As a product manager, I\u2019m a big fan of the\u00a0framework for finding causal reasons why people switch from one product to another.<\/p>\n
In the framework, we often talk about the importance of\u00a0energy<\/strong>. Energy manifests itself as the emotion and motivation customers have to make progress\u200a\u2014\u200ato make a potential switch to our products. Understanding how energy works, helps to make our products better.<\/p>\n In high school chemistry we learned about something called \u201cactivation energy\u201d. In any experiment, there needs to be enough activation energy for a chemical reaction to occur. Once the activation energy is achieved, the reaction just tumbles along.<\/p>\n In the above diagram, we start at the top left and at a certain state. Imagine the reaction is a small marble perched in the top ledge of the graph. What we need to do is supply just enough \u201cpush\u201d to the marble to get over that hump and then the marble will roll down the hill and produce change. The hump that needs to be overcome is called the activation energy.<\/p>\n In the same way, people looking to make progress must overcome a similar activation energy hump to move to a purchase. The hump in this case are the forces that are working against them\u200a\u2014\u200aThe\u00a0Anxiety of the new<\/em>\u00a0and theHabit of the present<\/em>.<\/p>\n \u201cAnxiety of the new\u201d is the fear of the future solution. Think about the fear you might feel when changing to a new job\u200a\u2014\u200ait\u2019s awesome because it\u2019s a new job, at the same time, there\u2019s lots of anxiety about the new situation (Will I get along with my co-workers, will my boss like me?).<\/p>\n The \u201cHabit of the present\u201d is the current situation being \u201cgood enough\u201d to satisfy any needs. Think about how hard it was to leave your old job (I know how things are done at this office. I have a lot of vacation saved up).<\/p>\n Potential customers need to get enough energy to overcome these hurdles and these come in the form of two forces:\u00a0Magnetism of the new<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0Push of the situation<\/em>.<\/p>\n The \u201cMagnetism of the new\u201d is the draw of the future solution. It\u2019s the vision of how life could be in the new world. (Maybe the new job you\u2019re thinking of is working on really big meaty problems. Maybe the new job has a super-smart team you admire).<\/p>\n The \u201cPush of the situation\u201d is the pain of the current solution. It\u2019s the problem with the present that makes life intolerable. (Maybe your current boss is not the greatest. Maybe the work isn\u2019t challenging you anymore).<\/p>\n Now in chemistry, there are two ways to overcome the hump of activation energy. One way is to supply\u00a0more energy<\/strong>\u200a\u2014\u200aturn up the heat on the bunsen burner, if you will.<\/p>\n In product marketing, often times we will \u201csupply more energy\u201d by playing up the \u201cMagnetism of the New\u201d. We\u2019ll tout the features and power of our new solution in an effort to increase the energy. What we don\u2019t realize is that in some chemical reactions there is something called \u201cNegative activation energy\u201d. When you turn up the heat, you actually decrease the rate of reaction! In the job example, the awesome new team you get to work with, might be intimidating at the same time! (Will I be able to keep up with these guys).<\/p>\n In Jobs To Be Done theory, this happens because as you\u00a0increase\u00a0<\/em>the \u201cMagnetism of the New\u201d\u200a\u2014\u200ayou\u2019re also\u00a0increasing<\/em>\u00a0the \u201cAnxiety of the New\u201d at the same time. The more you say how awesome the new thing is, the more you make the person fearful of the new thing. It\u2019s negative activation energy.<\/p>\n Instead of just applying more energy, we can look to the other way of overcoming activation energy\u200a\u2014\u200athe use of a\u00a0catalyst<\/em>. In chemistry, the catalyst is a substance that modifies the reaction so that the activation energy is lowered. Instead of supplying more energy, it lowers the amount of energy necessary to trigger the reaction.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" As a product manager, I\u2019m a big fan of the\u00a0framework for finding causal reasons why people switch from one product to another. In the framework, we often talk about the importance of\u00a0energy. Energy manifests itself as the emotion and motivation customers have to make progress\u200a\u2014\u200ato make a potential switch to our products. Understanding how energy…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7],"tags":[9],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rafalczarnowski.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rafalczarnowski.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rafalczarnowski.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rafalczarnowski.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rafalczarnowski.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=228"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rafalczarnowski.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/228\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rafalczarnowski.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rafalczarnowski.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rafalczarnowski.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Activation Energy<\/h3>\n
Applying More Energy<\/h3>\n
Using a Catalyst<\/h3>\n