What's your hidden population?

I spend a lot of time working in different parts of the city and often it's most efficient for me to just find a cafe to work in between meetings.


Time and again places claim to have wi-fi (McDonalds, Starbucks and many smaller cafes) but it is in name only, with the non-functional reality leaving me silently enraged or worse, wondering through the cafe balancing my open laptop trying to chase signal strength. 


I wonder, what would a place that offered guaranteed high speed wi-fi in every location achieve? And what is the size of the hidden population that suddenly would flock to these stores on a regular basis? According to IDC the mobile workforce was 29% of the population in 2008 and is estimated to reach 34.9% or 1.2bn by 2013. 


There are an increasing number of organisations servicing the mobile worker such as Roam, The Hub, select Regus locations. In the U.S. Chick-fil-a not only offers Wi-Fi but a few locations have turned their play areas into business meeting rooms in order to accommodate the increasing demand.


So, perhaps this isn't the most hidden population, but the point is - what percent of the available traffic for your store would come back again and again if you absolutely committed to meeting their needs, every time? 


You? Why not get ethnographic and watch the behaviour in your store or showroom, what can you see that people aren't saying? Look for behaviour of people making things fit their needs. Is it someone pulling out their own USB stick? Struggling to find a place to put their shopping? Students from the nearby university that check the menu and then keep walking? What's your hidden population?

A lessen in expectation and passion from Joan Collins (or rather, her audience)

Attending an event at the glorious Theatre Royal Haymarket today, a Master Class with Joan Collins, it was a reminder about passion. And about people. 


Funnily enough it wasn't from Ms Collins (who is absolutely an inspiration in terms of determination, pragmatism and traffic-stopping legs at any age!). Rather, it was after, speaking to people involved with the Master Class, the theatre and acting in general. They have their own language, what to me would be famous actors are master practitioners and dramatic practice becomes the craft. 


People have enormous, life-dedicating passion to the craft. But if I passed them on the street, or saw them in-store I would type-cast them as an X-type consumer. 


It was a vivid, candid and razor witted reminder that people are not defined by their 'type', they are defined by their passions. 


I wonder what you find if you ask some of your customers about their passions? 




*The Master Class is about to do some even more exciting projects - I recommend you learn more about this very positive organisation supporting London Youth and sign up for updates at http://www.masterclass.org.uk/.