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——————————————————————————————————- Learn How to Use Pain to Drive Innovation ——————————————————————————————————- The Pain Papers FORWARDING THIS NEWSLETTER IS MANDATORY. Any other unauthorized publication, excerpting, or duplication of the contents without the permission of Christopher K. O'Leary is a violation of copyright law. For past issues of The Pain Papers, see... To subscribe to The Pain Papers, please send a message
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message to... ...or see the instructions at the bottom of this message. ——————————————————————————————————- THE COURAGE OF YOUR CONVICTIONS There's no question that innovation is scary. We are constantly hearing that...
When describing innovation and new product development, people tend to characterize it as...
The consequences of failure include...
Given this, is it any wonder why most people and companies who come up with ideas end up not doing anything with them? In my view, the problem is that the current state of the art of entrepreneurship, creativity, and innovation doesn't inspire much confidence. It doesn't give you much courage. Why is that the case? Well, there are a number of reasons. For one thing, experts in creativity and innovation don't inspire much confidence. They tend not to have much business knowledge or experience. Another problem is that creativity facilitators cannot provide evidence why their ideas will be good ones. Finally, they also seem to be more focused on fun than focused on success. My goal with these writings is to present a straightforward and simple, but not simplistic, framework that will help you evaluate the ideas that you generate or that you come across and thus take some of the risk out of innovation. My goal is to teach you about the power of pain and give you the courage to take the leaps that will lead to success. I believe that if you teach people to look for and at the pain that is at the heart of any idea, they will be more successful...
——————————————————————————————————- THE THREE QUESTIONS I just wanted to remind you of the three questions that are at the heart of my model. You need to always have these in mind when generating, evaluating, and communicating ideas for new products and services...
——————————————————————————————————- PAIN PROMPTS I was asked to teach a class the other day at Washington University. The professor had asked me to come to the class and give the students some ideas about how to generate ideas for new products and services. In preparing for the class, I realized that one way to help people identify painful experiences would be to point out to them the words that they use to describe painful products and services. While we often use these words without thinking, they often point to opportunities. A product or service is likely to be painful if you describe it as...
Now, let me make a couple of points about this list. First, any of these words can be used to describe any product or service at some point in time. An opportunity probably doesn't exist unless you find that you can consistently use the same words to describe a particular product, service, or category. Second, to present a successful opportunity, a product or service must be able to be described using three or more of these words. Generally, in order to take a leadership position in a category, you must be attacking a product with broad weaknesses or have a product that has substantial strengths in multiple dimensions. Too many companies try to sell a "better product" and fail because, while their product may be better, it isn't better enough to overcome the inertia that exists in most people. Do you have any suggestions for this list? If so, then please send them to me at chris@thepowerofpain.com ——————————————————————————————————- ARE BRANDS DEAD? I have been participating in a discussion on the Tom Peters web site talking about branding. One of the questions that people have been asking is... Are brands dead? I would answer this question with a resounding "No." I believe that this is the case because brands represent a promise to the customer - a promise of less pain and higher levels of satisfaction. People understand that generally, you get what you pay for. As a result, most people will not be willing to take the risk of using an off brand - especially as the price and consequences of the purchase go up. The problem with off brands and generics is that the only promise is that of a low price, and that isn't enough for most people. As an example of this, look at how many off brands are now trying to brand themselves. They are getting more "brandish", not more generic because that is what people will buy. ——————————————————————————————————- FINDING PAIN One of the problems that companies frequently face is that it can be very hard to know what people really think about their products or services. While they can use surveys to gather some of this information, a great deal of meaningful data is lost in the survey process. One new option for companies is to use the Internet to solve this problem. First of all, I suggest that you go to Google and simply search for your brand. This will point you to places where people are talking or writing about your products. Especially interesting are USENET newsgroups (go to dejanews.com). Discussion lists and discussion boards also provide a great way to monitor the market's conversations about your products. You can subscribe to these lists or go to these boards and start watching the conversations. These will give you a sense of what people like and what people do not like. Technical support forums (especially those run by resellers or customers) can provide another valuable source of information about the experiences that the market is having with your products. One word of advice about protocol. You must go into these places with the goal being to learn and to help. People will tune your out of you try to put a P.R. spin on every problem. Don't get defensive because your defensiveness will turn off current or prospective customers and will blind you to valuable information. ——————————————————————————————————- Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox has an interesting talking about how search engine advertising actually works... https://www.useit.com/alertbox/20010902.html I find this interesting because it is consistent with the model of the attentional system that I presented in my Signals, Noises, and Pain column... https://www.thepowerofpain.com/thoughts/signals_noises_and_pain.html Search engine ads appear to work because they are presented in a relevant context. They offer a product that a person has always expressed an interest in through the search. ——————————————————————————————————- THE PSYCHOLOGY OF INNOVATION The first issue of my new monthly newsletter The Psychology of Innovation is on-line. You can find it by going to... https://www.thepowerofpain.com/psychologyofinnovation/ The Psychology of Innovation will discuss the psychological basis of creativity. It will be based on science and not anecdotes or what we hope is true about creativity and innovation. Please tell your friends! VENTUREREPORTER.NET A friend clued me in to an interesting site the other day. It is located at... https://www.venturereporter.net I find this site interesting because it gives you a sense of what kinds of companies are being funded. The editor of the site also gets the concept of pain. I'll use this site for future material. ——————————————————————————————————- Please send all comments or feedback to chris@thepowerofpain.com FORWARDING THIS NEWSLETTER IS MANDATORY. Any other unauthorized publication, excerpting, or duplication of the contents without the permission of Christopher K. O'Leary is a violation of copyright law. To subscribe to The Pain Papers, please send a message
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