The Zero Overhead Principle – Just Use It!

Wouldn’t it be great if all products and services could be designed in this way? The best most powerful brands are!

Here’s an article that discusses one of the most important parameters for successful products.

Although I disagree with the author that training for LinkedIn, Facebook, Google+ is not required, it is, his point is absolutely spot on! When was the last time you took training to operate an iPhone?

I know of some complete technophobes who are over 60 who took to an iPhone faster than being able to operate an old Nokia!

Usability and user experience are critical.
Here’s one example: My (free) invoicing software is about to close operations and wants all “customers” to switch to a $40/month paid version! But it’s not the price that put me off, it was the opportunity cost – the time it was going to take to learn the software.

So I began my search for replacement software, at first free, then paid. 4 days later, spending around 2 hours at a time, having tried to set up my account and to generate just a few invoices, I progressed  from free software to paid versions. Yet after trialling 12 different software packages both download and cloud versions, I was still frustrated as none of them met my somewhat simplistic requirements. And you have to remember I wasn’t looking for an accounting package just a simple invoicing solution.

By absolute chance I came across Wave Accounting – a free cloud solution that immediately struck a chord with me, from the simplicity of the home page to ease of the sign up. What was even better was the simplicity of setting up the account and generating invoices. Having a complete accounting solution that even a dummy like myself could use was an absolute bonus! And that’s the Zero Overhead Principle – no down time, no learning, no training, just use it!

Now all of the time we are going to save not learning how to use software, we need in our daily business lives, we can spend on re-engineering our own brands to make them as sticky as some of these leaders or just spend it on being glued to our screens being anti-social in the physical world by being social in the virtual one.