FAQs
Q: How does TrendStories™ make sense of trends for my business?
A: To build an effective trends program, it takes more than collecting information. We all enjoy nearly unlimited access to research online and through other curated sources, but the TrendStories team are skilled at accessing the most salient information through custom desk research and our broad network of culture and industry experts. Future trends only become valuable when the information is applied to a scaffold of understanding that allows your organization to interact with the future and anticipate the changes ahead.
Our practice at TrendStories™ merges trends inputs across 3 levels of scale in order to develop an integrated look into the future that is most targeted for your business. The resulting TrendStories™ weave together inputs from:
The World — Global trends at the most macro level
Our World — Consumer trends across the wider marketplace
Your World — Category trends influencing the future your business
Q: How does TrendStories™ excavate and discover trends?
A: We go through a rigorous process to build meaningful stories for clients that are clearly understandable and actionable. We start with a macro level assessment of the driving forces of change and investigate how consumers are reacting to them.
Our exploration looks at the whole consumer experience marketplace as well as within your business category and adjacent categories. Throughout our process we identify emerging signals that can indicate potential direction and intensity of each trend. Our TrendStories approach delivers clear, thought-provoking and actionable value for your business or organization.
Q: What’s the difference between a trend and a fad and why do I care?
A: A FAD is usually a behavior followed by a universe of people over a short window of time. The behavior will accelerate rapidly and then fall again once the novelty is gone.
A TREND generally builds in strength over time and has staying power. Trends also have identifiable and often explainable attractions that are driven by both macro forces and specific audience needs. Trends continue because they help solve a problem for people.
Another way to think about these two ideas, is that fads feel more tactically driven and may lead to quick-hit, one-off opportunities. Trends are more strategically based and can effect longer term thinking and planning.
“A trend gains power over time, because it’s not merely part of a moment, it’s a tool, a connector that will become more valuable as other people commit to engaging in it.”
— Seth Godin
Q: How accurate are trends in predicting the future?
A: It’s important to remember that there are no future facts — and we can’t predict the future. But we can prepare for it. The power of a trends program for your business, brand or organization is to establish a system for engaging with trends as part of a conversation to guide understanding and decision-making.
The easier it is for your organization to understand, interact and “play with” the trends — the more impactful they will be. Our TrendStory™ approach works because humans get storytelling. Stories are memorable and useful forms of communications.
Having said that, another way of thinking about future trends was summed up by influential and award-winning science fiction author William Gibson:
“The future is already here — it’s just not very evenly distributed.”
Somewhere out in the world, today, new ideas, philosophies, styles, approaches, technologies, systems, products, and services are already in use — being deployed and explored by small groups of people. On street corners or in laboratories. In Korea or in Kalamazoo. These ideas are evolving and spreading. Iterating or dying.