Here at Brinovation I am always looking for more effective ways to communicate my vision for solving a business problem with technology. Around the office we call this process by a variety of catchy names. The ‘Vulcan Mind Meld’ or the ‘Brain Dump’. It is a real test of my communication skills to choose the right tone, message components and visuals to turn those light bulbs on. Without the light bulbs, I don’t work. And I like to work. I’ve invested mucho time and sweat into getting the messaging right. But, I am still disappointed from time to time to discover that the audience takeaway is completely divergent from key points I’ve intended to make. Quite simply whiteboards and PowerPoint card decks are just not similar enough to the final user experience to always shape and nuance my message as I would like.
Of course, the best medium for conveyance is the app itself. Believe me, if we’re having a conversation about an idea, I’m already visualizing code and screens and database schemas and network diagrams and roadblocks in my head. It’s just the way I’m wired. It’s the special talent (for me) that Steve Martin was searching for in The Jerk. At the end of our conversation, I’m ready to sit down and start coding this baby up. Problem is, nobody else usually is.
I’ve very rarely run into an exec who works that fast. They like surety. They hate risk. They need to be armed with fortified, entrenched justification. Unless they have been working with me for years and just implicitly trust me (and you’re out there, God bless you), they usually demand blueprints and design narratives and pictures before they will commit to anything. And that brings a problem with it. My most precious capital resource is time. At this stage of the game, I’m not being compensated to draft and draw and assemble and revise collateral material that effectively convey my vision. No matter how clearly I can see the end product in my mind’s eye, channeling those visions from my imagination into something someone can also see, lay hands on, experiment with, etc, even a hollow version, takes time and money to build. I’d be happy to do it if I was assured of a reward when I deliver. But that’s never assured. What if I spend 40 or 50 hours creating all this collateral and they don’t like it and choose not to proceed? Or, worse, they take my narratives and storyboards and show me the door? (The most-excellent Mike Judge-penned HBO show, Silicon Valley, called this a ‘brain rape‘.)
This means every time I start putting together a proposal I have to engage in some mental calculus before I place my bet. And a bet it certainly is. I’m wagering the value of my sweat against the likelihood that the prospective client actually has a genuine desire to proceed and likes the story I tell enough to hire us to build it out.
There have been rare instances when the bet algorithm yielded a score so favorable that I have completely jettisoned the card decks, powerpoints and other ‘reasonable facsimiles’ in favor of just building a highly simplified version of the app. Build it and they will come. Many times the outlay of time and materials to code up a rudimentary app can be less than time spent with the word processor, mockup generator, powerpoint, etc. And the result, if favorably received, can jumpstart the formal development project. (A picture is worth ….)
One unique advantage weaponizing a new app into the hands of a new user is that the best ideas for deploying that weapon and improving the business many times don’t materialize until the stakeholders are actually shouldering your first release and taking aim at a target. All of a sudden all kinds of light bulbs start going off. New light bulbs. Quite often projects take off in a brand new direction because the business doesn’t think of the best ideas until they shoot the weapon at a target. It’s a gratifying thing that the constituents finally share the promise. (We’ll talk about the scope creep problem this can create in another post).
Fortunately, like everything else, our tools are ever-improving. We are now able to relatively-easily ‘sketch up’ approximations of the final user experience (UX) for presentation to a prospective client that are closer than ever to the actual app. We even borrow terms from the Madison Avenue Mad Men for app sketchups: ‘straw man’. ‘mockup’. ‘storyboard’. Collaborating desk-to-desk, to a worldwide audience on a developing user experience, with all of the stakeholders’ comments and ideas captured and distributed to the other stakeholders via email. We now regularly convene video teleconferences with stakeholders on a moment’s notice via Skype, GotoMeeting or Zoom. No longer a need to jot down detailed minutes to be typed up because the interactions are all recorded (and, optionally, later transcribed). Great ideas surface earlier in the process, and the dev team works from a more substantive (symbolic) clay model instead of abstract ideas tossed onto a white board. Information flows more freely. The end result is that the gap between concept to first release narrows. That saves money all the way around.
Despite this huge leap over what we were doing even five years ago, it is still imperfect. Especially when the audience is made up of C-level execs – which is where I tend to live when I have my sales hat on. C-level execs are interested in the big picture and usually don’t have time to comb through trivial technical details as we wait for the big idea to gestate. I usually have no more than ten minutes to set the hook. It’s difficult to do when the greatest intrinsic value is buried under layers and layers of jargon, bits and packets that can cause even the most ardent champion’s eyes to glaze over in 30 seconds.
Who’s Alexa and what does any of this have to do with her?
The annual December struggle to pick gifts for family and friends is always faced with a bit of dread. I know. I’m not alone. Except for Dallas Summer Musicals season tickets that have been stocking stuffers since forever in our family (and maybe a dive into the bookstore next to the box office when I pick them up), I now do almost all of my gift shopping online. It’s just too convenient to be able to browse items from my desk or couch, drag stuff to the cart, and, boom, here it comes, delivered to our door a couple of days later. More and more often the same day. Giftwrapped. Of course, Amazon is the default go to for this and I’m completely addicted to it. Just like a lot of you. (C’mon. Admit it.)
