The 24-Hour Customer: New Rules for Winning in a Time-Starved, Always-Connected Economy [Hardcover]

Adrian C. Ott (Author)

Book Description

Release date: August 10, 2010

Time is not money. Time is more important than money.

Today's customers are overwhelmed, overworked, and overstressed, and it seems that everyone--from CEOs to soccer moms--is short on time and inundated with information. As a result, despite the availability of 24/7 commerce and countless ways of engaging people in our multiscreen (mobile, TV, and PC) economy, companies find it more difficult than ever to claim even a fraction of the 1,440 minutes in their customers' precious 24 hours.

In The 24-Hour Customer, Adrian C. Ott, CEO of a successful Silicon Valley consultancy, argues that companies need to strategically harness the ebbs and flows of customer time and attention in order to win in today's competitive landscape. She explores the economics of time and attention, including why customers will devote hours addicted to social networks, yet will say "I have no time!" to other offerings. Based on extensive research and real-world results with market-leading companies, this book provides tools, such as Time-Value Tradeoffs and Time-ographics, that pinpoint opportunities to increase revenue and gain market traction.

Filled with fascinating case studies from companies like Johnson & Johnson, Amazon, and iPhone app start-ups, The 24-Hour Customer offers fresh ideas for capitalizing on the elements of time, attention, and value to innovate never-before-considered products, services, and programs for today's Über-connected, multitasking customer. Readers will discover how:

• Time-Slicing: How breaking a product into smaller time segments opens up new markets of customers that were too busy to consume the offering in the past.  Examples: Twitter (microblogging); Digital Chocolate (mobile phone games that 'Seize the Minute').
• Time-Magnets: Why more time is more money. How to tap into triggers that extend the amount of time that customers spend with your business. 
• Time on Autopilot:  How P&G leverages inattention by enabling habit-formation for some of its most successful brands.
• Time-Shifting: Why giving customers control of their time increases sales.

This book shares the latest strategic weapons for achieving market leadership and will change the way executives think about their businesses and their customers.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Remember the old adage "time is money"? It's outdated, argues Ott, a consultancy firm CEO; time is now much more important than money to consumers. It is also a consistently overlooked and misunderstood factor driving buying decisions, and companies that build their products or services around the customer's willingness to invest precious time and attention are gaining competitive traction in markets where their competitors, who approach the new dynamic by simply getting more strident in their marketing, are increasingly slipping. Ott offers specific advice and "Two Minute Takeaways" at the conclusion of each chapter to address the all-important "Time-Value Tradeoff." She illustrates her points with case studies of companies that have gotten it right, such as Symantec, Netflix, Amazon, and FreshDirect. Ott's accessible tone and systematic strategies will be an eye-opener for companies wishing to drive through the constant marketing chatter and reach their increasingly harried customers.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Library Journal

Marketing is often defined with the four Ps: product, promotion, place, and pricing. Ott (CEO & founder, Exponential Edge, Inc.) is revolutionizing marketing by adding the concept of time. Dimensions of time, especially its alternative uses, are major factors in consumers' decisions. She here shows business professionals how to integrate the different components of time in consumers' lifestyles into marketing strategies, especially to gain competitive advantage, build brand loyalty, and offer successful brand extensions. Ott respects readers' time by offering "Two-Minute Takeaways," or chapter summaries, and by including several sidebars in gray-shaded boxes that contain tables and charts illuminating important points. She presents many company case studies, discussing the ways Fresh Direct and Symantec gained success by recognizing the importance of time. VERDICT Ott's eye-opening arguments will appeal to business readers who want their companies to remain viable in ever-changing and evolving marketplaces. Perhaps the only business constant is that consumers have time preferences. Recommended. -Caroline Geck, Newark Public Schs., NJ Copyright 2010 Reed Business Information.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: HarperBusiness; 1 edition (August 10, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061798614
• ISBN-13: 978-0061798610
• Product Dimensions: 6 x 0.9 x 9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (31 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #520,496 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Adrian C. Ott, CEO and founder of Exponential Edge, Inc., was called "one of Silicon Valley's most respected (if not the most respected) strategists" by Consulting Magazine. She works with relentless visionary executives in Fortune 500 and start-ups to achieve market leadership in today's exponential economy. She was named Silicon Valley Enterprising Woman of the Year by NAWBO-SV in 2011.

