The problem with products “ahead of their time”
The Apple Newton was ahead of its time, the right device, created for a world that wasn’t here yet.
The Palm Pre was ahead of its time, a perfect solution, looking for problems you didn’t know you’d have.
Google Glass was ahead of its time, an experiment gone awry with social stigmatism, in a world that wasn’t ready yet.
And history repeats itself — there will always be products that are ahead of their times, borne into a world not quite inspired enough, not quite ready for the supposed paradigm shift.
The story goes that these ideas, too early to find their deserved success, flopped because the world wasn’t ready. The culture needed to move forward, or the “market needed to mature”.
But these are kind-worded excuses for mistakes that were made.
When Apple makes a new phone without a headphone jack, and the world doesn’t embrace it as the vision of the future, it’s not our fault for not being ready. It’s the maker’s fault for not making a product that’s right for this world. When I’m buying an iPhone, I don’t want to “Face the Future!” I just want a better way to get my work done and stay connected.
And while there are customers that’ll jump on hopes and promises of the fantastical, you probably shouldn’t build your business on the shoulders of dreamers.
The products that I pay for are supposed to solve problems in my life. If I pay for a new gadget or a new software or a new idea, at the end of it all, I’m supposed to go, Oh my god, why didn’t anyone else think of this? I’ve lived with this problem all my life, and the solution was right here!
If the world isn’t ready for your product, it means either;
- You’re attacking a problem nobody else sees, or
- You’re trying to sell to people who don’t feel the problem, or
- You’re trying to sell a product whose early-adopter tax — the cost of technical innovation — is too much for your customers to stomach.
These are solvable issues. In fact, these are preventable issues. If you’re really solving a problem that exists, that’s worth fixing, but nobody else seems to see it, you have to pay down the cost of elucidating the reality of the problem to your customers, and how their lives would be improved with your solution. If you’re trying to sell to the wrong crowd, you’ll have more success finding a group of people who feel the pain of the problem you’re trying to solve, and grow your market from there. And if it just costs too much to build the solution that it’s worse than what’s currently out there… Well, maybe that’s not the right solution to the problem.
What I’m saying is this: A great product isn’t a “glimpse into the future,” or “a groundbreaking innovation.” A great product solves my problems, at a cost that justifies its value, and does so with delight.
And no matter how bright and vibrant your vision of the future may be, if I can’t see the problem you’re solving today, or you’re asking for way to much money, or the product is just a pain to use, I don’t want any part of your future. I want to live in the present where other products or life-hacks can solve my problems.
The silver lining
Humans will be humans, and we’ll always run across the same problems, no matter how far technology advances and lifestyle changes. Problems worth solving don’t go away, and they aren’t conjured out of thin air. If you’re solving a real, fundamental problem, there’s probably a way to bring that solution into the present and make it relevant today.
Digital advertising, for example, is a very timely problem, but it’s a modern version of a more general problem: businesses can’t reach their ideal customers efficiently. And at every point in history, there have been great businesses built to solve that problem, with the available technology.
This “ahead of the times” misstep usually happens when businesses create technologies first, then go hunting for problems that they might solve. While there are places for innovation for sake of innovating, on your sales calls or customer pitches isn’t one of them*.
Lastly,
I’m not saying, stop inventing for sake of inventing. Startups are fueled by experimentation and iteration that make the headlines day after day.
But when those ideas become products, they can’t live in the future anymore. They have to live in the now. And when they’re solving the problems we have today, the culture shifts and world-readying that needed to happen? You’ll be the one leading the charge.
* In fact, some of the most valuable companies today have come out of commercializing technical inventions, Google being an example from the top of my mind. Productizing research is absolutely a valid option. But even then, unless we start from the customer and trace our way back to the technology, a product ahead of its time is probably a solution looking for a problem.
