The popcorn factor

Of course you know what I am referring to! I really, really enjoyed Faith Popcorn`s seminar. I attended at the invitation of Hollard Insurance which, together with The Star, hosted Faith`s visit to South Africa.

Women control, in a very real and measurable way, well in excess of 50% of purchase decisions.

What struck me most was the correlation between what Faith was saying and what we are seeing in business trends. This is not surprising since she is hailed as the foremost trend-spotter of the past few decades. However, her focus is clearly on consumer trends and what we are seeing is the effect of those consumer trends on business.

Over the past months I have touched on two key topics: electronic business and relationship marketing (and, by the way, we will be revisiting these topics soon - as usual everything changes all the time). However, for today`s column I would like to refer to Faith Popcorn, her consumer trends and how they are being manifested in the business domain.

Here, for example, is a Popcorn prediction made in December 1998 that cannot be ignored: "I predict that by 2010, 90% of consumer products will be home-delivered."

And herewith some statistics to back up this trend: Online sales in 1998 are $43 billion, TV shopping is $2.5 billion, catalogues are $58 billion in annual sales and two million new cars are bought over the Web (15% of the market). By 2000, 25% of all new cars will be bought over the Web and by 2002, Web purchases will amount to $300 billion a year.

I honestly cannot think of a clutch of statistics more compelling to drive home the realisation of the huge impact of e-business.

These statistics are grounded in compelling consumer trends: Cocooning (the concept most frequently associated with Faith Popcorn) and atmosfear, both of which simply mean that increasingly we are moving into our safe home environments, protecting ourselves from the harsh realities of the world.

Therefore, anything that allows us to operate from this safe environment will simply fly! A trend which Faith calls 99 lives; too fast a pace, too little time. Consequently anything which buys back some time cannot be ignored.

Home shopping, working from home, home banking, virtual reality holidays, healthcare over the Web, even visiting friends and family through video conferencing, commerce-tainment (touch the TV screen and buy Ally McBeal`s dress) ... Some of this is pretty far out, but technologically possible and definitely coming.

On the other hand, there is this huge and continuing focus on "relationship marketing". About a week ago I was travelling internationally and meeting a broad spectrum of companies, doing very different things related to IT. In reflecting on the past few days it struck me that relationship marketing is a common thread, not just for IT companies but overall.

It is as much the topic of the IT companies that we talk to as that of the client organisations that we talk to. This, by the way, is also not new and it will not be new for most of you. However, the very fact that it is still top of the agenda is in itself a message.

So there I was sitting in Faith`s seminar and listening to her recap the consumer trends and it is just so obvious that there is an increasing number of consumer trends driving both e-business (already referred to above) and relationship marketing. For example:

• On the relationship side - EGONOMICS: The simple idea that the past several decades have increasingly reduced the individual to a number and a barcode, and there is a push back for individual recognition. Any business able to recognise its customer individually and treat them individually is definitely onto a winning recipe.
• Another and more subtle correlation for me is that of EVEOLUTION - recognising the buying power of women. The statistics were interesting, but what it amounts to is that women control, in a very real and measurable way, well in excess of 50% of purchase decisions. It is also increasingly better understood that the way in which women buy and the way they make decisions is quite different to that of men. One key difference is that of relationship. Women tend to come at almost everything from a relationship perspective, so anything geared towards relationship marketing - getting up close and personal - will have great impact.

I have highlighted but a few of the major consumer trends Faith touched on in her seminar. The key takeaway for me from a business perspective is the insight of how these trends underpin and drive the more visible business trends of e-business and relationship marketing.

The Internet did not just happen; it exploded because it is fundamentally driven by consumer behaviour and the same is true of e-business and relationship marketing. With those insights one can get back to dealing with those topics with new vigour and enthusiasm. They will increasingly constitute the very lifeblood of an organisation.