Equally important: LSM helps you do this in 3 days. First you validate your customers actually have a problem worth fixing. Then you test the attractiveness of your solution. Finally, you validate that your solution would make them really happy. Ordinary entrepreneurs spend years doing this, if they ever figure it out. Want to know more ? Check out this great video about the Experiment Board. With great thanks to the inspiring team at Aim for the Moon, who helped organize everything. Don’t forget to check out the cool video impression of the event at the end of this blog, made by Amstelworks.

‘Nough said about the method. How about them concepts ? Bet you want to know who is going to be the Airbnb of Bicycles or the Spotify of Porn, right ? Well, I can’t guarantee that you will find the next IPO’s among the list below. But I am sure you will find great inspiration. Realize most of these concepts (click to enlarge the visual and see how the concepts started before pivoting many, many times) were created by teams that were formed in 15 minutes.  Enjoy.

Dominium On Demand Offers. This team validated their base problem quickly: a lot of people get special offers about the wrong products at the wrong time. So these guys came up with a concierge service that makes sure you get special offers for the product you want when you want it. On Demand. This team won. Not because they had the most innovative idea (admitted: many, many companies are active in this space) but because they learned the most, followed the process with the greatest discipline. And that is a great guarantee that they will eventually create a service that would kick the shit out of competing, sexier solutions.

Dine with the Dutch. This team started life as Ticker, an app that helped find your friends. And pivoted towards my personal favourite and 3rd prize winner: let expats/tourists dine at a real Dutch home. Especially relevant in this country since expats – after a beer or two – will tell you that everything is great about this country except you’re never invited spontaneously to a Dutchman’s home. We suck at being hospitable. These guys came up with a solution to match expats wanting to eat at a local’s home with Dutchies willing to open their doors and cook some stamppot. The team validated expat demand for this but had little time to check the Dutch side. However, I give them the benefit of the doubt: a) I would do it. b) we’re in the sharing economy c) the Dutch love showing off their (supposedly) great English skills and d) they would earn money ; ) Can’t wait for this to go live !

Studeaal ended up with a Grouponishy app that offers special deals for students in small, specialized shops. But it started as a location-based app drawing people away from supermarkets to small local shops using special promotions. Turned out they had to specify their target group to students. Th lack of initial reactions indicated these might b too lazy to get out of bed to save a buck. Maybe if there is more of an experience like the tweeting bakeries ?

Booked. Great name. Started as a Spotify for studybooks but pivoted after discovering students were not ready for digital reading yet (!). The problem of expensive study books validated, ended as a book-renting service that lets you rent the books for a period of time. Or maybe they ended with a Blendle for studybooks with the option to print. Well, if they can make any of these two work they could make a lot of students happy.

HappyDeal. Very brave, fun team. Started with a mission to make people happier, no solution in mind at the start. Tried to validate a stress problem for professionals not happy with work. Turned out they might have a stress problem but did not want to talk about it, making it harder to validate. So the Team thought about addressing the Taboo of talking about work-related stress and unhappiness.

I suggested (illegally, you’re not supposed to do this as a mentor) a service that let’s you talk to a boss, not your boss. But they were wise enough not to follow this. So what do you do when unhappy people don’t want help or talk about it ? You get the people involved that do want to do something about it: their friends. Brilliant. After great unhappiness (very fitting) in the first phase, the team ended on a high with their HappyDeal for friends, as the video above shows. Runner-up for the best Team. Congrats.

ForPlay. Just love that name, extra points ; ) These guys got an honourable mention (we were out of prizes) for an app that allows interaction between friends during a football match, about that match. From betting who will score when to auctioning a date with one of the football player’s wives (just kidding. Or not ?). It adds an extra layer of social interaction. Initial problem: matches are boring and require spicing up. Second hypothesis: fans cannot find a friend to watch the match with. Slightly different but validated problem: it’s difficult to interact with buddies during match using various apps, devices. So let’s fix that with a new app !

Cr(e)ate. The foldable bike crate was one of the concepts that was already pretty much defined when entering LSM weekend. I believe all teams with pre-existing ideas demonstrated why the Experiment Board is so powerful: they all had difficulty being openminded about their precious idea. Initially, this team found the problem – you can’t easily park a bike with crate – invalidated after interviews. After a few pivots they decided to skip some corners are just try to sell the prototype. And it worked ! Now they just need to figure out which problems it solves ; )

24 hours. The Dutch have the best DJ’s so you can expect a cool concept around Dance. Initially, the Team thought their target audience was looking for more democratic lineups. Sort of like Picatic meets Live on Demand. But it turned out people trusted the event organizers to come up with great lineups. But a new problem surfaced: events are getting massive. Hence the pivot: access smaller, exclusive events via social. If you join you can invite others. Closed after 24 hours !

Parkswap had a simple, great solution before testing the crowd: the Airbnb of parking spaces. But either the team hit on the wrong interviewees (Nah, I got my car parked, right ?!), nobody ever has parking problems (yeah right, this is Amsterdam !) or they blew the initial experiment by asking the wrong questions (would you mind making us rich by solving your parking problem ? Dutch people don’t like others being more successful). But then they took revenge with a nastily smart idea: rent a parking permit from locals. I foresee some legal obstacles but these are to be conquered !

HelloBread was one of my favourites. Launched by some of the LSM organizers, they were keen to set an example. And they did. Nice concept: an envelope with fresh bread in Yuppies’ mailboxes at 6:30 am, sourced from local bakeries. I was sceptical about the problem: would many people really pay for the service ? With a prototype in hand, they managed to get a lot of subscribers. Given they were part of the organization, I felt free to suggest all kinds of ‘improvements’ to the concept such as the integration with Blendle (headlines printed on the inside of the packaging with QR codes). They must have incorporated these just to be polite or they are simply not to be trusted. Either way, I never got the 15% equity stake in the company promised to me. By blowing their presentation (deliberately ?) they compensated for their organizers headstart and did not make it to the top 3. But they’ll be further testing the concept this week !

Rent a Bus wants to target the huge touring car industry. Intransparent, inconvenient. But the initial hypothesis – event organizers find the searching and comparing cumbersome – was invalidated. They ended with a promising new angle: enrich the market with reviews and rich content (photos) to facilitate better matchmaking. Their business case shows an annual 1,5 million euro profit. To be validated ; )

Candycrush is an intrapreneurial team from a game developer trying out new concepts for their business. Before the pivot, the team assumed players of Candycrush would be getting bored after playing for a few weeks/months. After discovering longtime CandyCrush players were still solidly hooked and satisfied with the game, they got a hit on their next solution: offer discounts from favoured brands when reaching new levels. Although technically challenging (at least, that’s what experts told me), an interesting mashup.

