It’s obvious, says the experienced marketer. The importance of creating a good customer journey is undeniable. But I’m not only talking about the online buyer experience but also about giving people what they really want (preferably before they even know they want it). But it’s one thing to say it and another to actually do it – history has shown this, and we see it again now.
Google understood it early on – of course! They have first-hand information about what people search for. For example, in most cases, after people book a flight, they will start looking for hotels and often also airport transfers or rental cars. Naturally! So, the smart developers at Google thought: why not make it a little easier for people by providing bookings directly on Google, in the search results themselves? It saves clicks for users and brings more business to Google.
Apple and Spotify are also examples of companies that listened to what people really wanted. When the big majors (like Sony, Warner, and many others) said no to MP3 players – not wanting to promote illegal music downloads – Apple said “of course” and became super successful with their MP3 players. People wanted media players for their MP3 files, and Apple gave them what they wanted.
When the trend of downloading music became a fact, some paid services emerged in a desperate attempt to reclaim some profits from copyrighted music. But the paid services offered in the beginning were much more cumbersome to use; among other things, the files were locked to prevent copying, causing problems when you bought a new MP3 player or cellphone/computer. Pirate Bay, Napster, and similar services were the first to actually understand what all media agencies talk about today – making the customer journey as smooth as possible. And how do you do that? By creating tools for people to get what they want, in this case, music to our devices without any hassle! I’m convinced that many people would have gladly paid for it too, for a good, functioning download service of music – IF just such a service had been available.
Then came Spotify. While record companies stubbornly said no to all types of streaming services, fearing to lose market shares, Spotify came along and offered a streaming service where you can log in from any device, from any place, and listen to any music you want.
Spotify wasn’t actually first with this idea, but they came along at a time when the record companies had nothing more to lose. A long time ago, I heard a very interesting episode on the Swedish radioshow “Sommar i P1”, with IT entrepreneur Niklas Zennström, who had the same idea as Spotify long before they did, but was pursued by lawsuits. Available in Swedish only on: https://sverigesradio.se/artikel/5598100 (From: 2013-07-23).
Spotify was a success, and also an example of people being willing to pay as long as they avoid hassle! But it took a while before the success story became a reality. Initially, it turned out that more people still preferred listening to, for example, the car radio over Spotify. Why? With all this available music, people didn’t know what they wanted to listen to. They were used to music chosen by radio stations or album/CD series like “Absolute Music”, “Absolute Dance“, etc. So, playlists were invented, another example on how well Spotify developers listen to their users, which the music industry now fights to be on! Netflix is another provider that has been listening, as well as HBO and Storytel. There are plenty more, but those came top of my mind!
BUT– now it’s getting complicated again! All these different platforms for music, books, movies, TV series, etc., all different payment solutions, apps, URLs, login details to keep track of. And now some of them even restrict access by IP address to prevent sharing logins. So, we are approaching square 1 again – it’s getting to be a hassle again, like when you have a second home, summer cottage, or are traveling.
I do understand though, it’s about copyright! It was about copyright when companies like Spotify and Netflix came along as well, but haven’t we learned from what happened to the music industry when they said no to the solutions people wanted?
“Those who grab too much often lose everything.”
It’s simply the case that ordinary people, people like you and me, are too busy putting together our life puzzles to deal with a lot of hassle. And when the “free alternatives” (pirate sites, that is) become easier to use than the paid services, the outcome is obvious!
So hello all owners of copyrighted material, if you want to keep making money, give the people what they want! And what do they want? A service for everything; one login – one solution for the whole family that works whether you’re at home, in the summer cottage, abroad, in the car, on the beach, on a walk, at the hotel – and here should be music, podcasts, books, tv-series, and movies.
Spotify has already started to understand this and offers both podcasts and a service for streaming books, but there’s still a long way to go. Maybe some mergers of companies are required, collaborations between the major players on the field.
Unfortunately, I don’t have the answer. If I did, I would be much richer and more successful than I am today. And surely, several extremely smart developers are already scratching their heads to come up with smart solutions. It’s about copyrights, but above all – I can’t help but think a bit cynically – it’s about the “middlemen” (like record companies, TV/film companies, book publishers, etc) and their great fear of losing what they already have. They’re clinging on for dear life to the solutions they already have, afraid of losing their percentages to someone else.
But this is where everything will go wrong again – if you don’t get on board in time. The train towards giving people what they want, even if it means changes like power shifts and rotation in market shares. If you don’t get on board in time, you’ll be left at the station, and without anything when someone else takes the place on the fast-moving train towards the future!