Why Some New Technology Catches Fire

Why do people buy into new technology?

The best answer comes from Nokia, the global cell phone manufacturer. Nokia – which accounts for more than 37% of global cell phone handset sales - has extensively studied that question and finds that a person will invest in new technology if it improves at least one of three specific needs in the consumer’s life. The more of these factors it touches, the easier the sale.

The three needs are:

• Security/Safety. That could mean enhancing the person's wellbeing. Examples could include improving his or her personal safety or making some contribution to career or business security. At their simplest, cell phones are a direct way to summon help if a car breaks down. On a more complex basis, they now deliver email to us, providing a leap in how we receive and process the information that keeps our careers on track or our businesses in the black.
• Socialization. This boils down to interaction with other people - family, friends, associates. Facebook, Twitter and other social networks are the most immediate examples. But before all that, simple text messaging gave millions of teenagers a reason to beg for a cell phone.
• Entertainment. Cell phone manufacturers widened their products' appeal - and the consumer's need to upgrade - by designing new models with entertainment-type features like MP3 and video capabilities. The same goes for the push toward internet access and built-in photograph captures and video recording.

This month I’ve spoken to two consultant groups about how internet and email technology are changing the structure of ag communications. Both times, I wished that time had permitted me to share Nokia’s findings.

The company’s research is interesting for a couple of reasons.

First, convenience isn’t a direct factor. You can argue that it’s kind of in the background with all three factors, enabling security, entertainment or socialization. But it’s not in the forefront of anyone’s thinking.

Second, it’s very simple to look back on older technology and see how Nokia’s findings clearly apply to past trends and purchases.

Broadcast television took hold purely on its value to entertain, disrupting a broadcast radio industry that for a couple of decades had held center stage in the American parlor. In the same way, cable television disrupted the broadcast TV industry, offering more channels and options. Now, people are abandoning their telephone land lines because the cell phone – with its myriad of uses – emerged as a better way to stay in touch.

My favorite example, though, comes from my mother, Elizabeth Jenkins Taylor. At 86, she’s now on her third computer, so she’s watched a fair amount of technology come and go.

One day recently when we were talking about something to do with computers, I touched on the Nokia study and the three factors – security, entertainment, socialization.

“The first and maybe the best example of that that I can remember was the CB radio,” she said. “It was a social network for a lot of people.”

She was right. In high school, I had a CB radio (call letters KKR-4150), so she certainly watched me wile away (well, waste, actually) plenty of hours talking to people I might not have spoken to on the street. And, as she pointed out, it was entertaining. People told stories. Sometimes you heard news on Citizens’ Band before it made it into the newspaper. And there was even that element of security. If your car broke down and if you were really lucky, you might use a CB radio to call for help.

Taken to its extreme, Nokia’s findings even apply to the Paleolithic campfire caught on for all those reasons. It provided security and gave people a warm place to come together and tell stories. Plus, the fire was entertaining, all by itself. The fact that you could cook on it was a bonus.

- Owen Taylor