I’d like to buy the world a psychological examination
From Harvard Business Online’s Conversation Starter Blog: “Why I Underwent Psychoanalysis in the Name of Coca-Cola”
Jerry’s market research technique, ZMET (Zaltman Metaphor Elicitation Technique), is a rigorous and, for me, at least, emotionally draining experience. It gets consumers to express their deepest feelings about a particular product or brand — whether they intend to or not — through a multi-stage encounter that whisks one from grade-school collage-making through something like psychoanalysis and back again.
It’s all fascinating stuff that culminates with the creation of a digital collage to visually represent one’s deepest feelings about Coca-Cola. How do you feel about Coke? How do you really feel about Coke? It’s these types of understandings that lead companies to make hamburgers cheaper, fashionable boots harder to find, and pickup trucks more intimidating-looking.
Here at Yahoo!, we’re experiencing all kinds of emotional reactions from our users. Yesterday we migrated our last users from the old My Yahoo! to the new My Yahoo!, which for many users was a brutal shock. They may have had the same home page for 8 years, and now, after a year-long beta of the new My, their daily ritual has been changed. And change is hard. And some of the abusive tones in users’ feedback reveal just how much their My Yahoo page means to them.
When a brand becomes a relationship is like when a house becomes a home. You move into the empty place. Before you schlepp in all your boxes, you look around and see what the house expects of you. Then you bring in your furniture, your plants, your books, your electronics. You push some things into the basement; your relationships to your possessions change as your stuff adapts to the space. Within a few weeks, you have new habits. Within a few months, the house is a balanced ecosystem, with some resemblances to your last house, but vastly different behaviors.
Eventually, it’s time to move out. And what was once just an empty framework of rooms is now something alive, something you’ll have to destroy.
We have deep and complicated and sometimes turbulent relationships with our brands and products. Incremental change can delight customers. Radical change will usually shock and anger them. And understanding what our stuff really means to them is the first and also the most challenging step to re-winning their loyalty.