The Lean Accountant started life as a CFO that hated expense reports. This productive team probably held the pivoting record of the weekend after discovering that neither employees nor the Finance people saw great problems in the expense system. Their relentless interviewing helped them discover a promising nugget: accountants fear that automation is taking away their jobs. So the Team took a surprising, smart turn: why not offer the Lean methodology through training/workshops to accountants so they can pivot their propositions ! To be continued…

The AppSocial Team held the belief that small app developers will never get a decent position in the app charts given the marketing power of large app houses. So why not help them with smart market insights so they can create apps that will find the sweetspot ? The lack of positive reactions revealed a disconnect. Switch to the app users: would knowing more about their friends’ favourite apps make it easier to buy/download the right apps ? 70% said yes. Next hurdle: build the b*tch !

CareerBooster wanted to help people change jobs. But after several interviews they found only starters saw this as a problem. What to offer ? A personal coach for 99 euro per hour ? Nah. A free online seminar (with coach afterwards)  ? No clicks. The question remains: a botched experiment or barking up the wrong tree ?

First Step to Greatness (epic name, might not work in Calvinistic Holland but surely in the US ?) wants to fix the internship market. Intransparent, leading to lots of suboptimal matches. And yes, they turned out to be right but not with the broad segment of ‘anyone having to do an internship’. After pivoting to higher-educated youngsters, they offered finding an internship with a guaranteed match for 150 euro. Or your money back. Or 6 months of your life ; )

Poki was another game concept, taken from a gaming company’s product development inventory. Problem definition: you can’t play your favourite games on your mobile’s browser. Pivot (hold on to your hat): we make sure you will never be surprised by a 40 euro bill for apps your kids downloaded on your phone. How ? By building a kids-appropriate game platform via a subscription model. And: accessible via a mobile’s browser (some parts never die). The Team faced some challenges when they wanted to talk to kids as their target audience and parents treated them like drug dealers. But perseverance (and talking to the parents) got them to discover the real opportunity !

Storage XXL starts out as the Airbnb of storage space but quickly makes its ideal segment more specific: people offering/needing 25m2+. Apparently, professional players do not even offer this or at outrageous prices. But is there real demand ? The team hits buyers and sellers on marktplaats, Holland’s Ebay. First it’s really slow. Then I personally witness them chatting to a seller and buyer of 50m2 storage space within 5 minutes with a 50 euro/month positive pricing difference. How’s that for a validation: two phonecalls to make 50 euro/month ? Let’s scale !!!

123 Energiezuinig started with a software solution for helping installation companies save energy in houses. It turns out that after several pivots, helping home-owners to save energy is not an easy feat. Yes, they find it challenging to maneuver the various solutions that might help you do so. But they appear not sufficiently motivated to do something about it. The Team concluded with a simple setup: get a free energy-saving advice and then find your installation expert. No validation yet. What could push it forward ? Target only people with humongous energy bills (me) ? Add a crossover of any of these energy-saving apps ?

May these ideas inspire you. Let me know if you want to be hooked up with these entrepreneurs or with LSM itself. I believe Lean Startup Machine as a methodology is as buzzable as these concepts. Personally, I started on a serious validation track for a new business I am starting.

Stay Lean.

P.s. for more photos, go here... For tweets, check #lsmamsterdam !

Cooking for Peace. A few years ago I visited Capetown’s infamous, troubled township of Khayelitsha. A local female entrepreneur had just become a bit of an international celebrity and local source of inspiration by promoting her B&B as a place to stay during the 2010 World Championship Football. Tourists staying overnight in townships was pretty much unheard of up to that point. Jumping over to the culinary arena, one of the most celebrated cookbooks of the last years is Jerusalem, written by Israeli pseudo-vegetarian Ottolenghi and his Palestinian counterpart Sami Tamimi. In this blog, I showed how mediators are creating buzzable services around divorce and other personal conflicts.

The Crazy Ones. I am sure there are hundreds of similar examples. But examples of what you ask ? Well, of entrepreneurs providing a positive influence in troubled regions in the world. Of creating constructive action where others persist in battling each other. Of seeing opportunity where others see opposition. I believe the reason entrepreneurs deviate in their behaviour is so simple it is easily overlooked. In conflict, most people tend to harden their stance and focus on preventing further damage or risk. Vulnerability could prove deadly and any action could trigger terrible consequences.

Opportunity knocks. But entrepreneurs look at problems differently. They are utterly, passionately focused on one simple thing: opportunity. The opportunity to create new value. Obviously conflict areas present huge opportunities to create value. The greater the misery, the greater the potential value, improvement in conditions to be created. Read Why Greece is in better shape than Germany for a great example on this phenomenon.

Parachute entrepreneurs into conflict areas ? And ultimately that drive is stronger than all the negative emotions that keep people fighting. Bcause in essence, humans are economic animals. If they see a way to be better off, they will follow it. People do not belong to groups for social purposes. We do that to profit from it. So if a few entrepreneurs can show the way to the opportunity, others will jump on the profit train as well and set their other emotions aside. So how could we use this force of nature to our advantage ? We can’t very well drop an airplane load of entrepreneurs over a conflict area and expect them to bring everyone to their senses by creating great value in everyone’s lives. Or could we ?

The Power of Many. Well, maybe not literally. But we live in a time that is rapidly producing tools that enable the forces of entrepreneurship to flow freely. And they might be used to help resolve international conflict. So let’s dive into the wonderful world of startups. To start new businesses, you need ideas. What better way to get them than to crowdsource them ?

“… the process by which the power of the many can be leveraged to accomplish feats that were once the province of a specialized few.”

Cities and communities have been crowdsourcing solutions for neighborhoods for a decade, so why not get your ideas for new products and services from Palestinians, Israeli, Ukrainians and Russians ? Think about it: in conflict areas you typically miss a lot of stuff you used to have or would love to have.

Hackathons & Lean Startups. During a truce, a Hackathon could be organized with entrepreneurs from both sides. A Bring Your Enemy Get 40% Discount might work better to break the ice than your typical Early Bird. Building on the crowdsourced ideas, mixed teams of entrepreneurs get hacking, rapid prototyping (no weapons please) and validating their concepts using Lean Startup Machine or Value Proposition Canvas tools.

