The New Content

I am excited by the blurring of the lines between our digital and physical worlds that we are seeing the moment.

In a roundabout way, this has been coming for a while, with its roots in 'shared-ownership' of entertainment media. We have had book and movie/music libraries for quite a while of course; they are continually evolving in various forms – how about an Amazon eLibrary on the Kindle, free to the end user and paid for by local councils (BookLending.com in partnership maybe)? After all Spotify has successfully managed to build a business that (just about) delivers free music to consumers and provides revenues for the record labels.

This model is also present with the more tangible objects of our world. Street/Zip-car have long understood that consumers are adept at weighing up the value and cost of owning a high cost item vs. paying for it when you need it. While this does not mean downloadable cars (at least not yet) - it does mean that a new car is just a cheaper subscription fee away – and this mindset is showing itself cheaper, in-frequent use categories such as D.I.Y tools and fashion bags, with Fashion Bags for example. And of course, it has made entrepreneurs of us all, giving us the ability to unlock the potential of the physical assets we own. Airbnb the peer to peer accommodation service is the current high-flyer, but expect many more examples to follow soon.

What this adds up to is an evolving relationship between us, these items and the channels to using them. With ownership no longer a pre-requisite to use,  physical objects have effectively been 'positioned' alongside digital content, enabling people to choose the cheapest/most flexible/quickest/etc ... service to access this new 'content'. 

And for us (and our clients)? We will need to continually evaluate the decisions people make when looking to solve their needs. Knowing what people consider 'content' (therefore a commodity) and what they consider 'service' (therefore ownable) will be a key aspect how we shape future interactions with brands and organisations. It is this shifting relationship that will provide the most exciting opportunities ... 

Posted via email from rosstimms's posterous