用語で、実質的には「なぜ消費者がそのような行動をとるのか」という質問の答えを探そうとするものだ。何が人を動かすのかを研究して理解できれば、消費者の要望やニーズに合ったよりよいマーケティングを考えることができ、消費者行動の変化さえも予測することができるだろう。
消費行動とは、かなり全般的なマーケティング用語だ。基本的に、なぜ消費者がある特定の行動をとるのかという質問の答えを探すためのものである。何が人々の心をとらえるのか、調査し、理解できるならば、マーケティングメッセージをもっとうまく人々の望みや必要に合わせて調整することができる。消費者の変化を予測して調整することすら可能となる。
The Black Box Model (Kotler, 2004) is related to the black box theory of behaviorism, where the focus is not set on the processes inside a consumer, but the relation between the stimuli and the response of the consumer. Even Eric Ries’ Lean Startup has strong elements of Black Box models, as it aims to test the unknown, unseen, focusing on the early adopter market to find an appropriate customer, problem and solution fit. By engaging this audience to invalid assumptions, innovators can fairly efficiently ‘create the future.’
So why is such a testing approach not more common? The answer lies in the decision framework of incumbents, which aims to only justify an assumed solution, usually lead by numbers sourced from existing mainstream markets. A weak place to find trends of future behaviours.
“If you want to create the future of a market, look to the consumer behavior of early adopters.”
If you want to create the future of a market, look to the early adopters. They are usually the individuals that play around with stuff even if it’s not very good, giving you valuable feedback into the viability of your product or service. Enabling the accelerated maturity, and eventual user traction and growth. Essentially, you’re looking for the minimum set of features needed to learn from your early adopters because you want to learn early what users want and don’t want. Limiting time and energy spent on products that no one really wants.
This post was originally published on scottebales.com as “Consumer Behavior: Creating The Future“
この記事はもともと「Consumer Behavior: Creating The Future（消費者行動：将来を築く）」というタイトルでScottebales.comで発表された。
この記事のオリジナルはscottebales.comにおいて「Consumer Behavior: Creating The Future」というタイトルで公開された。