Crowdfunding & X-Prizes. At the end of the two days all concepts are published on a crowdfunding platform. The entire conflict region can now push its favourites, boost the economy, get in on the action and start to shift mindsets to growth and prosperity. Alternatively, an X-Prize kind of incentive could be offered to solve a region’s conflict. X Prize’s founder Diamandis became a celebrity when he offered 10 million dollars to the first non-governmental team in the world that would put a man in space in a reusable vehicle. Three things are remarkable about the approach:

1. More than one team succeeded, in a timeframe that was deemed impossible
2. The teams all combined invested a total of 100 million dollars to get to the 10 million.
3. Diamandis did not have the money when he launched the challenge. That’s entrepreneurship for you.

New solutions, new markets. Whichever way you fund, new products and services will be kickstarted. Security firms that create safe passages for people. Delivery services that ship products from one area to another. Companies that provide access to shared computers and online tutoring. Solar-power solutions and build-your-own-mobile phones. And yes, there will still be risk. But if people have a vested interest in the success of these ventures the pressure will be on to keep the people running them safe.

Incubate Peace. To structurally boost this process, Accelerator, Startup BootCamps and other incubator programs should be setup in conflict areas specifically designed to stimulate cross-border startups teams and products/concepts that bring people together and have them collaborate/share. Entrepreneurship Awards like the GSEA will be given to reward the pioneers and stimulate others.

You might think this to be a highly naieve and romantic view on how humanity works. But without silly dreams nothing of importance would ever be created. Any thoughts on how to make this silly idea better ?

Let’s hack some peace.

“Honey, I have decided to leave you. I have found someone else that is simply a better match. I love you and you have made me happy for years. But I stumbled onto a website that predicts matches between people based on reviews from previous partners and friends, can you believe that ?

Anyway, I decided to try it out for fun. To my great surprise, it turns out I will be 34% happier with Jason than with you. And I don’t even know him ! For years, I was very happy with you knowing what you are and give me. Now I realize I was also loyal because I was not aware what else I could have. Now I do. I thank you for all the years together and your loyalty, based on the same misconception that I had. I don’t feel bad because I am convinced you will be able to find a better match as well !

Good luck, love, Katherine.

The end of brand loyalty. Fortunately for me, Katherine did not write this letter. Nor does the website that she refers to exist. At least, not exactly. There are sites that discuss ex-partners in less glorious manners. But why – apart from a general care for my wellbeing – should you be interested in my love life ?

Well, you shouldn’t. But there are thousands of websites and apps that make matches between people and products and services using reviews. You use them, probably daily. And if you replace my personal relationship with that between a brand and a customer than the story implies that word of mouth is unintentionally but unequivocally sounding the bell for the end of brand loyalty. That, in essence, is the message of an important marketing book called ‘Absolute Value’.

Although death bells are constantly rung for marketing phenomena like the brand itself, advertising, Facebook and email marketing, the consequences of the demise of brand loyalty are so massive that you just might want to understand this one.

For a very long time we have made our purchasing decisions based on our previous product experiences. For an equally long time, companies were able to predict future revenues as a result. All that time, it has been very difficult for upstarts to capture market share because they would need to break rusty habits or ‘loyalty’ of customers and spend millions on creating awareness. If this would all change:

• We would have no feeling for a brand when we contemplate a purchase
• Companies could not predict ANY retention of clients.
• Startups could conquer huge markets overnight, competing on actual value, not awareness.

An important book. A book that can build a case for such a shift is an important book. So I decided to review it and add my own perspective to it. So what you’ll find below is a mix of the book’s opinions and my own. I strongly recommend reading the book to get the full picture.

We’re only as good as our latest product. I don’t believe in brand at all.

– James Dyson

What’s driving the change ? Emanuel Rosen and Itamar Simonson describe a few key drivers that are changing customer behaviour and in turn will transform the marketing landscape. Summarized in my words:

Driver 1: Reviews predict your match with products ever more perfectly.

Although the bulk of Word of Mouth is still an offline phenomenon (as hilariously symbolized by the movie ‘The Joneses’, below), reviews have stolen the crown when it gets to using people’s opinions as a deliberate step in a buying process. And reviews and expert opinions have found the jar with steroids:

• The fast increasing volume and diversity of reviews will create access to nearly perfect information about a product.
• Review tools are fast becoming better at predicting how YOU will feel about a products’performance if you buy it.
• In contrast, brands have the tendency to mislead or seduce you. Which means – by nature- they suck at predicting whether you will like their product.

Driver 1 Reviewed…
Volume of reviews yes, diversity a little. quality no. There are masses of people who do not share their opinions yet, which undoubtedly creates significant bias. But I am most disappointed in how well current review platforms and tools predict my personal satisfaction with a product, considering Amazon started the race to predict my likings 15 years ago. An average number of stars punched in by hasty users is simply not going to cut it.

But there is no denying that the movement to improve the ‘Personal Predictive Power’ of reviews is getting much stronger. It’s simply a numbers game: you leave behind a large amount of data connected to your preferences. Combine them with big data from other customers and you’re off to a good start. And now that companies are starting to make money in the review business it will progress much faster. The next big opportunity is to help customers create much better reviews.

Driver 2: Information access makes all of us more sophisticated buyers

So the information is out there but are we using it to make decisions ? Most marketing is based on the idea that at a certain point people ‘will be in the market’. And that marketers are then in a good position to influence their buying decisions. With information, advertising.

Couch Tracking (not surfing) ‘Absolute Value’ shows how sophisticated ‘prosumers’ are ‘couch tracking’ (categories of) products through expert reviews, user opinions, pricing developments. These people are not necessarily ‘in the market’ to buy in the classic sense but are somewhere in the buying cycle. When they buy, their decision has pretty much been made and there is very little space for influence by the brand.

The Zero Moment of Truth. And even the masses of normal consumers are joining the game, without much conscious effort. Nearly everyone is checking reviews before buying. Google calls this the ‘Zero Moment of Truth’ (video below). And if we see friends discussing their latest acquisitions in our timelines or are automatically offered reviews in online shops about products that are not on our immediate shopping lists we are empowering ourselves with information just like the ‘prosumers’.

As a result, the authors believe that people will no longer behave according to the boxes that Everett Rogers once put them in. Because the information is available to everyone, more people will behave like the pioneers and early adopters. And can make buying decisions quicker, with more certainty.

