Digital Has Changed Nothing

So it is Friday which means it is time for me to share the third chapter of my book Think More Analogue, Be More Digital.

This week I explore the important difference between behaviour and needs and why this is critical to digital success.

As always I hope you enjoy!

Chapter 3 - Digital Has Changed Nothing

One of the fundamental problems with the digital behaviour of consumers is that it is incredibly easy to get distracted by what you see at the expense of actually understanding why they are doing something.

What is more, fixating on what we see or observe can also be highly misleading and offer up a false reality.

Digital especially, has a habit of serving up optical illusions that can quickly send us off down the wrong path, developing strategies and communications built entirely on behavior and not the real drivers behind it.

To explain this further let me use two examples, one very much rooted in the old analogue world, and one from the new digital age, but both with the same fundamental point.

In 1985 a Gentleman called Edward H Adelson created the Checker shadow illusion that you can see below.

In this we see a checkerboard of alternating light and dark grey squares, with a green cylinder sitting on top of this in the top right hand corner of the board, casting a shadow from top right to bottom left.

Within the board there are two square marked A and B and on first viewing they appear to be different shades of grey.

However despite what your eyes are telling you the two squares are exactly the same shade of grey. Now I can assure you that is true but if you don't believe me then do print this page off and place square A and B next to each other, at which point you will see that I am correct.

The reality is very simple, the tube or cylinder distracts your eyes and brain, creating an optical illusion that makes you perceive something which is actually incorrect.

Only by changing your perspective and the way you look at it, in this case by placing the squares next to each other can you actually see the real truth.

So moving back to the modern day, you don't have to look very far to find a similar illusion offered up by digital media in recent years.

For my sins I have attended a number of conferences and industry events where digital types, many of whom are clearly educated beyond their own intelligence levels, gather to discuss the future of digital marketing and media and share evidence of how digital technology is changing the world beyond all recognition.

And each year there is always one chart or image that gets reused constantly by everyone, be it with the unswerving belief that they are the first toever share it in public.

In the last year or so that chart has been the now infamous image of people taking pictures of Pope Francis XI being ordained in Saint Marks square in the Vatican City, sometime in 2013.

Alongside this, (Or often below it, if your being pedantic) is a picture taken several years earlier in 2005 from the same vantage point and showing the same image of the crowd watching the ordination of the previous pontiff - Pope Benedict.

Now if you haven't seen this chart or image presented and I am assuming that most people have, the 2013 pictures shows almost all of those people holding up smart phones to record the event, whilst the other image shows very few such devices being used.

Now from my own perspective I can honestly say I have probably been exposed to this image twenty or so times in the last year alone and each time with the same headline proclaiming that

 'The world has gone mobile.' 

And alongside this the speaker always too, without fail, urges us to look at what's changed, with a large dose of I'm a real smartarse dialed in for good effect too.

Now I cannot argue that these headlines are indeed correct, if a little tedious and predictable.

Yes, there in black and white, well colour actually, is irrefutable evidence of a massive change in consumer behavior, which has taken place in just a few short years.

However for me, every single person whom I have seen present this image has completely and utterly missed the point and missed it by a country mile.

In short the really significant thing about this image is what it doesn't show and that is simply that nothing has actually changed.

Now before you start ranting that I must have gone completely mad, and also highlight that I just said it did show a massive change in consumer behavior, let me explain.

I would suggest that the really significant thing about these two images, and as a result the far more important thing for us to consider, is what they don't actually show.

And that is quite simply this.

The reason why people are gathered there in 2005 and again in 2013 is exactly the same.And it was the exactly the same if you go back to 1978 when Pope John Paul II was ordained too.

They are there because they are driven by something very much grounded in the real world, religion. And religion, the last time I checked is very human and very analogue in its nature and origin.

Of course technology enables them to record and share the event like never before and as such does create a big change in behavior, but the reason they are doing this, i.e. the need driving their digital behavior is exactly the same as it ever was.

So at this point I hope that I may well have just made you stop and think, if only for a brief moment and also hopefully it means that you will probably never look at the aforementioned image in the same light ever again.

Indeed if any so called digital guru's show you this chart again, firstly suggest that perhaps they purchase and read this book, and then challenge them with my observation, if only to liven up what may well be a tedious presentation.

Going back to the first example of the checkerboard illusion, I would propose that what you see in the second example is the same kind of optical illusion, be it from the modern era.

Quite simply what you see and observe here in terms of behaviour instantly distracts you from the really important truth that lies behind that behavior.

As with the checkerboard illusion, it is only after changing how we look at this, by applying a different and dare I suggest more analogue perspective, that we can then see the real significance or truth on offer here.

Now the law of averages would dictate that a number of people reading this book are likely to be atheists, and given many of you are presumably in the world of marketing, then that might be even higher, so for those individual I will offer an alternative and non theological example.

As a teenager, two of my favorite pastimes were heavy metal music and smoking.

So imagine my delight when I discovered that I could combine these passions through the purchase of a KISS branded cigarette lighter manufactured by the good people at Bic. And I didn't just use this device to light my cigarettes behind the school bike sheds, no, like thousands of my fellow brethren, I would also take it along to rock concerts where it was held aloft during the ubiquitous slow power ballads.

Fast forward to the present day and similar gatherings of modern day rock fans.

Now these days you won't find any cigarette lighters held aloft, health and safety would probably result in the swift removal of anyone who even attempted this, no, in the modern day rock arena it's the mobile phone that is now held aloft with pride.

But just for a few moments apply your analogue lens and you will see that this is in fact the only difference.

Yes it's a difference device being used, but in this example not only is the need or motivation the same as with our theological example, but also the behavior is exactly the same too.Indeed one of the most successful branded mobile apps of all time is the KISS virtual concert lighter - so go figure!

And just as with the religious faithful in our previous example, it is what we don't see here that again is the more significant.

Again the core analogue need or motivation behind the behavior here is fundamentally the same as it always has been, i.e. it has not changed one bit.

Yet sadly, all too often in digital marketing, people are too quickly dazzled or distracted by what they first see, going straight to the obvious digital behaviors based around technology and devices, rather than stepping back and trying to get to the real needs or deeper motivations which lie behind this.

As another example, consider cyber Monday in the run up to the Christmas holidays.

Yes of course it's a massive change in the way we behave and shop and has big implications for the world of e-commerce and retail.

Yet at its very core again remains a very old and analogue need or driver, the desire to get a bargain, again something that hasn't changed from the days long before ecommerce and the Internet were invented.

So quite simply the first more analogue way of thinking is this.

Yes, digital changes behavior but not the analogue needs behind it, so always consider these human or analogue needs first, before focusing on any digital behavior or technological devices.

Now I am not for one minute saying that we should completely ignore consumer's digital behaviour, far from it.

However the ability to step back and understand the needs or drivers behind a consumers behavior, before you head straight into developing solutions based on them, will I believe make you, I or anyone for that matter, a much better digital strategist and marketer.

Starting with analogue needs, in my experience, also allows you to develop digital communications that by responding to real human needs, rather than just reacting to behaviour, deliver much deeper and powerful connection with consumers.

And the even better news is that understanding what these needs are is no more complex than a fart in a spacesuit, something that I will explain in next weeks chapter!

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