In addition to consulting, she writes a popular column at FastCompany, and her work has been featured in Harvard Business Review, Strategy & Leadership Journal, The Washington Post and Forbes. The 24-Hour Customer was named a Best Business Book of the Year by Library Journal (2010) and USA Book News (2011)

She regularly speaks at industry events such as TEDx, and lectures at top universities including the University of California, Berkeley, Harvard Business School, Rice University, and Carnegie Mellon.

Prior to founding Exponential Edge in 2001, she was an HP executive who was recognized in an annual report for "infusing HP with new revenue streams and new technologies and new business models." She holds an MBA from the Harvard Business School and a B.S. from U.C. Berkeley.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars How and why a Customer Time-Value mindset can achieve a decisive competitive advantage October 20, 2010

By Robert Morris HALL OF FAMETOP 100 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover

What Adrian C. Ott characterizes as a Customer Time-Value (CTV) mindset takes into full account the fact that consumers are investing less time and less attention in purchase decisions. They are better informed now than ever before. (Reviews such as this one offer an excellent example of how Amazon accommodates a reader's need for information about a given book.) Experts on time management offer suggestions as to how to achieve more and better results in less time within a finite timeframe that has remained constant throughout human history 168-hours in a week) since Egyptians first divided the day (and night) into 24 temporal hours.

Today, consumers seem to have a form of ADD. They have the same amount of time as their ancestors did but much less patience. Efforts to capture their attention have created an ever-increasing "clutter" of sensory messages and even then, the attention span resembles a strobe light blink.

What to do?

Ott offers a wealth of information, insights, and recommendations to survive (and hopefully thrive) in a "time-starved, always-connected economy." She highlights a number of companies that have applied a customer time-centric and attention-centric lens to their business, such as Amazon, Cisco, Costco, Disney, FedEx, Google, John & Johnson, Nike, Procter & Gamble, and Southwest Airlines. As she notes, "the company case studies that I highlight may not have used my terms to describe their approach (or used any names at all, for that matter), but they are applying a Customer Time-Value mindset and many of the new rules that became apparent to me as I looked across companies for commonalities.

Time Out: Although Ott offers a number of the largest global corporations as exemplars of the principles (if not the specifics) of Customer Time-Value (CTV), she also examines a number of start-up and fledgling companies because what she affirms and recommends is relevant to all organization s, whatever their size and nature may be.

For example, in the first two chapters alone, she provides a wealth of practical material that explains how to

o Understand the differences between the "Old Rules" and "New Rules"
o Conduct a time-ographics analysis to determine time allocation
o Turn customer time-value into market traction
o Trigger events that drive purchasing behavior
o Capture time and attention opportunities
o Map customer activity
o Deliver value by shifting boundaries of time and attention
o Increase time value
o Formulate time boundary strategies
o Provide instant gratification
o Deliver time-critical value
o Influence time and attention by targeting the senses
o Leverage "captive time"

Mind you, all this in just the first two chapters. Better yet, Ott provides a "Two-Minute Takeaway" section at the conclusion of each of the first six chapters. This reader-friendly device will facilitate, indeed expedite frequent review of most of Ott's key points.

Those who read the book make frequent purchases in-person and/or online. When considering and making a purchase decision (one of the options is not to buy), presumably they assign great value to their time and energy as well as to the ease and convenience in combination with the selection and quality of what the seller offers.

This is a "must read" for anyone who needs to understand what are indeed the "new rules" of what is indeed "a time-starved, always-connected economy."

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Forward-thinking treatise on leveraging time to sell products and services in a hurried world April 6, 2011

By Rolf Dobelli HALL OF FAMETOP 1000 REVIEWER

Format:Hardcover

No one has enough time today. In her heavily researched book, corporate strategist Adrian C. Ott explores this issue and its implications for businesses. She proposes innovative practices that transform consumers' increasing lack of time into a fulcrum that can boost sales. Conscious of her readers' time limitations, Ott provides handy "Two-Minute" capsules that summarize each chapter's main points. getAbstract recommends Ott's timely advice and her new methodologies for increasing your sales while saving your customers time and trouble.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Overwhelmingly Timely and Timeless August 29, 2010

By Juletta

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

This is a must-read, must-act book, especially if you think you have no time! Adrian Ott pulls no punches: consumer time and attention are commodities on auction 24/7. This timely book is supported by extensive, in-depth research; insightful case studies, and timeless strategies to effectively capture business executives' and consumer's decision-making consciousness and turn them into new business opportunities and viable market positions. It is compulsory reading for business managers, marketers and business/marketing students.