Driver 2 Reviewed…
On the surface, there is a lot going against this trend. People want to make as little decisions as possible, love saving time and freeze when faced with information overload. But technology is simply making it too easy to use the information in an effective way for people not to use it. If you Google a product the first reviews show up in the search results without another click needed.

I recently connected with a promising Berlin startup called Triprebel. They allow you to book an hotel room and then they will check whether a better price or even a better hotel becomes available and then rebook for you. A great example of facilitated couch tracking that will turn everyone into a prosumer.

At Buzzer, we started turning the early or late majority into pioneers a decade ago, by allowing thousands of ‘ordinary’ consumers to try out and review products ahead of others. Nowadays, ever more tools and apps are proactively bringing you information about products. At the perfect time. If your smartphone warns you there is a better match on the lower shelf, you will grab for the unknown…

Trend 3: Emotional, irrational buying will decline.

We are and will always be emotional animals. As a result, we are very irrational buyers. Who else can explain droves of people switching to the newest iPhone while offering very little new value ? Brands use this to their great advantage, creating emotional landscapes for you to dwell in on a strategic level and employing all kinds of persuasion techniques as tactical tools to keep us from making an objective buying decision.

The ‘Facebook Phone’. So even if reviews are offering much better information and we are ready to use that information, won’t the emotional appeal of brands and sophisticated persuasion techniques counterbalance that ? The authors offer a compelling argument why access to nearly perfect information will change this. A great example in the book is HTC’s 2013 launch of its ‘First’ smartphone and positioning it as ‘The Facebook Phone’. It is obvious HTC is appealing to the emotion of ‘belonging’ and being part of the Facebook community. Without the phone you just might lose your friends ! It is also claiming ‘relative value': it is more a Facebook phone than another smartphone.

But people do not vent their emotional buying kicks in the reviews and opinions that we access. Because they are less aware of them and/or ashamed of them. In our reading of reviews, we will be helped to zoom in on the rational aspects of judging products. In parallel, reviews and expert comparisons will reveal that pretty much all smartphones offer enough Facebook connectivity to call any smartphone a ‘Facebook phone’.

Absolute value will win. By becoming more rational buyers, the ‘Absolute Value’ of products and services – servicing real needs of people – will gain ground, as compared to the relative value of – for instance – a product that states it was ‘Made in Germany’ or ‘The Facebook Phone’.

Driver 3 Reviewed…
The much greater transparency of the world we live in and a yearning for greater integrity and honesty will drive people to look for real (absolute) value and less bullshit. So I agree with the book where it claims that the efforts of brands to deceive or target people’s emotional weaknesses will lose impact.

But ever since reading Seth Godin’s All Marketers Are Liars, I have been convinced that the emotional or non-functional side of products is just as important as the hard features. This is not a weakness in people, it is part of our nature and constitutes ‘hard’ value, just like features and product performance. Enter storytelling. People simply love good stories. They add real value to their lives, not fictional value. My oldest daughter likes One Direction’s music better because of all the stories around them. No review can change that. Unfortunately. But even less emotional products like Dyson’s vacuum cleaners benefit from stories and emotional aspects. The great inventor’s tale, like Steve Jobs for Apple. The design statement beyond the functional.

Reviews currently do not offer much space nor opportunity to transfer our emotional likings. But who says that people’s verdicts (i.e. the number of stars) are not already ‘tainted’ by our soft side ? I suspect that people’s opinions on technical aspects are influenced by their general feeling and that the emotional benefits of products and services will always find their way into our review-driven world. We just need to find a way to give them a proper place like their own number of stars ; )

So will these Drivers change the face of marketing & what should you do about it ?

Of course marketing will change forever. And it should. If people can and want to use nearly perfect information to make buying decisions and become less susceptible to all kinds of persuasion you bet we will become less loyal to brands. Because we simply don’t have to be. And since gazillions of euros, dollars and yens are spent by brands to influence us, mak us loyal and make the world less transparent, comparable, we’re in for a big shift.

Not that this is a new revolution. I got to know Emanuel personally years ago when we were both pioneering in the Wonderful World of Word of Mouth. He wrote a book about word of mouth, I created a company that helped bring word of mouth to the marketing forefront. Since those days, the world has become ever more review-dependent. We are both guilty for our role in that ; )

So what now ? The book offers a really rich description of the consequences of these drivers, using a framework they call ‘The Influence Mix’. People’s buying decisions are influenced by ‘P’ – their own preferences, ‘O’ – other people and M – marketers or the brand. ‘Absolute Value’ in essence states that ‘O’ is becoming more important and what you should do about it. I encourage you to buy the book and delve in.

Here is my personal and simplified marketers ‘To Do’ in the age of nearly perfect information:

Create more buzzable products – If people no longer automatically buy from brands they know and instead follow reviews, you better make sure you shine in those. And the best way to get more stars and a more convincing recommendation is to make a significant difference somewhere in your product experience. In other words: you need to be Buzzable: remarkable enough to talk about. Check the rest of my website for more inspiration on how to increase your buzzability ; ) Not surprisingly, larger corporates are starting to recognize the urgency of this and have responded by buying into innovation, such as Unilever and yes, even Apple.

Follow the Review – Brands used to spend tons on market research and then millions on driving home a message about what the product does and for whom it is meant to be. Now I would strongly suggest you ‘follow the review’ in both areas:

• R&D 2.0: create products based on ‘review insights’. There is a very little known but highly successful company called C&A Marketing. They check what people miss in products by tracking Amazon reviews. Then they create products that address these needs. Simple and incredibly effective. Read this great Fastcompany article about them.
• Let your marketing (message) follow the word of mouth. Want to have effective marketing ? Spot what people are valuing in your product and amplify. By making sure people can see these stories and by giving the features valued most central stage in your own messaging. Do not try to convince your product is something else and DO NOT create ads with ‘recommendations from real users’. They suck. While you’re at it, create a Word of Mouth Officer.

Promote & Live Your Purpose ! Reviews are important but they are just part of the story. You should keep on telling your own story. But not just any story. Not a story that is the ideal version of what your product or company is not. The story of what you are trying to do, to achieve. If there is one thing people look for even more than for a well-informed buying decision, it is inspiration, leadership, being surprised, enriched.

Your customers should experience your purpose in such an extreme, emotional way that they will have no choice but to talk about it. If you align Purpose, Product & Promotion well, the impact will counterbalance any negative effect of diminishing customer loyalty.

