Solving a problem rather than creating a product is a driving principle at Intuit. Noticing his wife’s frustration with paying bills and balancing the checkbook Intuit founder Scott Cook identified an opportunity. Quicken was created to help people track personal expenses. Users hire the software to help them accomplish the tasks associated with this goal. Functionally the product completes repetitive, numerical and standardized procedures. Emotionally it alleviates many frustrations generally associated with this process.
Until a product or service does something for its user it has little to no value. When a person can explain what something does and how it helps them it has fulfilled a need and they are likely to tell their friends. Once functional circumstances have emotional benefits you are on to something worthy of pursuit.
Attribute-based categorization merely indicates tendencies and is too general to be effective. It is like telling someone what they should do based on certain characteristics. Circumstance-based categorization is more reliable when making predictions because people faced with the same problem react in similar ways. It is like asking someone what they would do in a given situation. From my experience results are improved in the latter scenario.
The simple art of listening to, understanding and responding to the needs of users is the science behind Intuit’s success. Innovation is driven by customers not technologies. However, their products are based on circumstances of customers rather than attributes of segments. And that has made all the difference.