This year there were two products whose ad blitzes I just couldn’t escape. One was Virtual Reality devices. (Really pretty much a pair goggles that hold your phone.). Samsung VR and it’s cousins were constantly lighting the pixels on our TV during football games (Netflix, where we live most of the time, doesn’t show commercials). The other was the Amazon Echo. The Siri-like black box that becomes your every-ready assistant to magically cater to your every whim.
Now the cool thing about Jeff Bezos is that he totally gets the razor marketing model. You know. Give away the one-time-purchase razors to sell the high-margin blades for life? This means that Amazon-branded devices have always been offered at very aggressive price points. The Kindle has always been cheap for what you get. The electronic books? Ahhh, not so much.
So just in time for Christmas, Jeff brought us the Amazon Echo ‘Dot’. A downscale version of the original Echo. A mere forty bucks. Free delivery. Lots more sizzle than a pet rock (I know none of you are old enough to remember that. Google it for a laugh.) . Add to cart. Boom. I get a couple to convey the season’s cheer to my more tech-loving family and friends. Of course reserving one for us that I stuck under the tree for Bev. (She *had* actually mentioned our friends having one that they loved.).
Anyway, Christmas day arrives, egg nog and prime rib consumed, Home Alone, A Christmas Story and It’s a Wonderful Life looping on the TV. And Alexa arrives.
If you’re not aware of Alexa, she is a fascinating implementation of the voice-interaction UI – like Siri – packaged into a barely-noticeable cylinder. Alexa seems to be far more natural and have a broader vocabulary than Apple’s Siri or Google’s ‘Ok’ competitors. Before long everyone was having all kinds of fun chatting with Alexa.
If you’re unfamiliar with Alexa, here’s a short list of other things she does.
Alexa, what’s the weather?
Alexa, play some Christmas music.
Alexa, tell me a joke.
Alexa, what’s 17 times 13?
Ok. Sounds a lot like Siri. It is. But the interaction seems more natural.
Oh, and, of course you can order merchandise from Amazon. Who didn’t see the news story after Christmas about the little girl who ‘accidentally’ ordered a doll house from the family’s eager new Alexa assistant?
But really. What does this have to do with selling your app ideas?
Well, what got my synapses firing was the realization that Alexa is not just a product. It’s a development platform. Bezos has made sure that Alexa’s architecture is open and available for independent developers to plug in to with their own apps and devices. Home control was probably the first extension. You can get all kinds of thermostats and light switches and remote control door locks that plug in to your Echo. This is enabled by a thoroughly explained and supported API that Amazon has published so that independent companies can create interfaces to their own systems that Alexa ‘understands’. Amazon calls such extensions ‘Skills’. And Alexa is ‘learning’ a flood of skills as these developers release their inventions..
Alexa, dim the lights in the den.
Alexa, it’s cold in here. Increase temperature 3 degrees.
Alexa, set the heat to 73 degrees at the lakehouse.
Oh. Ok. So you want to develop some Alexa skills?
Well, sure. But that probably won’t happen right away – need a sponsor. Interested? Shoot me an email.
No. The light bulb that flipped on in my head wasn’t so much about teaching Alexa some catchy new phrases. But how I could use Alexa awareness on the C-level executive row as a vehicle to convey my spacy new ideas without jargon, pictures or diagrams. It was a facepalm moment because I really needn’t have waited for the invention of Alexa to employ this metaphor. Siri has been around for years. It just never occurred to me until now. (Remember what I said about the best ideas not coming to you until you have the weapon in your hands?). Suddenly I started imagining all kinds of ways I could clearly, concisely, without-a-lot-of-props, deliver impactful presentations of an app vision by chatting with Alexa.
For example, we’re developing a mobile opt-in platform for small businesses so that they can more closely and regularly engage their customers. It combines a lot of geo-targeting, a tablespoon of MLM and a dash of promotional rewards. I was struggling with how to convey the value proposition to an interested prospect who didn’t know he was interested, yet. In three minutes or less.
BOOM! Alexa to the rescue:
“Alexa, send a message to all of my customers that if they can get 10 verified friends to install this app before next Thursday, they will receive a coupon worth $25 in free merchandise on their next visit. The promocode for their friends to use when installing the app is ‘GOODDEALSFORMILES’.”
“Alexa, send a BOGO coupon valid on any item $10 of value or less to any customer who has visited me at least twice in the past year and gets within 2 miles of my location on Main Street. The coupon expires when they exceed 5 miles from the shop, or tomorrow at noon, whichever comes first.”
“Alexa, what new 3 bedroom, 2 bath single-family properties with tax appraisal of less than $100,000 were added to REOMatch since the last time I asked?”
“Alexa? Request a price from the seller for the REOMatch property at 9677 Elm Street.”
“Alexa? List the tenants in the Village Real shopping center in Houston.”
“Alexa, add this item from my photo gallery to my Amazon Marketplace store.”
“Alexa, invite other merchants located within two miles of me to a complimentary dinner at our restaurant next Friday.”
“Alexa, send a coupon for 50% off Dewalt drill bits to any customer who has visited me at least twice in the last month and gets within a half-mile of a Home Depot location within the next 24 hours. The coupon expires as soon as they are 5 miles from the shop or tomorrow at noon, whichever comes first.”
“Alexa, turn on the light bulbs in the heads of the people I am making this presentation to.”
Yeah. BOOM! Like that.
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