Lastly, an entrepreneurial heads-up. Already a fast-growing sector, reviews will become a huge industry. Companies will be specializing in every aspect of this field, facilitating you get more reviews to developing matchmaking technologies to helping consumers create better reviews. Have fun.

Willem

Wasserbombe. For decades, innovation in this sector was mostly urban myth, like square tomatoes. Chiquita was the only brand that I can recall. If you heard something about vegetables, it was usually bad: the Dutch (or rather: the Germans) have only recently recovered from the ‘Wasserbombe’ trauma. My fellow countrymen had been shipping shiny but watery, tasteless tomato-lookalikes to our German neighbours for years.

One day the Germans decided they had suffered enough culinary abuse. The boycot that followed was tough but ultimately saved the Dutch vegetable breeding industry, making it an economic powerhouse.

Sexy Seeds. When my wife became the legal counsel for Enza Zaden, one of the world’s leading vegetable breeding companies, I flipped through their catalogue in her first week on the job and I could not believe my eyes. Why was I not enjoying all these wonderful varieties, colours, innovations and design vegetables in my kitchen ? I decided to dig deeper.

Broccoli.com. When Enza invited me to speak at their 75-year anniversary I explored the rise of marketing in this sector in ‘Broccoli.com: the future of marketing in fruit and veggies (presentation below) and challenged four teams of ambitious students to come up with buzzable new innovations and couple them with the latest marketing techniques.

“We invented civilization. Now we’re taking a break”

I spent last week again in this fantastic city. With 1200 fellow entrepreneurs from one of the most inspiring organizations in the world, the Entrepreneurs’ Organization. You might expect that I would now conclude that things had gone from bad to worse. From a determined complacency to a country that is ridiculed as the living symbol of the crisis. But the opposite is true. I now believe Greece might be in a better position than Germany, the country that is a prime source of the ridicule.

Don’t get me wrong. As we speak there is no doubt Greece is in a bad state. Many people have lost their jobs. Higher educated people are getting extra jobs to pay their bills. Their children are no longer sent to the best international schools for further education. Protests halt the country’s already weak economy. And so on. But there is something else going on at the same time.

Greece is for lovers. When I visited the touristic Plaka, the first shop I walked into  – Forget Me Not – had just been opened by enthusiast Filippos. It offers a collection of Greek Design. It was amazing. It was humorous, fresh, cool and above all – Greek. Meet the Greeks fold-it characters, an incredible, iconic skateboard from the inspiring Greece is for lovers brand. I bought the Kickstarter-funded ‘Cooking to share‘ cookbook by Alexandra Stratou that is simply the most stunning I have ever seen. Further along, simple tourist shops sell clothes that should have been made in China and sold for 7 euro. But they sell for 35 and are made in Greece.

New concepts. I visited 6 Dogs, just a bar. But more remarkable than anything I have seen in a long time. A friend told me that young people – even more hungry to connect socially and have a good time – have found new ways to do this on a very tight budget. Impromptu, pop-up parties are formed around kiosks, in squares. The kiosks replace traditional bars and are selling drinks at 1/3 of normal prices. Some people see this as a temporary low-end alternative borne out of necessity. I see a new bar concept in the making that adds new value.

Corporate Cool. Not all signs of buzzable new life and innovation in Greece are ‘underground’. Surprisingly, the Dutch embassy is supporting an incubator called Orange Grove together with a Dutch beer brand. I visited an event and was struck by the contagious energy, not least from Ambassador (and surfer) Jan Versteeg himself and all the people involved. Jan calls Athens the warmest cool place on earth in this fun video. 35 startups are getting support and are working out of the basement of the Dutch embassy. One of these startups, headed by Myrto Papadogeorgeou, created the civic engagement app ‘City of Errors‘. Spot problems in the city and help fix them. Not the first one, but done with a unique tone of voice. Startup Fleksi is possibly the best example of Greece’s path towards a buzzable future: an incredibly clever concept for a better keyboard on your smartphone. Who but the Greeks could reinvent the way the αλϕἁβητο is captured ?

City of Errors from City of Errors on Vimeo.

Plato, Skateboards & Buzzability. Although apparently all different, something connects these products and activities with the historic soul of the country and its future. A quirky, slightly black sense of humor laced with some fundamental philosophical wisdom and a strong urge to live life to the max. To enjoy it without having the urge to reduce all life’s risks as western countries are doing in ever more pathetic ways. These aspects could help Greece become buzzable again by aligning an inspiring ‘Why’ with a remarkable customer experience and ‘buzz’ that travels. And from what I can see, I think they are on the right track.

Greece is ahead of the curve. On a more global level, the EU has been similarly dismissed as irrelevant by the ‘real’ world powers China and the US. I have always resisted this notion. I simply believe the EU is in a different phase. Having achieved widespread wellfare and wellbeing first, Europe was also the first region to become lazy, defensive, complacent, fat, uninspired and unimaginative. As a result, it is now being forced to reinvent itself first. And after it has done this, it will again be the first continent to climb to the next peak. It is only poetic that the first European country to engage in this epic journey is the first one to conquer the original mountain.

I can relate to this from a personal perspective as I am sure many others can. A year ago I took time off to recover from an exhaustion that could have turned into a burnout. It was not an easy process but after time I started finding new energy, creativity and conviction every day. And more importantly: I was shedding waste, irrelevancies and getting closer to my inner purpose. I am now experiencing greater clarity and am having more fun in what I do than before. I am having more positive impact on my environment.

Creativity stems from necessity. So what is happening ? The depth of the crisis is finally awakening the Greeks from their post-civilization slumber. Yes, it starts from necessity and not from pro-active actions but this is typical. Most entrepreneurs start on a frustration, necessity, a tough challenge. It is not glamorous and success never comes overnight, as many publications tempt us to believe. Wonderboys AirBNB struggled for years and also started from necessity.

The Rebranding/Rebuilding of Greece. Greek’s greatest inspirational celebrity Peter Economides (who I was fortunate enough to chat with in his Voula house at the end of my trip) explained in his groundbreaking presentation (check it out below, English after the intro) the need for Greece to rebrand itself. When I discussed this with him, we both agreed that this is actually being done from the ground – through activities, experiences – and not by creating a shiny new advertising campaign with a funky logo. More rebuilding than rebranding. And yes, ultimately you should give the new dirction, the new ‘Why’ of Greece a name. That reflects what is unique about all the things coming out of this country. That aligns Plato with coffee mugs, bars, apps and skateboards. Coincidentally, Peter is an advisor to the Orange Grove incubator.

