My only counter argument to disruption theory is that everyone in business wants to be the innovator because the remarkable success stories are always about innovators. It’s a much more interesting story, and much more highly rewarded, than just making a solid product that people want. But that rat race at the core is still a huge business opportunity, if you take the time to get it right. In that sense, I think it’s as much about listening as it is about having a masterful response to what you hear–whether you’re listening at the periphery in order to innovate, or whether you’re listening at the core in order to sustain. I’ll have an update on that with regard to Kodak today.

I’ll respond to your innovation vs. marketing post on your site.

The key to doing that actually has less to do with social media and more to do with selective listening. Do you listen to your most demanding core customers or to your peripheral customers who are hacking and improvising new uses for your stuff? Disruption theory argues that you should listen/watch at the periphery, not the core, for leadership opportunities, because the core is a rat race.

I’d be interested in your take on my recent piece on innovation vs. marketing views of the world.

You’ve invoked one of the classic dichotomies of corporate strategy–what the ivory tower marketing geeks talk about as the difference between Market Leading and Market Following strategies. Market followers don’t innovate, they just follow customer demand. Market Leaders innovate and show customers what’s possible. Apple is a clear market leader, with a gift for showing us more than we imagine–but how many Apples are there in the world? Not many. It’s much safer, and much easier to be a market follower and try to scrape profits out of efficiently meeting customer demands, and I have no doubt that many companies will use social media for exactly that purpose–ie: they’re not as interested in connecting with their customers as they are squeezing an efficient profit out of a target segment. But I think social media provides an opportunity for more companies to be innovators, simply by participating more meaningfully in the communities that sustain them. If you understand the real needs of the community because your a participant, and not a detached observer looking at “profiles” and “needs” through the microscope of focus groups, I think you have a much better shot at anticipating innovation opportunities beyond the stated wish lists of your customers. But then, I’m an optimist.

As an employee of the big company across the street from Kodak, this certainly interests me. One thing that I wonder about though, is that social media may allow unwary companies become too customer-driven. When you say things like “cleaned up the entire list” it worries me as an engineer. Perhaps this case was the weird exception, but in general, the design tradeoffs in engineering, not to mention plain old design conceptual integrity and aesthetics, will rarely let a good product be totally driven by customer expectation.

The challenge for companies will be to take the voice of the customer and add that high concept design insight that pulls enough together in a beautiful way to move the needle of expectations to the next level.

And yeah, you’re right. A sure sign that your strategy is working is that your best customers start grumbling about the next generation of features