In his 1988 book, The Design of Everyday Things, Donald Norman discusses an idea known as affordances. As he describes:
“
The term affordance refers to . . . those fundamental properties that determine just how [a] thing could possibly be used. . . . Affordances provide strong clues to the operations of things. Plates are for pushing. Knobs are for turning. Slots are for inserting things into. Balls are for throwing or bouncing. When affordances are taken advantage of, the user knows what to do just by looking: no picture, label, or instruction needed.
Building on this idea with an example, in his 2019 book, Alchemy: The Surprising Power of Ideas That Don’t Make Sense, Rory Sutherland describes the creation of Sony’s Walkman in the 80s:
“
The request for the Walkman had initially come from the 70-year-old [Masaru] Ibuka [one of the founders of Sony], who wanted a small device to allow him to listen to full-length operas on flights between Tokyo and the US.
When the engineers came back, they were especially proud. Not only had they succeeded in achieving what Morita had briefed them to create – a miniature stereo cassette player – they had also managed to include a recording function. . . . but according to multiple accounts, Morita vetoed the recording button. . . . In the same way that McDonald’s omitted cutlery from its restaurants to make it obvious how you were supposed to eat its hamburgers, by removing the recording function from Walkmans, Sony produced a product that had a lower range of functionality, but a far greater potential to a change behaviour.
On a device like a Walkman, the inclusion or exclusion of specific buttons would naturally have a dramatic impact on how the device was used, and, further, how it was perceived by potential customers. Now the customer base is only those who would like to listen to music, which makes it easier to market and easier to make a purchasing decision if that’s what you’re looking for.
The mediums we choose to present our content in are similarly designed with various types of affordances. What can I click? Where do I look next? Where does this button go? But that doesn’t mean that every possible affordance must be made available to the audience. Only the ones that your specific customer base finds valuable.
So, how can you design and engineer the medium of your content in a way that maximizes its usefulness and impact for your customers?
