It’s 43 degrees out, you’ve been at the beach for a few hours. It’s hot, you’re frustrated and you need a drink.
There aren’t any shops, just one little café on the corner a couple streets back, so you walk in.
In business, we see this all the time. Marty Neumeier describes this as “onliness.” This advantage also often goes to the first person to move, the first person to execute on a new idea.
But then, of course, the second comes along… a little corner store opens up.
Maybe it’s a copy and they do coffee too… maybe there’s twist. Either way, now there are two options, we now have choice as to what we do.
This is the first stage of commoditisation of the product, service or information that the first person had.
And already, this choice changes things.
Which will you choose?
In version 1.0, when there is no choice, almost anything goes in biz – it can be pretty basic, and we’ll still come in because there’s no other option. We’re after the information or service.
In version 2.0, we start to see abundance. So, we see a new set of factors come in. In the abundant market, we make our choices based on design, brand, reputation, user experience, how it makes us feel, the story they are telling, and who else is there.
It’s most likely that in your niche, things switched into version 2.0 many years ago. The question now is, are you focusing enough on these soft-skill driven areas to really resonate with the people you are after?
