Against common misconception, (or at least my personal one) consumers do no automatically overvalue any new / upgrade of a product. While, on the other hand, innovators who work on the product for a long time, tend to be convinced it works and that it is needed and that the lack of it has consequences. On the other hand, customers are not that easy to convince with the new products, they prefer the ones they have already come to trust. The “endowment” effect is what we call what makes individuals overvalue what they already possess, it is a status quo bias that leads them to avoid change and stick in the comfort of the current product. Which creates a “9x Effect”, which is when the consumers overweigh the already-existing product’s benefits by a factor of three, whilst at the same time companies and engineers and designers overweigh the incoming product’s benefits by a factor of three. The first step that Product Managers can follow is asking themselves what kind of change they are asking of customers. Because a change in product implies a change in the consumer’s behavior. And the bigger the behavior change, the stronger the consumer resistance is likely to be. Hence, the easy sells are usually innovations that require minimal behavior change from customers. On the other hand, products that offer minimal benefit but significant behavior changes are to be avoided! They are much less likely to succeed, and shall be avoided by companies, the article calls them “sure failures”. There is a third category, also called the “long hauls” which is the case where there are important benefits in the new product, but it also implies significant behavioral change from the consumer. In this situation, the company goes through a difficult and slow process of getting the customers to adopt the product, but once they do, it is a huge success. Examples for this are the cellphones and satellite radios. Then there are the smash hits, those bringing significant benefits without much change in behavior (i.e Google!). So, to overcome consumer resistance, Product Managers would want to make sure they are aware of the extent of change they are asking from their customers and the value of benefits they are offering. Additionally, patience can go a long way in embracing slow change. However, in the extreme case of unbreakable resistance, one solution can be to eliminate the existing old product that customers are holding onto. Finally, minimizing resistance is also a strategy to pursue by either making behaviorally compatible products that don’t require behavior change, or seeking a specific group of customers who either are not yet used to / have not used the old product or value the new product so much, much more than the regular population, so that they are willing to accustom their behavior to it.