When you have nothing to lose, you do things right. Most Greeks would probably not agree with my observations. They are suffering. They feel they have been robbed of everything they had. They don’t see the way out and feel utterly helpless. But when you are freed of your golden handcuffs you are in a great position to do something remarkable. Because you are less cautious, defensive. Risks are taken out of the equation because you have nothing to lose. This is why innovation comes from startups not from corporates. This is why even Apple is now buying innovation.

Entrepreneurs will take the lead. But a small core group of people, most of them entrepreneurs, is starting with little but gearing up to build great things. And eventually they will inspire others to start believing again. Or at least to jump on their train. It might take 5 or 10 years for the popular opinion to notice this, but I believe I already have. As the Dutch embassy did, I believe more outsiders will start to see the opportunities (undoubtedly also powered by lower prices for pretty much anything) and invest in the new Greece.

The Cyclades as Summer Office ! During my Athens days I had a chance to catch up with two great friends and entrepreneurs: Stephan Bayer, CEO of the Berlin-based online educator Sofatutor and Feliks Eyser, founder of Regiohelden. They are thinking of a ‘Summer-Office’ concept that aspires to bring hordes of startup employees over to the Greek Isles in the summer to make building new companies more fun during those months. I’m going ! Ruling beer brands could see the kiosk parties as a threat to margins. But I am sure they’ll eventually position a local brand to embrace the kiosk parties with mobile DJ booths, disruptive art platforms. And if they don’t, another startup will ; )

But better off than Germany ? Obviously, I wanted a buzzable title for this blog. It’s just the way my deformed mind works. But there might be a lot of truth to this statement. On the surface, Berlin is the opposite of Athens. It breathes success. All startups want to have an office in the Silicon Valley of Europe. All countries want the German/Berlin model.

Last Man Standing. But you could also see a rollercoaster of venture capital financing and ‘exit-horniness’ driving startups to deviate from real value creation towards inflated growth predictions. Of failing business models rapidly being pumped up to ensure an IPO or exit before it all tumbles down. Of startups for the sake of startups. A new TV show about Silicon Valley (below) paints an equally glorifying and disturbing picture. You might believe that Western economies are so hungry for success that we inflate entrepreneurial activity to mythical proportions to disguise the fact that there is little underlying intrinsic value, inspiration. Possibly Germany is even no longer aligned with its ‘Why’ (predictable quality) when the minister of education loses her PhD and organic eggs do not deserve that label.  It seems no coincidence that an article I read on the airplane back to Amsterdam predicts the demise of Berlin as a capital of Cool.

Greece’s big advantage. Maybe countries like Germany simply have not seen enough misery to fix the real bugs of the system. There is just enough wealth to keep on going without making real choices. There are still enough Chinese hungry for status to buy expensive cars. So we stumble on without capturing the opportunity to do something more remarkable. In Greece, there is no disguise possible. Greece is naked, vulnerable. And that is their greatest advantage.  I have not looked for data to support this view. The dots I am connecting do not create an obvious nor a straight line.  But ever since reading Malcolm Gladwell’s ‘Blink’ I try to follow my ‘intuition’ and it is telling me:

Greece is an ancient, cool startup on a path to become buzzable again.

The ‘Why’ Statement.  When I work with a brand, I sometimes create a ‘Why’ statement that reflects the buzzable purpose of the brand. That will act as a compass. One popped up when I was writing this blog. I look forward to your comments and alternative statements on Greece’s Why.

Greece. Food for thought.

Would you like your partner to have cosmetic surgery ? I hold a dinner party each year for a group of long time friends and partners. After 20 years, It can be quite a challenge to give an interesting speech. I don’t want to drag old cows out of the ditch (famous Dutch expression) and I haven’t heard enough about their lives over the past year to concoct an interesting mosaic of what’s up with them. But I know there is lots of interesting stuff going on. There is a great story. So this is what I did. First I thought about what the (sub) stories could be:

• The dreams that people have (isn’t it time to start doing something !)
• The relationship with their kids (what do you hate about having them ?)
• The state of people’s sex lives (does it still exist ?)
• The importance of material vs. immaterial (still trying to outshine the neighbours ?)
• Happiness with your physical apparance (how honest are you to eachother ?)

In short, everything about life. Next, I backward engineered questions for the group. So that the answers would generate a story around these topics:

• On a scale of 1-10, how well are you versed in the Kamasutra ?
• With which man could your wife have a date, Justin Bieber or Silvio Berlusconi ?
• Do you have a dream you are not actively pursuing ?
• Would you like your partner to have something improved physically ?

Over drinks, my wife and I interrogated our guests. To our surprise, all were open and actually (mostly) enjoying it. In between courses I punched the results into Excel and created an overview on my iPad. I did not have time to review so I hoped there was going to be some fireworks. I was not diasppointed. Some results (Life’s Scorecard) got people thinking, widely varying perceptions (between partners) about copulatory frequencies triggered endless, incredibly funny comments and aspired surgical improvements led people to speculate on the chosen bodily areas, followed by unasked for advice on ‘design aspects’ (size, shape etc.). There was a mix of ‘get you thinking’ and ‘get you laughing’ stuff. Which could turn from one into the other.

The most important result ? The rest of the dinner party people were talking about these topics, sharing personal stories, deepening their friendships. Which – if this would have mattered to us – would have given the outside world a great and inspiring story of our ‘brand’ of friendship.

This can work for your brand as well. I am sure you are now thinking about your next dinner party. And whether this could work with your friends (yes it will). I am hoping that someone will help me turn it into an app but before that happens I am happy to provide more detail about the questions. But hold on. You can actually use the same mechanism to spread your brand’s story and create awesome free publicity. Guaranteed.

Warning: online recommendations losing credibility… At Buzzer, we wanted people to know how much we cared for and knew about word of mouth. So I thought of ways to get that story out into important marketing publications. I followed the same pattern: first I came up with a story that would be buzzable and reflect our authority. A headline. In this case it was: “Online recommendations suffering from inflation”. I was pretty sure that any research would corroborate this.

Next, I designed a few questions around it and organized a group of consumers to answer them. In the meantime, I contacted a few marketing bloggers and asked whether they were interested in research into the lagging credibility of online reviews (yes !) and offered them a chance to include specific questions. Next, we turned the poll’s results into a story and shared it with the bloggers. Publications in various countries followed, as you can see here and here.

