Technology push and market pull

A chemist set out to make a stronger glue, and made one that barely stuck. What did his company do with it? You might expect the bin. Instead it sat on a shelf for years, a new material with no use. Then a colleague, fed up with bookmarks falling out of his hymn book, tried it on paper, and the Post-it note began. Did the glue make it, or the bookmark? The sticky note gets its verdict after two words for where products start.

Technology push is when a product is developed because of a new material, a new component or a new way of manufacturing. The new thing exists first, and a product is designed around it. The folding phone is technology push: a screen that could bend came first, and makers built a phone around it. Market pull runs the other way. A product is developed because of demand from the market: what people need and want, what they complain about, what their reviews and feedback say. The refillable steel bottle is market pull, because people were tired of buying plastic ones. Cordless drills improved once small lithium-ion cells arrived. Push or pull? Push. Lithium-ion cells, the small rechargeable batteries inside phones, are a new component, and the drill was redesigned around them. The test every time is what came first. A new material, component or process means push. People asking, wanting or complaining means pull.

Four short product stories now, each one push or pull, with the proof sitting in a phrase inside the story. A running-shoe brand switches to a new, lighter and springier foam, and designs a new trainer around it. Parents keep asking for a child's car seat that can be fitted without tools, so a maker designs one. A torch company redesigns its range once LEDs become cheap enough to replace filament bulbs. And online reviews complain that a rucksack's zip keeps splitting, so the maker launches a version with a heavier-duty zip. Which stories are push, which are pull, and which phrase proves each one? The trainer is push. The new, springier foam came first, and the shoe was designed around it. The car seat is pull. Parents kept asking, so the demand came first. The torches are push. LEDs became cheap enough, and the range was redesigned around them. The rucksack is the story to slow down on, because a heavier-duty zip is a better component. Is the rucksack push or pull, and what makes you sure? Pull. The change started with online reviews, and complaints are feedback from the market. The better zip is only the fix. The customers came first. One examiner's report puts the problem plainly. Few candidates understood the term market-pull, a term clearly listed and defined in the specification. A simple description was only required. The term was there to learn, and a plain description would have done. The way to avoid that is one ready sentence for each term: market pull is a product developed in response to demand from the market.

Plenty of products need both forces at once. The technology makes them possible, and the demand makes them sell. Wireless earbuds went from rare to everywhere in a few years. A longer question might ask you to explain, using both forces, why so many people now choose them. Here is a one-line answer a student might give: everyone has a phone now, so everyone wants earbuds. What is that one-line earbuds answer missing? It names no technology and no demand. It says the earbuds are popular, but not what made them possible or what problem they solved. Start with the push. Tiny Bluetooth chips, the short-range wireless link, and small lithium-ion cells made it possible to fit a complete wireless system inside each ear, with a case that recharges them. So the product could exist at all. Now the pull. People wanted to listen on the move without a cable snagging on bags or tangling in a pocket, so the demand was already waiting. Then say what it did to choice. The first buyers wanted the newest thing and paid a high price. As more makers used the same parts, prices fell, and ordinary buyers chose them for convenience. A different report, on a question about streaming music, records this. Young people are very familiar with downloading and streaming music via their mobile phone devices, but few could relate, with clarity, why this method of listening to music has increased in popularity. Using something every day is not the same as explaining it. What works instead is a chain for each force: the named technology or demand, because, then what it meant for the buyer. In a longer answer, open with one line defining each term. A new technology still does not win every buyer. An app-connected electric toothbrush with a pressure sensor is advertised everywhere, and plenty of people buy a plain manual brush instead. Why might a buyer still pick the manual toothbrush? Give two linked reasons. Cost is one. A manual brush costs a few pounds and needs no pricey replacement heads, so a buyer on a tight budget keeps more money. Needing no charge is another. It works anywhere at any time, so it suits someone who travels or forgets to charge things. Nothing electronic to break, or no app to manage, would also count. Push can put a product on the shelf. Whether people choose it still depends on what they need, and what they can afford.

Four quick questions to close, and the last one goes back to that weak glue.

A vacuum cleaner is built around a new, smaller, stronger motor. Which force started it? Technology push. A new component came first, and the cleaner was designed around it. Now a snack brand cuts its sugar after shoppers keep asking. Which force is that? Market pull. Shoppers asking is demand, and the demand came before the change. Another kind: why might a buyer skip a brand-new gadget for an older, plainer one? Price, nothing to charge, nothing to go wrong. A new technology never decides choice on its own. One more, back to the start: was the sticky note push, pull, or both? Both. The weak glue was a new material, so that is push. The bookmarks falling out of a hymn book were a need, so that is pull.

If you can sort any product story and point to its proof, you're comfortable with it, and a thumbs-up ticks this one off your list. If not, keep it saved; three questions in, it starts to feel normal.

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