My Daily Emails

Touch doesn’t make a decision, but it sure can shape it. Researchers at Bocconi University ran a series of experiments that touches close to home. Participants were asked to hold familiar objects,

For decades, translucent plastic and glowing colors meant progress, optimism, and technological magic. Yesterday I wrote about Jell-O losing relevance as consumer tastes pushed away from artificiality. But the product accomplished something

Convenience products age horribly when the culture grows past them. When I was a kid, Jell-O had STATUS. Not luxury status. Futuristic status, man. At family gatherings, someone would inevitably arrive carrying

Sometimes the smartest strategy is recognizing the battlefield has already changed. In military planning there’s a term called O.B.E., which stands for “Overcome By Events.”* Imagine spending months planning and

Gollum reminds us that the strongest products change the way customers talk about them. Watching The Hobbit film series with my daughters, I thought about how much is packed into a

Mass adoption happens when enough people feel safe following the signal. I realized something when discussing my recent missive about wired earbuds coming back. I say “permission” a lot, but

When the economics flip, adoption becomes the default. China’s logistics sector is moving quickly toward electric heavy trucks, and the signal ain’t environmental positioning. It’s COST. Startups like Windrose Technology are building

Attention used to be delivered. Now you have to earn it, moment by moment. I wrote recently about how QVC built a powerhouse by creating and perfecting a format that still dominates

New research shows buying decisions change when people recognize a gap in their understanding. A fresh new study explores what happens when people look into one ethical aspect of a

The internet loves a “THIS will destroy Apple” story. Most misunderstand the product strategy involved. I’ve seen a wave of posts claiming that Apple is in deep, dark trouble because the European

When value happens can matter more than the value itself. A study on temporal framing looked at a familiar problem. Most folks say they care about the environment. Yet we

Reputation seldom moves markets the way you’d expect. The Ford Pinto is one of those products you name and it instantly triggers a reaction in people of a certain age. Rear-end collision.

Shake it off: not even Taylor Swift and Kylie Jenner own their Instagram followers. A few days ago, Instagram carried out what some are calling the “Great Purge of 2026.”

Patents can protect an invention, but they rarely protect a category once it proves valuable. When Steve Jobs introduced the iPhone in 2007, he made a point of saying they had “patented the heck

The most effective product signals lately are the ones nobody paid to create. “The Devil Wears Prada” gave luxury fashion a cultural shortcut. You didn’t need to explain what Prada

The most powerful product moments happen when a brand shows up in something we really care about. During a lunar flyby for Artemis II, a jar of Nutella floated by, through the cabin

When timing matters, the best solution lets you experience it. Barilla partnered with Spotify to create playlists that match the cooking time of different pasta shapes. You boil the water, plip-plop-plunk in the

I love it when a gimmicky invention gets legs that just won’t quit. The BIC 4 Colours pen arrived in 1970, created by Marcel Bich at BIC, and on the surface it looked like a

Adoption often follows visibility more than product upgrades. Wired headphones were in decline for years, steadily replaced by wireless options that deliver convenience, status, and a cleaner aesthetic. Then something

When identity becomes the product, pricing can get out of hand. There’s a wild blip happening in who buys beauty now. Gen Z boys and ten-year-old girls are showing up

A legit Nigerian prince is helping bust counterfeiters. Vaseline has launched a campaign in Nigeria that takes one of the internet’s oldest tropes and turns it into something useful. The “Nigerian

We always overestimate tech in the short run and underestimate it in the long run. Big mistake. Amara’s Law shows up in pretty much every wave of innovation. We expect

People are still buying, but the emotional weight of spending keeps amping up. A fresh reading from the University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers shows sentiment dropping to 49.8 in April, the

The Boston clog shows how a product can expand usage without changing its core logic. The Birkenstock Boston clog keeps outperforming the sandal category, including in colder markets where open

If a product becomes part of the story, placement feels more like a character. My wife and daughters have been counting down to today’s release of The Devil Wears Prada