Help my baby shrinks ! Pampers also had a story. Very flexible diapers prevent the ‘shit hitting the fan’ when your baby’s tummy shrinks in the hours after feeding. But how to get it out ?

N.B.: when we saw Pampers’ commercial we pointed out that it basically tells parents that their baby is like a balloon. However true this might be, we thought this story would not catch on.

The story first: ‘Help my baby is shrinking’. We then supplied trial packs of the diaper with funky measuring tapes to parents and asked them to measure their baby’s tummies before and after feeding. On the Help my baby shrinks’ website parents uploabded their babies’ shrinkage as acompared to thousands of other babies. A story easily picked up by the media. And shared by parents with their friends.

And so on. As you can see, the trick is quite simple:

1. Think up a buzzable headline that connects with your brand’s domain
2. Create questions that will generate anwers that create the story
3. Get the results from your research and synthesize into a story
4. Share the story and your brand will benefit in the limelight

The creativity challenge lies in choosing a buzzable headline and designing the right questions to make sure the answers could deliver the story. In my experience disruptive headlines always work: something that’s counter intuitive or going against popular belief. Read Steve Knox’ article about the power of disruption here. Timing is usually critical here (before you know it popular blief has changed). Part of the success of the approach can b that the people that supplied the answers are now part of the story and will help to spread it. One key success factor: do NOT talk about your brand or product. Let it be in the background.

Although it is not in any way a new technique I am still surprised that not more people use it to get their story out. Against the background of an ever more impoverished media landscape, you’ll never have to buy mediaspace again.

I met an old friend who was working at EZGov at the time. He told me how they had tried to show the benefits of e-government in Italy (EZgov sure knew how to pick a challenge) by doing a kind of participatory theatre play in a small city’s central courtyard: on one side you could line up to get a passport ‘Italian-style’, meaning 23 steps that would take you 3 years, on the other side you experienced the smooth-sailing e-process. I immediately spotted the opportunity.

In the phonecall with the civil servant I excitedly explained that we would create a timemachine for the EU-citizen. Which would allow them to experience key activities (paying, getting permits, crossing the border) in the EU over the course of history. This, I explained, would make it possible to experience what otherwise could not be experienced as it had gradually evolved in 25 years: the benefits the EU had brought us. The civil servant exploded in enthusiasm. Of course, the whole project got lost in the Ministry’s hallways. When I taught an MBA class at the RSM (see the slideshare below, slides 41 & 42) I put the EU challenge among the cases the students had to solve. They came up with a promising alternative: experience the EU through the eyes of someone outside of the EU.

Next patient was a pet health insurance company (did you know this was an entire industry ?) that was seriously insecure about their buzzability. With good reason: their product had not changed in 15 years and was the same as the entire industry’s. People only experienced the product under dire circumstances (loved pet suffering terrible disease) and would focus on the chances of recovery rather than the policy when speaking about the situation. The solution was simple: introduce an annual health scan for your pet. Great extra experience (pet is likely to be ok), you chat with more people because you can show you’re a caring boss and lastly: you’ve created a better product. Hallelujah ! Shouted the insurance person. Obviously, he faced the same type of people as the Ministry when he got back in th office and never got it passed his colleagues.

More examples followed. A job (invite people to experience a day with a person in a similar job. In our times you could even put a GoPro on top of that person’s head and follow him/her online), an online investment product (play with fictitious money), A charity that builds houses (put webcams at the building site when they put in your window sill), loneliness (take away all their Facebook friends temporarily and block their smartphone). Patterns started to emerge:

1. Some product benefits are experienced over a longer time. Losing the ‘triggering’, compact impression that gets people to talk about their experience. You need to shrink time or zoom in on (set of) a small sub-experiences.
2. Some experiences are not immediately suitable for sharing. Meddling with the product and/or adding new experiences can do the trick.
3. More abstract concepts (feelings, ideas) are more situational and thus do not have a concrete experience associated with them. But these can be simulated, provoked.

A savings account buzzable ? Recently I sat down with a large bank. In their eyes most of their products had no potential for being remarkable. I disagreed. They said no one would talk about their savings product. But what if you would save for something specific ? That you would like to talk about, like a trip around the world, a new business or another kind of experience ? And what if your savings product would tell you each period how much closer you had gotten to doing it ? Or explain how you could get that moment closer by taking certain actions ? Or even: which other ‘savers’ have similar plans and which parties can help you realize your objective ? A savings account that talks, listens to you and brings you in contact with others. Imagine that.

It’s National Burglary Day ! If you sell a DIY burglary kit, you are effectively selling a rather abstract feeling, namely home safety. Get a group of people to test it and organize a National Burglary Day. Your testers invite their neighbours to try and break into your house while you see the kit in action lying in waiting on the first floor. Your neighbours’s videotaped attempt will go online and further boost the buzz. Proposed to a large utilities company that loved the concept but went for brochures instead ; )

I made you read a lot. Sorry. Now just undergo the last recent and brilliant example while watching the video. How do you make Alzheimer’s buzzable ?

Bottomline. Many marketers believe their products will never inspire, trigger people and benefit from word of mouth as the experience does not allow that. I believe they are wrong. It is not just possible to make these products, ideas and concepts more remarkable, it is relatively easy to extremify your experience. If you take that step, your customers will love you for it and the world will pay attention.

If you are still in doubt or want more examples, comment with your example and I’ll give it a go !

The bottomline ? Small changes in our behaviour can bring (significant) benefits. And here’s how understanding the underlying dynamics can help you innovate more succesfully.

Most business success stems from innovation. And innovations always require people to change their behaviour (a little). But we hardly ever adapt those changes to reap the benefits. Or it takes ages, as happens with the shoelace tying technique. I doubt whether 1% of the 3,840,534 viewers of the video has changed their behaviour. So if we understand why we resist changing our behaviour we might find a way to influence that and use it to achieve world/market domination. I think of this as ’creating buzzable behaviour’.

To understand why we find it so hard to change our habits you need not look further than the book ‘Power of Habit’. We are all animals of habit. Caught in ‘habit loops’. Trigger, habit, reward. Quick & dirty summary of the book: as the trigger will still occur and you still crave the reward, you need to replace the habit. With which one ? Yours obviously.

I have come across two ways to actually go about doing this. There is a deeper, more difficult path with greater conversion ratios and sustainability and an easier route which will get you some quicker returns.

Disruptive Fun Therapy. If you watch the Bottle Bank video first you’ll understand intuitively what this approach is all about.

