Rarely is it the case that you place something out there for mass consumption and it’s received exactly how you had planned it. An essential difference between products that fail and those that flourish are in their abilities to adapt to market opportunities. When your users find a new and innovative way to use your offerings you should make course corrections to better suit their needs. Expect this to happen.

As creators of content it’s no stretch of the imagination that we succumb to cradling our ideas. There’s a desire to make something that has an instant and lasting impact by design. It’s silly to think that you’re going to get it absolutely right on the first swing. When Thomas Edison announced to the world that he had invented the first phonograph his original intent was to create a dictaphone. In essence he thought that he had conceived the answering machine. Ironically, his inaugural recording was a recitation of Mary Had a Little Lamb.

How could you blame Edison for not recognizing the big picture? His real mistake was in not adapting to the forces of the market. Edison focused all of his energy on the mechanical stenography while opportunists swooped in and patented the gramophone. From this innovation the entire music industry was born.

Adapt adapt adapt. Don’t get stiff legs, the market waits for no one. When the site UStream.tv was initiated into the pool of web properties I imagine that the creators wanted it to be a platform for streaming legitimate live content. I would be surprised if they had anticipated that it would be used to transmit a puppy feed over the internet. In the past month their most popular stream with an average of fourteen thousand viewers, at any moment, and a total of two million plus views is in fact the puppy channel.

Though this may not be the original intent of the UStream.tv founders it should be seen as an opportunity. I’m not advocating that they go all out with puppy themed branding on their site but they can look into ways to better serve this niche demographic. Simple things perhaps like allowing for more personality in chat. Make it easier to pull content from the site and share it with friends in a personalized manner. All of the things that aren’t specific to a professional lecture streaming application.

Dale Carnegie mentions in his book, How to Win Friends & Influence People:

I often went fishing up in Maine during the summer. Personally I am very fond of strawberries and cream, but I have found that for some strange reason, fish prefer worms. So when I went fishing, I didn’t think about what I wanted. I thought about what they wanted. I didn’t bait the hook with strawberries and cream. Rather, I dangled a worm or grasshopper in front of the fish and said: “Wouldn’t you like to have that?” Why not use the same common sense when fishing for people?

Dale is talking about adapting to the needs of your target. It’s good practice to go into a new venture knowing that you are going to have to make adjustments. You may be the master of your domain but you’ll never be able to read the minds of your users. Once again this doesn’t mean that the first release should be generic. It means that you should always leave room for play. If you find that your demographic is dropping mentos into your soda and making mini geysers then find a way to adapt.

Keep adaptation in mind. Never be insulted that your user base has found a more innovative way to use your product. Embrace it, love it, capitalize on it.