Wave at It; Poke It; Pull It; Twist It

A couple weeks ago I was in New York City with my daughter visiting the Editions\Artists Book Fair and the IFPDA Print Fair. We yelped our way over to an excellent Szechuan restaurant where I found myself washing up and waving idly at a grey box on the wall. After a bit I realized that paper towels weren’t going to dispense, and closer inspection revealed I was waving at the soap dispenser. I tried waving at another grey box, but realized that it would only dispense towels after twisting the recessed knob. When did using a restroom become so complicated?

Behavior that used to be simple and habitual now requires option-navigating decisions.I don’t think I’m alone in this. On other recent occasions I’ve found the water pouring in public facility sinks. I don’t think that’s because the recent hand-washer was wasteful, but rather because their office sink worked when you waved at it, but these sinks had knobs. In our office we have both handled and waved sinks; you have to think about how to use the particular sink you’re at. Behavior that used to be simple and habitual now requires option-navigating decisions.

So Simple It’s Complicated

Perversely this has come about because companies are working hard to make our lives easier, business more profitable and less wasteful. Automated faucets and towel dispensers use fewer supplies and are more hygienic; public spaces and businesses want to make their facilities easier to use. And yet every innovation adds to complexity. It’s not as if all faucets get upgraded at once; old styles, newer styles and competing styles are all in market at the same time. Simple has become complicated in the name of convenience.

We see this same situation in the digital realm. In the good old days we sent messages to each other by email, and it was good. Then we got to Instant Message each other, and that was good too, we then combined instant messaging and mobile messaging and that was even better! We could tell each other where were going to eat, or how much we liked a book, or where to get a good deal – practically in real time. Now of course we have multiple separate apps for each of those activities, and thousands more besides.

But for the consumer convenience has again come at the cost of complexity, where once email or text would suffice, now people are sending, leaving and reading messages everywhere through email, social media messaging like Facebook, Twitter and other services like Foursquare that also message through Facebook and Twitter. The more messaging components a consumer integrates into their day the harder it is to make their use habitual – there are a limited number of daily habits we are willing to incorporate.

How Much Time Do You Have For Something New?

So inevitably balkanization is occurring, with different groups favoring different clusters of services. Facebook has an increasingly wide demographic base in contrast to Twitter and Foursquare, which are much more limited. The divide has become less about digital/nondigital, and more about personal investment. How much time are you willing to invest in incorporating a new service into our personal digital ecosystem? What social environmental forces will it take to get an individual to adopt a new digital social app?

For brands the challenge is even more daunting. Marketers are consumers too, with limited time to play with new platforms. Yet it’s hard to market effectively on a platform you are not fluent in. And as consumer communications become more multi-channeled it has become exponentially harder to message to them effectively. Email relationship marketing was complex and challenging on it’s own. Email/Facebook/LinkedIn/Twitter/SMS/Apps relationship marketing is far more daunting. But the rewards are there for marketers who devote the energy and resources needed to communicate in this, the era of wave, poke, pull and twist.