How to Market the Smart Home: Focus on Emergent Experience, Not Use Cases

20 Pages Posted: 21 Sep 2016

See all articles by Donna L. Hoffman

Donna L. Hoffman

George Washington University School of Business

Thomas Novak

George Washington University School of Business

Date Written: January 15, 2016

Abstract

For smart home adoption to expand beyond the niche segments of technologically sophisticated upscale consumers and technology-focused DIYers, marketers must do a better job of understanding the inherent value the smart home offers. Current marketing approaches are fragmented and focus on individual devices and single use cases. Most companies are wondering which combination of entry points - appliance and home entertainment control, energy management, pet monitoring, property protection, safety and security - make the most sense. But, the mass market is not buying a platform or devices controlled by an algorithm, they are buying an experience. The key to smart home marketing is to view the smart home as a complex dynamic system, an assemblage with new capacities from ongoing interactions among devices and consumers, from which new experiences emerge. Marketers must focus on communicating the value proposition inherent in experience; current approaches may actually be underselling the smart home. We discuss the value of our framework and offer eight actionable insights derived from our research that can guide marketer action in the early stages of adoption and usage of consumer Internet of Things devices that comprise the smart home.

Keywords: adoption, assemblage theory, customer experience, Internet of Things, smart home, use cases

JEL Classification: M31

Suggested Citation

Hoffman, Donna L. and Novak, Thomas, How to Market the Smart Home: Focus on Emergent Experience, Not Use Cases (January 15, 2016). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2840976 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2840976

Donna L. Hoffman (Contact Author)

George Washington University School of Business ( email )

2201
G St NW
Washington, DC 20052
United States
9515431260 (Phone)

HOME PAGE: http://postsocial.gwu.edu

Thomas Novak

George Washington University School of Business ( email )

2121 I Street NW
Washington, DC 20052
United States
9515431592 (Phone)

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
560
Abstract Views
3,275
Rank
89,951
PlumX Metrics