Great product strategy begins with the outcome you want to create. At Apple Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) 1997, Steve Jobs was confronted by a belligerent developer in a super-awkward moment that could have

AI is changing how people learn stuff, but not necessarily how they buy. I came across an intriguing new study by researchers at Harvard Business School and Stanford examining exactly

Obsolete products don’t disappear if they solve a different kind of need. Luxury watch sales have been climbing again. Rolex, along with brands like Patek Philippe and Audemars Piguet, continues to post strong

Performance improves when visuals attract and text resolves. Look at the Apple AirPods Pro 3 page and the balance is immediate. A clean product visual (that morphs into an animation loop on

The thing that matters is what gets meaningfully better for the customer. Last month, JD.com launched Joybuy across markets including the U.K. and Germany, stepping directly into competition with Amazon, Temu, and AliExpress. At first glance, it

Under cost pressure, spending gets reallocated toward faster emotional returns. On Wednesday L’Oréal reported 6.7% like-for-like sales growth, beating expectations as demand held strong across the U.S., Europe, and emerging

When your brand name doesn’t carry the benefit, your customer bears the cognitive load. A strong product name does more than label. It preloads the reason to care. The research

When a brand embeds behavior into the product moment, is it helpful or overreach? KitKat has introduced “Break Mode” in Panama, developed with Ogilvy, turning its wrapper into a functional signal blocker

The structure of a deal can change how valuable it feels, EVEN when the math stays the same. New research looked at something marketers tend to assume is straightforward: Discounts.

A leadership change can unlock decisions that have been economically or culturally out of reach. Will this one? Apple has named John Ternus as its next CEO, with Tim Cook stepping aside after 15 years

Two technically identical claims can create very different levels of trust. I came across a deep study that tested something most product teams I know would dismiss as a formatting

The risk is being unable to move when the future arrives. Qurate Retail Group built QVC into a powerhouse by mastering a format that still dominates product sales today. A host, a product,

What happens when central distribution controls the demand itself? For years, Bath & Body Works staunchly resisted Amazon. The logic was sound, and the kind I encourage. Control the experience, protect margins,

Even a perfect solution can get erased by something bigger than the problem it solves. Years ago, I bought a Tile after losing my wallet, which had somehow slipped behind the clothes

Markets reward narrative shifts faster than customers ever could. Allbirds (the minimalist wool sneaker company) just announced it’s pivoting out of shoes and into AI infrastructure, with plans to rebrand as

External forces don’t help categories equally. Yesterday I wrote about rising fuel prices accelerating EV adoption. The exact same trigger is yielding a totally different outcome somewhere else. Luxury sales

Adoption curves can change faster from geopolitics than from product innovation. Tension around the Strait of Hormuz has pushed oil prices up at historic rates. That narrow passage carries a significant share

What feels obvious to you may be completely invisible to your customer. A while back, I wrote about Lay’s discovering something surprising. A large portion of people didn’t know Lay’s chips were

The first place your product is seen may no longer be a store, a search result, or an ad. I wrote recently about how Shopify products can now be discovered

It’s not a coincidence. Sadly, it’s the model. I wrote recently about ensh*ttification. Products start off great, pull you in, then gradually take value away while switching costs rise. YouTube is

Some distribution channels are designed to sell. Others, to SPREAD. I’m working with a client on a fun vending machine product. I won’t share details quite yet, but it has

Scaling revenue without fixing friction is how small flaws become massive liabilities. In Chapter 20 of I Need That, I make a point founders don’t like to hear. When you scale

When a core ingredient in an iconic product gets swapped out, it’s rarely a marketing experiment. Ya don’t put chicken in a Big Mac by accident. Lately, I’ve been seeing billboards for

If nothing bad has happened yet, people tend to assume it won’t. Here’s how to get around that. I’ve written about status quo biases before, but there’s a cousin that

Lower prices don’t often fix a product strategy problem. Tesla just reported first-quarter deliveries of about 358,000 vehicles. Way below expectations, again. Production continues to outpace sales by a wide margin.