According to SimilarWeb, a website traffic analysis service, OpenAI, which shook the world with ChatGPT, has seen its traffic decline by 10.35% every month since May. Initially, it captivated the attention and time of people worldwide due to its novelty and entertainment value. However, unless it establishes a clear and essential role in people's lives, it faces the possibility of being quickly forgotten. Of course, considering the decrease from the initial massive traffic of 1.8 billion and the trend of the generative AI era, this may not be a major issue in the future. However, it is important to acknowledge that no matter how excellent a service is, its relevance to users' lives determines its success.
The businesses we observe are rooted in highly personal choices and dedication within the private realm of their founders. For instance, Elon Musk, who recently changed Twitter's name to X, declared that he simply liked the letter X without providing any further explanation. This led to the decision to release Twitter's iconic blue bird from its cage. His love for the letter X, which originated from X.com, his startup in 1999, continued through the merger with PayPal, where he advocated for the name XPayPal. This affinity extends to SpaceX, Tesla, and his vision for a super-app, X.
Crucially, just like founders, the starting point of users' service experiences is also based on highly personal interests and needs. Mothers' grocery shopping and cooking are acts of dedication and expressions of love for their families. A novice family man's choice of the smallest and most affordable smart thermometer for grilling among various smart devices at home connects with his desire for warm relationships with those around him.
However, companies' interest in the relevance between these products and services and their users is very limited and unsustainable. From the initial product planning stage to subsequent marketing strategy meetings, the questions are predominantly focused on 'what ideas are appropriate.' There was a time when snack content dominated the online world. In the 2000s, Facebook emerged as a platform for people worldwide to connect online, leading to the creation of easily consumed and distributed content. From BuzzFeed internationally to Pikicast domestically, content with shallow and engaging topics gained popularity and fueled the expansion of companies, but many have since shrunk or disappeared. The influence of light content on the public has diminished because after the emergence of TikTok and Instagram, the public have become the media content hosts themselves.
In his book 'Look', Christian Madsbjerg, based on 20 years of consulting experience, clarified that it was not ideas but insights that consistently led to innovation and crisis resolution for his client companies. He revealed that these insights can only be gleaned by observing both the foreground and the background in play. He argues that the reason why companies with highly skilled professionals in their respective fields fail to create meaningful change is that they 'don't know how to discern what matters.' Observation, he claims, is the only and slow skill to determine what is truly important to oneself and others.
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With a flood of big data and countless statistics, we get to hear what consumers are doing. Business leaders check massive datasets recording what's happening outside to make countless micro and macro decisions. However, nobody questions how much attention is paid to what isn't recorded in those datasets. When checking who attended, no one asks who didn't and why. When one person speaks, no one asks why others chose to remain silent. When discussing a new trend, no one questions what people don't talk about.
In a context where ideas are overflowing, discussing only visible and verifiable changes creates a distance from relevance that hinders deeper understanding and leads to short-term outcomes. Therefore, the question 'What do you think of this idea?' is often difficult to answer. In anthropology, the reason for human creativity is discussed as a means for one person to influence another in a desired direction. If you're discussing ideas about a product or service, I suggest maintaining a consistent interest in the backgrounds of others beyond that. Sometimes, instead of focusing on which idea to pursue, it's essential to consider a change in process.
*This article is the original content of a named column published in the Electronic Times on August 21, 2023.
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