Forrester's Consumer Forum + The Convenience Quotient

Next week I am attending and leading a discussion at The Forrester Consumer Forum. I was able to get a sneak preview of one of the keynotes from James McQuivey, Ph.D. and VP principal analyst at Forrester. The them of the conference is staying ahead of consumers by predicting what the future consumer might look like.  James talk is going to be pretty interesting in part because what he did was look to the past (a great way to predict what might happen in the future) and he identified some data points which ultimately lead to the above Framework which outlines the four universal needs which are unchangeable. They are:

Connection
Uniqueness
Comfort
Variety

James outlined that each of these may play a significant role based on current conditions. So for example, in a recession, comfort may be more important as a need. In boom times, it might be uniqueness that needs to be dialed up. But what I found MOST interesting was the way James describes the idea of convenience:

"People share a set of universal needs – satisfy those needs with convenience and you will win"

This particular statement stood out for me, because I see convenience as an often time overlooked value meaning that you can hit any and all of the above needs, but if you don't make it convenient for consumers, customers, users you'll be less likely to satisfy any of these universal needs. In other words, convenience is not a need itself, but a vehicle to satisfy a need. That's the basis behind "the convenience quotient". James says they will be blowing out this model and testing it over the years.

Anyway, sounds pretty interesting. The Forum will also include the Groundswell Awards which will be live streamed at the Groundswell blog.  We will also be doing some streaming for Critical Mass over at our Always In Beta site which will be re-designed for the event.  Lastly, there will be a major "tweet-tup" happening on Monday night. See details here

If you are going to be at the Forrester Consumer Forum next week, please look me up and say hello. Hope to see you there!

Comments

[Liz]

I don't believe in universals, everything is conditioned by the culture one lives in. Variety, for example, is only an option for those rich enough to have a choice of possibilities. If something is not an option, then it is really a luxury, not a need.

[David Armano]

Liz,

what about variety in diet? Our bodies get sick without it. Some diets can even kill without it.

[James McQ]

Liz raises an important question, one that we need time beyond a blog post to explain. But basically, variety is a word we use to describe the human being's need for stimuli of all sorts. We know from isolation studies that if you deprive people of stimuli, they will invent their own stimuli, that's how dependent our brains are on a variety of stimuli to survive.

[Jean-Philippe DIEL]

Interesting to see how technology is going to help us rebuild what it deprived us off in the first place. I explain. Rewind time to a 100 years ago. The family cell, Communities, story telling etc... do you picture all of that ? since the technological revolution we have witnessed the explosion of the family cell, urban migration, communication breakdowns, people being more alone than ever in the crowd.

Technology is now restoring what we had a 100 years ago but on a totally different and much wider scale. Social networks, being connected to our loved ones, Communities, Seamless communication... Technology is solving the one thing that drive human beings crazy... Loneliness. It is providing everyone again with a sense of belonging, a sense of purpose.
Don't you find that interesting?

Cheers, JPh

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