Billions With Zero Knowledge

Every company, entrepreneur and I believe every person is in search of their one thing.  The one thing is that makes what you do special. The product, service, message, offering, feature, approach or solution that just fits with customers. The thing that the company becomes known for.

Often this search for the one thing can take years of experimentation, trial and error and fine tuning of products and approaches.

With consumer web applications and anything involving social software the need to find your one thing and make it easy for your users to talk about is critical.

Youtube is a fun and easy way to share video clips. Flickr is a fun and easy way to share pictures.

As Seth Godin points out in his great post on how ideas can become viral.

For an idea to spread, it needs to be sent and received.

No one “sends” an idea unless:
a. they understand it
b. they want it to spread
c. they believe that spreading it will enhance their power (reputation, income, friendships) or their peace of mind
d. the effort necessary to send the idea is less than the benefits

No one “gets” an idea unless:
a. the first impression demands further investigation
b. they already understand the foundation ideas necessary to get the new idea
c. they trust or respect the sender enough to invest the time

This explains why online ideas spread so fast but why they’re often shallow. Nietzsche is hard to understand and risky to spread, so it moves slowly among people willing to invest the time. Numa Numa, on the other hand, spread like a toxic waste spill because it was so transparent, reasonably funny and easy to share.

Notice that ideas never spread because they are important to the originator.

Notice too that a key dynamic in the spread of the idea is the capsule that contains it. If it’s easy to swallow, tempting and complete, it’s a lot more likely to get a good start.

At my new startup we talk often about our one thing.   The one thing that our community members will talk to each other about.  The one thing that will excite and inflame our users interest & amusement so that they will want to share our service with their friends.   Finding the one thing is harder then it looks, because it forces you to focus on the most essential parts of your idea and cut away all the other fat.   It’s also never just one thing.  It’s not just one feature, the name of the company or any one person involved in the project.

So it is with great sadness that we observed the passing of the god of the one thing, Jack Palance.   We talk about the following scene alot at our company.

What is your one thing?

YouTube Video Link

On Thu 16 Nov 2006.