Evolution @ the speed of thought...

Once upon a time, not too long ago, say about 20 years back, there used to be a time when dad would come home, buckling under the two tonnes of paper work and documentation that he’d have to drag home in order to “work from home”. Being the loving tiny little tot that you are, you’d rush up to him and wrap yourself around his knees, unable to contain your delight at having him back home. Dad trips, sheets, binder and paper clips take flight; havoc ensues.

Now, fifteen years is not so long ago. Now, you are all grown up and all that you get to bring home is your old, Stone Age office laptop that creaks and groans. How unromantic! So the next obvious question here is, just what happened in such a short speck of time?

Over the last 2 million years, the human brain has nearly tripled in size. What we as a species got gifted with this time around was a few new structures which literally changed human history. One of these structures is the frontal lobe, particularly the pre frontal cortex. Sounds cool? What this means for the rest of us who don’t speak neuroscience is that humans gained the ability to simulate experiences. In essence, we have the ability to dry run (imagine) experiences or activities in our heads before we actually do them. This is something none of our ancestors could really do and something that no other animal can do quite as well. It is this evolutionary boost that literally got us out of the trees and where we are today. That’s a process that took 2 million years to get us to where we are. Driven by that power to imagine, we took the next big leap forward in about 1958 with the Advanced Research Projects Network or ARPANET which led to the big bang called the Internet and the Information Age. The internet acted as a catalyst, to unify our intellects and imaginations into one massive collective.

Just how has the information age changed the way we do business today? Some of the more obvious changes that have resulted from the information boom would include:

a) Continually shorter product cycles:

Since product development and delivery cycles have now become shorter thanks to the many “technological wonders” of the information age, end to end product developments take lesser time with each passing day. What this also means is that an imperfect product, especially in the software business can be released into the market since it’s now much easier to deliver fixes and patches without interrupting regular business flow.

b) Instant communication now drives increased productivity:

Improved connectivity and next to instant communication has pushed the demand for quicker decision making. Unlike the gaps permitted by the earlier slower alternatives such as snail mail, instant messaging and connectivity now makes it critical to react in the blink of an eye to dynamic market forces.

c) The information overload:

It is estimated that we have managed to create as much data in thirty years as our ancestors could pull off in about three thousand. The challenge today is not the lack of information but rather segregating the right information or “mining” in IT speak from the massive troves of data.

Another significant way this has impacted business is that consumers now have the ability to “pull” information towards themselves rather than be “pushed” information in the form of advertisements and other marketing campaigns. This increased awareness and agility amongst consumers makes it critical for companies to continually innovate and back their claims with a strong product delivery.

So where do we go next?

If we are to really let that gift of an imagination loose and envision where technology and the information age is headed, reality might be headed exactly where Ray Kurzweil has predicted it will. In his book titled “The Singularity is Near”, he postulated that by the year 2045, computers will vastly exceed human intelligence and will be able to redesign future generations of themselves. Ray also goes as far as to predict that in the next twenty years, the processing power of an average Desktop PC would equal that of the human mind. Fact or Fiction? Looks like we are already half way there!

If you can’t stop smoking, cancer will!!

Heard that one before? How about “There are cooler ways to die”? Anti smoking campaigns showcase the pinnacle of failed marketing campaigns and represent billions of dollars wasted in advertising funds.

Understanding the various vectors that contribute to its ineffectiveness would probably bring out some valuable marketing insights.

Although it appears that an increasing number of people have actually retired or never attempted smoking, on the contrary, after years of sharp annual decline, per capita cigarette consumption is now at a plateau. Further, teen smoking has now increased substantially since 1991.

Part of the reason why such campaigns tend to fail is possibly because most campaigns currently target tobacco industries themselves and often “preach” at individuals towards kicking the habit. Hence, following repeated exposures to these messages, one of two things happen: The first possibility is that the message is so weak it can’t really connect to your cognitive reasoning (eg: Tar “.xgm”, Nicotine “.x gm”, Benzene “x.gm” etc) and you’d probably wonder, Ok, so what? Either ways it’s just tiny decimal numbers and obscure chemical compounds, I’m sure regular airborne pollution contains more toxins than that.

The second possibility is that the consequences stated appear so unbelievable (like the super gross pictures on the pack) that it fails to connect to you emotionally as you fail to see how your picture perfect life could possibly end up like that.

Ok, all that sounds plausible, but heck, what else do we do? As Prof. S. Ramkumar at the Sp Jain Institute would say it, introspecting on why campaigns don’t click and complains/faults pour in, often provide deeper insight into what must be done differently. In the same way here, rather than increase the visual appeal and impact of the core message, what needs to be done is change the message itself.

Smokers are exposed to anti-smoking messages designed to discourage youth from starting to smoke, but they seldom encounter smoking cessation messages that offer realistic strategies on how to quit. Instead, too many messages offer overly simplistic solutions that generally fail to hold.

Just about everyone who has smoked long enough has tried to quit at some point or the other. And they have been quite successful at quitting… like a ten thousand times over! Dad had wondered a long time back as to why normally free thinking intelligent men could in a second go from point smart to point stupid by puffing away when all around them there are blaring messages of the death it brings. What most smokers fail to acknowledge is that smoking is an addiction. It is extremely challenging for the body to just abandon the chemical high and quit. Withdrawal symptoms last long after that.

Therefore the key is to switch from pure scare tactics and visuals to imparting workable techniques on kicking the habit. A paradigm shift in campaigns towards education on simple yet practical steps on quitting step by step, inch by inch is what would probably work.

(Also read this feature and many others @ The New Age Marketing blog: http://newagemarketing.wordpress.com/2009/11/10/smoking-kills-but-so-does-traditional-marketing/)