Treating Information As A Service Not A Product

from the thinking-alike dept

I'm very close to finishing up a longer article I'm writing with an almost identical title to this one I found this morning. It's something I've been working on for a while, but it's still good to see others have come to the identical conclusion completely independently. One of the biggest problems online today is the simple fact that too many content producers view content as a "good" and not as a "service". From an economics standpoint, it changes (almost completely) how you position yourself, and what you're offering to your customers. The problem is that offering a service usually takes some amount of thought - whereas offering a "good" seems very straightforward. The problem is that information isn't a good. The fact that it's universally copyable at no cost means that the basic economics that applies to a "good" doesn't apply to information. However, when viewed as a service, that is providing some sort of continual future benefits, there are tremendous opportunities that open up. This article points out the specific "opportunities" in viewing information as a service, and also suggest what's holding companies back from embracing these opportunities: "The top three candidates are media owners who are still transfixed by a fast-eroding model based on the belief that content is king; marketers who are fixated on sending messages that few people want to receive; and product and service suppliers for whom it's a new and unfamiliar area outside of their normal skillset." Definitely a worthwhile read, and great incentive for me to finish my article on the subject.

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