One of the (many?) ways Steve Jobs drove those around him crazy was his habit for saying:
I’ll know it when I see it…
In a general sense, Jobs wasn’t a developer. He wasn’t a designer. He relied on others for those important skills. Jobs was an organizer. He had vision. And he also seemed to value his ability to see hit products.
The reason he drove people crazy in this sense was that he gave very little feedback and direction. He would simply tell them that what they had created wasn’t good enough or that it wasn’t a hit. And he would send them back to their offices to continue working, often starting over from scratch. And he would keep repeating this cycle until he saw something he felt was good.
This often occurs in the music industry as well.
Artists sign with record labels. They sometimes come to the labels with a few songs already. But often the label will have them work on more songs. The artists will write more songs. They will play those songs for the label executives and often the executives will say, “I don’t hear a hit. Go write some more songs.”
As you might imagine, this drives artists insane.
In an interview, record label president Mike Dungan, talks about his experience with Luke Bryan. Luke’s first album had done pretty well. One pretty big hit and a few other good songs. When it came time to select songs for his followup album, Mike sat down with Luke and they listened to songs. Mostly it was songs that Luke had been writing. They listened to dozens and Mike just wasn’t hearing any hits. He kept asking for more songs. Then more songs.
Finally, Luke pulled out some from his own discard pile. Among those was a rough copy of Rain Is A Good Thing. Mike instantly perked up and said, “Why is that in the discard pile? I love it!”
The song was a genesis for the album and shortly after, Luke would write a couple more songs that would be major hits off that same album.
Viral Content…It’s Quantity
It doesn’t matter what area you’re in, viral content or hit content or songs or products or whatever, there isn’t a way to predict what will be a winner. But usually you know it when you see it, but even then there usually isn’t universal agreement that something will be a hit.
The way to get viral content is to create a lot of content. It’s to create consistent content. To find a schedule that allows you to create and experiment and build data that leads to continuous improvement.
If Luke Bryan hadn’t written hundreds of songs, he would have run out of songs to play for Mike Dungan. He put the one song that turned into a hit into his own discard pile. That seems to prove that even for the most successful, they really don’t know what a hit is.
I know I feel that way with blogging. I try to write viral blog posts. But most don’t turn out that way. And over the years I’ve experimented with different things. And I’m often surprised at what turns out to be popular.
Sure, sometimes you can perfectly formulate a viral piece of content or a hit song or big time product. But usually they come as a result of a lot of creation, a lot of iterating and a lot of little experiments.
Steve Jobs couldn’t even tell you what to do to create a hit product. He sometimes knew it when he saw it. But even then he often had to be reassured with some early signs from the market.
The iPod, was basically an afterthought. Even after it’s initial release, it was a very minor part of Apple’s product mix. But after those early indications in the market proved it’s popularity, Steve then “realized” that he had a hit and pushed it to the forefront.
Predicting viral content?
Good luck…