« 50 in 50. #19: Where’s My Fifteen Minutes? | Main | 50 in 50. #20: The Next Evolution of Marketing »
December 10, 2009
Taking a break and thinking about the “paradox of time”
Yes, it’s true: Over the past few days my 50 books in 50 days project has come to a screeching halt. I could claim that the dog ate my homework, but the truth is, I’m in a vortex of business travel and work deadlines and Christmas shopping/decorating and trying to take a couple days off and . . . well, you get it.
I will have a new review for you tomorrow, but in the meantime, I wanted to share highlights of a brilliant MarketingDaily commentary called The Paradox of Time in Consumer Behavior by Bob Deutsch, a cognitive anthropologist consultant. This idea really hits home for me, especially since I’m feeling so time-pressed right now.
The paradox Mr. Deutsch describes comes about as a result of two opposing impulses that we Americans experience: We want everything newer, better, faster, but at the same time we feel like everything is happening too fast—spinning out of control—and we’d like to stop it or, at least, slow it down.
“People experience life as a series of staccato ‘nows’ and must-do's that are metastasizing,” writes Mr. Deutsch. “A typical sentiment, ‘I used to have a list of chores to do that I could check off one at a time. At some point, my list was completed. Now, as soon as I get to the next chore, another has miraculously appeared at the bottom of my list. It's non-stop.’
And he adds: “Perhaps the best description of the present paradoxical context of the world was stated by a 44-year old woman in a focus group in Kansas City, ‘Things are always advancing, getting better, sometimes for the worse.’”
What’s a marketer (or a communicator) to do, to reach people who are suffering from this paradox? Mr. Deutsch offers a few ideas, including:
Connect the dots. “Help re-structure peoples' experience of the extremely puzzle-pieced environment so they don't feel completely overloaded and splintered.”
Provide reassurance. Give people “a sense that your products and services can help them make better sense of the world and their world. Convert the pressure of time to a feeling of time well-spent.”
Make it easy. “Don't be a provider. Be a partner. Care for your consumer.”
Thought-provoking, right? This is great advice right now, especially for communicators who are seeking to ways to counteract information overload.
Time to stop the madness and change the game. Cool. Cosmic.
Posted by Alison Davis at December 10, 2009 03:49 PM
(Find me around the web)
