I had to opportunity today to listen to an open forum discussion led by Louis Gray and Chris Wetherell on Products versus Users: Who is winning while being at SXSW. The overall theme was generally discussing why companies and their products don’t listen to their user feedbacks very well. We all know the story, the users want feature X but the product never produces feature X while instead create feature Y that creates an uproar and the Mob affect.

Being the natural introvert that I am, I listened to both the speakers and the audience discuss this issue with great interest. Just why does a product not listen to it’s audience? Do the users have the appropriate vehicles to talk to the product teams? Is the community right? Is it wrong? Does the community have rights especially if the product is free? People complain about change anyway and you can never satisfy everyone…

There really was no true answers that came from this discussion, which is tough in a forum like this, but it is an interesting topic worth addressing on TechYell seeings as the domain name implies this very subject, to add value by suggesting ways in which we can improve things even though the application improvements are generally out of my hands (except for those I advise).

Consumer Rights – Is Freemium and Paid That Much Different?

As a consumer of many free products on the web, I do not expect that all of my ideas be addressed within a product. I will give my feedback on a product, try to clearly point out things that I do not like about the product and offer ways to improve upon that product. Yes a rant comes out time to time but we all know that this don’t solve much. Now of course, I would love for my feedback to be noted and then applied within that product but that is up to the internal team of that application to capture my feedback and determine whether it is worth including (which I’m assuming many others have requested). I also understand that the information that I have provided within the free online app may be used in ways that can benefit that applications ability to ultimately make revenue (within reason).

If of course that application does not evolve in the direction that I would like, I could simply stop using that product and perhaps look for alternatives. The web is after all vast and has many alternatives, right? Well, as Louis pointed out in the discussion, the web is quickly consolidating into a few core companies with large portfolios of web applications. In the case of social media apps, the success of the app does in many ways come down to the size of the community. So a consumer does not have a lot of choice outside of the Twitters and Facebooks of the world where that community has already set ground. Yes, there are many alternative/clones of these systems but the audience is the “special sauce” so the individual is in many ways “stuck” with what that application does and it’s limits.

This is in many ways not much different than any other period of time with technology, even with paid apps or hardware. Many people and companies use Microsoft Office because the rest of their audience does in which you may need to share a document. Yes there are other products that someone can use and even translate to the MS Office format, but usually some format issues occur. You also had very limited ways to improve Microsoft Office through feedback. So just like today in the online world, we flocked to those products in which became mainstream regardless if they had every feature you desired and the outlets to provide feedback are even tougher. Do you have more rights as a paying customer, it doesn’t seem that way on large products.

So Does Your Voice Matter?

We all like to think that it does and even those companies would like you to believe that too but I’m not so sure. Not to get political on TechYell but we have the same exact issues within our governmental system. Yes we have voting rights on who represents us but how many of those representatives have successfully brought the changes that you, as an individual, have wanted? We’ve all heard the mantra of “your vote counts” but does it really count enough to make an impact? We’ve seen in Washington that even a majority doesn’t mean much.

I don’t want to be all doom and gloom here but I don’t believe that your individual voice matters unless your a specific voice higher in the food chain both in politics and also in the future application design choices, even then it can be challenging to create change. The outside voice matters very little once a product becomes a certain size and mainstream.

However we are in an age of technology and openness to allow your voice to be heard louder than ever before. Even in cases such as the Motrin Moms PR disaster, there were no major impacts to revenue despite the angry mob-effect that wanted to engage with Motrin but couldn’t. Not much different than the “everyone skip pumping gas for a day MEME”, our behavior isn’t impact-full enough to make major change unless it’s truly a full community shift.

That’s not to say that you shouldn’t express your ideas, just don’t get too disappointed when they don’t materialize. You can still impact change when something was released incorrectly such as a privacy feature or a controversial Motrin commercial, just don’t expect their big picture road-map to magically come into your control.

So Does Competition Matter?

Yes and No. Competition matters only when it becomes a potential mainstream competitor. Doing this is no easy task, you need to not only build a great product but also create something that makes people feel that it is time for a change in behavior. This certainly has been done before but it’s not easy and I’d imagine will get harder over time. It takes a strong product with very strong marketing and, in many cases, it takes the leader in that space to screw up. By messing up, I mean either not keeping up or staying relevant. Some will add that missing feature on their own. However when you get to a specific size, one of the easiest ways of staying in the lead is through acquisition of threats or complimentary products. As end users, we often find that these acquisitions have little to do with making the acquired or original product better for us consumers but more about containing the market.

So has “the Product” Won?

Not exactly but clearly the producers of the application have more control over the audience. And in some ways, they deserve that control as they’ve given you just enough to keep you as a customer. If you don’t like Apple’s culture and yet you still buy their product over others, clearly you have shown Apple that they are providing you with a “just enough” product. The same example could be said for Microsoft Office or even Twitter. They all give just enough at it’s core and allows “some” 3rd party API development options in which they can change the rules at any time. I’m not downplaying what Apple or Microsoft have developed but they are the easiest example to illustrate who has control due to the Mass Adoption Effect.

Independent developers have the best advantage because they can create something that fits their needs whether that’s through the existing system’s API or making something on their own. End users also have a better chance of getting their voices heard on smaller projects, especially in the early phases when the new startup is hungry for an audience and ultimately profits.

However, I don’t want the Twitters and Microsofts of the World to believe that they will always be safe. When enough people have caught on to “the next big thing” (and I don’t mean the early adopters), a sea change can occur and it can happen very quickly. Before this past November, Android was not a major threat to the iPhone. The debate is still out if it will truly overtake the iPhone but in my view it will happen due to Apple’s mess ups. The way things have been moving with the various removal of iPhone Apps (Sexy Apps, WiFi Detectors, Competing Products, etc), they are creating more friction with it’s community (developers and users) than I think they realize. If you believe that traditional desktop OSes are on the verge of Death, these two factors create a huge opportunity for Google to win the hearts of the Smartphone Flock. Unfortunately it’s another big company that won’t create that killer-feature for you but at least they will be more open for the little guy’s app that you might have some voice of influence.