You create a fun, disruptive (deviates from normal patterns) experience which teases people to try a different habit. It shakes up your thinking: Hey, changing my habit to a new one is actually not so hard and could be fun ! It works by boosting the actual benefit (get healthier by taking the stairs) through fun additions such as entertainment, storytelling, games. And by lowering the barrier of trying (the cost for the user).

This is a great tool to use when your product or proposition (habit) that you would like to take the place of an existing habit (product) is not too complex, engrained in culture or otherwise ‘big’. Say change your breakfast from bread to a fluid equivalent with cereals. At Buzzer, we created hundreds of ‘BuzzTools’ with similar mechanics that helped consumers discover products and change their consumption patterns.

Customer Transformation. To understand this route, check out the video first.

This is the big one. You need vision, conviction, business cojones to travel this path. Like Google and/or any seriously ambitious startup wanting to become Google. The aim of this is to change your customer. Literally. Make him/her a different person. And the way to do it is to invest heavily in teaching, coaching, supporting your customer to adapt new behaviour. Ask yourself: what were we before we became Googlers ? We were Yellow Pagers. Time Atlassers.

Michael Schrage convincingly describes how Google and other companies focused on changing their target audience’s behaviour through education, not traditonal marketing. Google took us by the hand and transformed us to expect accurate search results in 0.00012 seconds. It helped us discover and adopt a new habit, routine to replace the old one. And take that as the norm. Reaching the holy grail of marketing: loyalty.

A year ago, I designed a customer transformation path for an international financial institution. After great initial enthusiasm and 6 months of creating the first building blocks, the project halted. The company did not have the longer term vision or stamina to pull it trough. We should have gone for the less ambitious road.

I am currently teaching my youngest daughter Mae to open up bananas the right way. She’s picking it up slowly but held back by all the other people doing it wrong. I estimate that it will take a few generations to get large groups to adapt this. I am thinking about a Fun Therapy technique that will speed this up.

Most companies convince themselves that traditional advertising will do the trick. “Exercise with our Absolute Abdominal Apparat 20 minutes each week and you will have 200% more energy”. This assumes that the lure (promise of the benefit) is sufficient to adapt a new routine (exercise). But the cost (machine, changing your schedule, finding a place for it, exercising, muscle aches etc.) is not addressed.

Of course, people are changing their behaviour all the time without any apparent use of the two methodologies. But then we confuse ‘changing behaviour’ with ‘copying behaviour’. In ‘Herd’ Mark Earls explains how strong our copying tendencies are. But people can only start copying behaviour once others have changed theirs, right ?

To get the benefits from innovations people need to change their behaviour. This is difficult. To speed up the process you can apply at last two different techniques, suitable for smaller innovations and quicker wins or for more radical innovations and greater gains.

If you know of other approaches or good examples, let me know !

Sun Maliya solar panel ecosystem (finalist). Supply solar energy to people living in conflict areas. What I like is the fact that as a consumer you can basically order your power station to come to you. Your family, friends in wealthier countries will pay the power bill per week/month. What would make it even more buzzable is if local entrepreneurs could become the people paying for the panels and exploiting them. Then you get a truly sustainable business model by creating a local economic model.

Dabirdy EV charger (finalist). Smart usage of high voltage tram lines to create more efficient fast chargers for electric cars. Buzzable because you are leveraging existing stuff: electricity and locations. People like elegant solutions and understandable low tech. The founders want to turn the charger into a visible, fun object like a tree tapping fuel (water) from the tram lines. If they go more extreme, you could turn charging your car into an experience, like ToTheLoo  has done for toilet visits. If you spend 25 minutes charging, why not create a fun experience in that time ?

TiLT Bike locator/protector. Find your bike using an app and get notified when it is moved/stolen. At first glance, these guys will find it difficult to compete with the likes of Tile. But they have a few aces up their sleaves: their product cannot be removed without alarm and they are thinking about making their product more versatile, suitable for more occasions/objects. And the fact that you can customize the sound and light effects (like a ring tone) is a nice buzzable touch.

Dwillo mentorship matching platform (finalist). In our times, you’ve got to have a coach or mentor to survive. Dwillo focuses on creating thee match between mentor/mentee for the group that needs a mentor most: students about to make career choices. That by itself is a pretty buzzable proposition. Their matching algorithm gives it a nice ‘tech/Amazon-smartness’ edge. To make it more remarkable sooner, they could start with a freemium model and target corporate customers once they have some scale.

Shake On networking bracelet (finalist). You might think: not another app or wearable piece of tech that aims to replace the business card. But the buzzability lies in the focus on events (where do you meet most new people ?) and the intuitive link to a very human gesture: shaking hands. What could make it more remarkable ? A Shake might trigger your memo recorder app or camera on your smartphone so that you can add verbal, visual context to the encounter.

GlucoTouch glucose monitor (finalist). Monitoring your glucose levels as a diabetes is (literally) a pain. Making that a painless, easy and cheap process is a highly buzzable solution for an ever growing group of people. A great buzzability enhancer would link its glucose monitoring data to ‘life-monitoring’ apps (movement, diet, health signs) such as Jawbone’s Up https://jawbone.com/up and and create intelligent big data that will help solve the problem. Another way to create buzz that they ar thinking of: create awareness of diabetes by monitoring in public places.

Esteon  Rental Housing Matching. It’s smart to focus a housing matching platform on a niche such as rented houses because thre is very little attention or innovation. But what makes this service truly buzzable is that it learns from your behaviour/reactions while you search and look around. In other words: these guys understand that you cannot put all your living criteria in 3 search boxes at the start of your search and expect to find the perfect house. You react/refine based on what you see. Sort of artificial intelligence. The biggest buzzability booster ? Don’t turn this into a rental-housing matching proposition. But turn the self-learning, behaviour-based matching algorithm into a standalone, plugin tool that any party that wants to create better matches can use. And, of course, you can start with applying it to the rental housing market ; ) Next ? Other costly investments such as furniture, cars and yes, finding a partner for life ; )

Dillys interactive billboards. Imagine walking past a billboard in December that challenges you to engage in a snowball fight ? And that the billboard turns into a Kinect-based gamescreen. Not only will you enjoy the wait for your train more, you might actually appreciate the discount coupon for a skiing holiday that pops up on your smartphone after playing the game. ‘nough said. What would speed up bringing this buzzable billboard to market is a ‘plugin kit’ that converts existing billboards into a Dilly…