Non-Obvious 2017 Edition. Rohit Bhargava
Marketing will continue to be the place to be.”
“Fantasy Sports”
“Virtual Reality”
“Change will be led by smart home technology.”
Virtual Reality? Really?
Not to ruin the suspense, but I don’t believe any of these are actually trends. Some are just random buzzwords or the names of platforms. Others are hopelessly broad, useless and, yes, obvious.
None of them are a unique idea describing the accelerating present.
Meanwhile, all of us as media consumers see these predictions with varying levels of skepticism. To better understand why, let’s review the four main reasons why most trend predictions fail the believability test.
REASON 1: NO OBJECTIVITY
If you sell virtual reality content, declaring 2017 the “Year of Virtual Reality” is clearly self-serving. Of course, most bias isn’t this easy to spot and objectivity is notoriously difficult for any of us. Our biases are based on our expertise and the world we know. This is particularly true in business where we sometimes need to believe in industry or brand in order to succeed. The problem is, losing objectivity usually leads to wishful thinking. Just because we want something to be a trend doesn’t make it one.
EXAMPLE: Near the end of last year, I received what seemed like dozens of emails about white papers and blog posts each forecasting that wearable technology or the “Internet of things” would be the hottest trend of the coming year. Unsurprisingly, the vast majority of them had some type of product or strategy to cash in on this hot trend—and were mostly dismissed by the media they were aiming to reach.
REASON 2: NO CREATIVITY
Trends need to do more than repeat common knowledge. For example, saying that “more people will buy smart phones this year” is obvious—and useless because it lacks creativity. The biggest reason that most trend predictions share these types of obvious ideas is because it is easier to do so. Lazy thinking is always easier than creative and informed thinking. Great trends are never obvious declarations of fact that most people already know. They share new ideas in insightful ways while also describing the accelerating present.
EXAMPLE: The phrase “digital natives” was first coined nearly 15 years ago to describe a generation who would grow up never having known a world before the Internet. Despite its long history and relative ubiquity, several trend articles still share the “emergence” of this group as if it were a brand new insight. That’s just plain lazy.
REASON 3: NO PROOF
Sharing a trend without specific examples is like declaring yourself a musician by simply buying a microphone and learning to sing one song. Unfortunately, many trend predictions coast on the power of a single story or example. Great examples and stories are powerful parts of illustrating why a trend matters. They are necessary elements of proving a trend. Only finding one example and declaring something a trend without more evidence is usually a sign that a so-called trend is based on little more than guesswork.
EXAMPLE: When publishing website Medium.com first became publicly available and increasing numbers of journalists and writers began using it to freely share extremely high-quality stories and articles, several early trend reports last year predicted the rise of a sort of anti-Twitter trend where people would begin flocking to longer-form content. Unfortunately, one popular website isn’t enough to describe a trend, and most of these forecasts were predictable failures.
REASON 4: NO APPLICATION
Perhaps the most common place where many trend predictions fall short is in the discussion of how to apply them. It is not enough to think about trends in the context of describing them. The best trend forecasts go further than just describing something that is happening. They also share insights on what it means and what you can or should do differently as a result of the trend. In other words, trends should be actionable.
EXAMPLE: In a piece of accidentally ironic content, a collaboration of top PR agencies published a sponsored editorial in Advertising Age magazine last year aimed at sharing predictions for the upcoming year to underscore the value of PR for big clients. Unfortunately, most of the top ten predictions featured plentiful buzzword babble, like “Big data is important, but big insights are critical” and was dramatically short on any real insights on how to apply the thinking or what to do about it. Not the PR industry’s best work.
How to Think Different about Trends
So if there are so many myths and reasons for failure, what makes a good trend?
As a reminder, here is my definition for a “Non-Obvious” trend:
A Non-Obvious trend is a curated observation that describes the accelerating present in a new, unique way.
The next two chapters will dig further into the idea of Non-Obvious trends and thinking by sharing a step-by-step approach to help you think differently about trends and escape the trap of lazy thinking or flawed insights visually. The biggest challenge is learning to abandon the obvious ideas and push yourself to work harder.
When you do, I guarantee that your ideas will improve, as well as your outlook on your business and your career as well.
So, let’s get started.
2
The Curator’s Mindset:
Learning the 5 Essential Habits of Trend Curators
“YOU NEVER LEARN ANYTHING BY LISTENING TO YOURSELF SPEAK.”
—SIR RICHARD BRANSON,
Entrepreneur and Founder of the Virgin Group
In 2006, renowned Stanford psychology professor Carol Dweck wrote a book about an idea so simple it hardly seemed worth mentioning—much less devoting an entire book to exploring.
Across decades of research into motivation, achievement and success, Dweck had come upon a beautifully elegant idea to describe why some people succeeded while others failed: it all came down to mindsets.
After conducting experiments with grade school students, interviewing professional athletes and studying business leaders, Dweck proposed that most people had one of two types of mindsets: a fixed mindset or a growth mindset.
People with fixed mindsets, Dweck argued, believe that their skills and abilities are set. They see themselves as either being either good at something or not good at something, and therefore tend to focus their efforts on tasks and in careers where they feel they have a natural ability.
People with growth mindsets believe that success and achievement are the result of hard work and determination. They see their own (and others’) true potential as something to be defined through effort. As a result, they thrive on challenges and often have a passion for learning.
It likely won’t surprise you to learn that I believe in the power of the growth mindset and aspire to always maintain one for myself. When it comes to learning to predict the future, it is important to adopt that same mindset for yourself.
The beautiful thing about mindsets is that we all have the ability to change ours—we just need to make the choice to do it.
Seeing trends, like playing an instrument or being more observant, are skills within your grasp to learn and practice. Does this mean you can transform yourself into a professional flamenco guitarist or a full-time trend forecaster with enough practice? Not necessarily. Aptitude and natural talent do play an important part in succeeding at anything on a professional level.
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