Homogeneous Innovation

Things are all too familiar. That’s good and bad.

It’s good if the service or product meets my basic needs and is memory-neutral: that is, the interaction results in neither good memory or bad memory.  It just is and I don’t care.

It’s not good if I come away from the experience thinking “I could have received that same service or product at 50 other places, with no material difference.”

I’m inventing a new term: Homogeneous Innovation (â„¢, pete abilla, shmula.com).

Homogeneous Innovation: Stop thinking for yourself – without question or healthy skepticism, do what the popular media, authors, & consultants say, with blind obedience – be everybody to anybody, but nobody to the customer

Homogeneous Innovation is the state of affairs we engage in when we, without thought or question, do what Godin, Chris Anderson, Gladwell, Bain, Mckinsey, or any of the popular media says about anything¹.

The result?  Companies end-up looking like each other, but become absolutely non-memorable or distinguishable to the customer.  Indeed, the crowd sometimes isn’t all that wise – in fact, the crowd isn’t wise most of the time.  So, why do so many companies join that party?

The Cure

Learn to question and begin thinking for yourself.  Yes, if every person in a company learned to read, absorb, critique the good and the bad messages from consultants, authors, and the popular media and learned to form their own opinion, companies and customers would be better off.

Think for yourself.