Category Creation Versus Category Design

Category creation and category design are often confused or thought to be synonyms of each other. Those two, however, are different but closely related.

Category Creation

Category creation often gets conflated with “first mover”. That is to say, that a category is created by the first company to introduce a new offering. That is radically different than anything that has come before.

That’s why we prefer the term category design. Because dominating a new category is not necessarily about being first to market with a product. It is about being the first company to have your definition of a problem, and therefore solution, tip at scale.

And categories can be redesigned. Apple did not create the mobile phone. But they did redesign the category with a fresh point of view and a radically different product.

Category Design

Is a management discipline that focuses on establishing different categories of products of services. It involves educating the market about a new, often ignored problem as well as a solution that you can provide. It is often associated with a breakthrough product or service. However, your offering has to be combined with a breakthrough business model and a breakthrough big data about future category demand.

Many legendary category designers design the space around their product and company based on a noble purpose. It is about defining and developing the category you created so that people understand it along with your product and company and then demand it.

Category design comes after you have created a new category and product. It may be associated with company design in that an enterprise must develop its business model, culture, and point of view in a way that aligns with the new category.

Breaking Through With Category Creation And Category Design

You may have heard this many times: category design will push your company to success. The principles of it have been hiding in plain sight for a long time, and they have been proven effective regardless of the industry. Recently it has broken out of Silicon Valley to become a mainstream business discipline. That is because they are not anchored to just the innovation of new products.

Category design strategies are founded on perspective — a new point of view. That just like products, services, and business models, market categories can be proactively created.

That is what makes them effective and applicable to any company. The human brain forms connections between categories and its own experiences. Thus, people remember categories—especially those that solve their personal problems—more easily than they remember brands. Category design solidifies your company’s brand identity as the pioneer in the new category you came up with.

Many companies succeed with category creation and design because they generate a new market for your company, one that truly needs your product or service. You are, in essence, marketing to a captive market. Category designers win by radically differentiating themselves by creating a perception that they are very difficult to replace. They do not compete in any traditional sense of the word.

They are unique. And in a world where more and more legacy categories are becoming commoditized, being perceived as different, unique. Is the ultimate advantage.