Following A Trend Is The Triumph Of Laziness Over Creativity

Following a trend is easy, however, pushing yourself to look further and deeper can unlock creativity which leads to opportunities that everyone else is overlooking. So, how do you do this?

Step 1:

Identify widely held but untested assumptions - an example would the concept of ‘work from home’ isn’t feasible; Zoom identified this.

Step 2:

Map out the easiest potential market opportunity if these assumptions turn out to be false. Continuing with our previous example, Zoom mapped out that saving companies on intra-company international travel would be a low-hanging fruit for them to get corporates to sign-up for their service.

Step 3:

Changing existing behavior is difficult, so create tools that enable a smooth transition process. This can be in the form of on-site training, demos, extended trial periods, etc.

The biggest benefit of not following a trend is that you don’t waste your precious resources as a startup on competition. Those additional resources can make the difference between success and failure in the marketplace and all it cost you was some creativity.