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CITY-AS-A-STARTUP METHODOLOGY
Exploring the Perception Engineering core of the City-as-a-Startup method
WHAT ISN’T
Perception Engineering is not the good ol’ marketing
It’s fundamental for the way your city creates & shares new things with the world.
WHAT ISN’T
Perception Engineering is not some fancy bla-bla
It’s not just a methodology but an approach and a set of tools that work. It’s always evolving and its effects are measurable.
WHAT IS IT
Perception Engineering is ethical
It’s not another way how to manipulate and distort the way people perceive your city. That’'s so 20th century.
Good luck doing that in a world with 4 billion people connected on social media.
WHAT IS IT
Perception Engineering is visionary
It’s not just another set of boring tools to make things incrementally better. It should give people in your city goosebumps.
WHAT IS IT
Perception Engineering is holistic
Finally, everything in one place. Good bye entropy & guesswork. This is a systematic way to manage the way your city is perceived.
WHAT IS IT
Perception Engineering is strategic
Remember, strategy = sacrifice. It’s giving up the unimportant so that your city can focus 100% on what really matters.
“It’s always been frustrating for me that I couldn’t find anywhere a holistic & strategic methodology to help cities manage how people perceive the city and its products. Finally, it’s here: you can simply plug-in the Perception Engineering core of the City-as-a-Startup method into your city, and you’re ready to go”
— Adrian Docea | Perception Engineering creator
WHAT IS IT
Perception Engineering is humans & robots together.
Just like we no longer fly planes that don’t have both a human pilot and an automated pilot, you can’t implement Perception Engineering in your city if you’re not using both AI & NI (native intelligence). Part human, part software.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING MODEL
Looks like this ☞
It looks complicated. It’s not. It is complex. But once you master it, it will change your city.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING
Born in San Francisco
LET’S SEE THE PRINCIPLES OF
THE PERCEPTION ENGINEERING METHOD
⬇
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING PRINCIPLES
Perception is reality
We might not like it, we might not admit it’s true, but that doesn’t make it not true.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING PRINCIPLES
The one percent
Approximately 1% of the organizations out there really become successful. For example, out of the two million new tech companies founded every year, 1% succeed. And only 1% of those become unicorns.
Plus, we only remember about 1% of all the messages we see in a day.
Because exceptional is rare.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING PRINCIPLES
A good product
Whether you’re a city, a startup, or an enterprise, you offer products. Having a good product is a good beginning. A prerequisite for any competitive market in the 21st century. But it’s not what will make you successful.
If every good product launched by every city was equally successful, they would all have identical market shares. They don’t. So many cities have exceptional products that are not successful.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING PRINCIPLES
The perfect fit
Most of the new products fail on the market. The #1 reason? Lack of product/market fit.
It’s not that the product isn’t good. It’s because the product isn't everything. You launch something people don’t really want, or they don’t perceive as being valuable enough. And you only realize it when it’s already too late. But perception can be managed. Holistically and scientifically
Perception Engineering.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING PRINCIPLES
The 80/20 rule
Cities tend to invest 80% or more time and energy in Product Engineering (renovating a castle, for example) & Process Engineering (hiring a team to manage it), and 20% or less in Perception Engineering.
Perception Engineering is exactly where the severe product-market-fit failures happen, because cities create products people don’t perceive as being valuable enough. Organizations underestimate the importance of the 20% and tend to minimize its role and resources behind it.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING PRINCIPLES
The other half
Successful organizations understand that only part of your success is related to Product Engineering & Process Engineering. “The other half”, as we call it, is Perception Engineering: it’s how people perceive you.
Because it’s not the best product that wins. It’s the product perceived to be the best. You can have an exceptional product and still go bankrupt. And that’s unfair. Perception Engineering is the answer.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING PRINCIPLES
Perception = feelings
It’s what makes us human. It’s what makes you, you. What we feel about a product is what will determine its fate. Perception Engineering is a paradox: we aim to understand & manage scientifically how people feel, and why.
Often we can’t even figure out what we really like. A supermarket might carry 50.000 types of items. How do you choose 50 of them in one hour? It’s how you feel about the packaging design, the name, an ad you might remember, that makes one item more familiar than other.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING PRINCIPLES
The precious one
More than 3000 brands fight each other for the most precious resource out there: our attention. Only 1% win.
This research made by The Guardian shows that people see more than 3000 ads per day. By the end of the day, they'll remember about 1%. Imagine the competition for attention. Everything you do, should be better than whatever 99 other cities and companies do. Every day. Plus, some of those 99 have way more money to spend in the daily battle for attention.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING PRINCIPLES
The unfair advantage
We all believe our product is “the best”. But people don’t make purchase decisions based on what you think.
They have to believe you have something they need by connecting emotionally with your story, you need to captivate them and make them feel something for you. Perception Engineering does that.
It's science. It's an unfair advantage.
It works.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING PRINCIPLES
You change for them
Perception Engineering is about how people feel about your city, because their happiness is the only thing that ultimately matters
Change is hard. Change is painful. So when we change, we don’t change for our sake. Cities are subject to inertia. We don't like change. We change for their sake.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING = CHANGE
Perception Engineering exists to produce Change
Change is when you disrupt the normal way things work, in order to create more perceived value, because perception = reality, remember? More perceived value makes people happier.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING = CHANGE
Perception Engineering is also known as “P3”
Because we are using 3X Toolkits and 3X Engines of change, in order to manage “the other third” of your business, which is Perception Engineering.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING = CHANGE
The 3 toolkits of Perception Engineering
Perception Engineering works with 3 types of tools: Strategy + Creativity + Technol0gy (SC&T)
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING = CHANGE
1 Strategy
Long-term planning and strategic vision, with a rejuvenating, lasting and measurable impact across the entire city.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING = CHANGE
2 Creativity
Delivering immediate results in clearly defined areas of the city, throughout the user lifecycle.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING = CHANGE
3 Technology
Deploying the right mix of software and human expertise, that will instantly upgrade your city’s perception management.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING = CHANGE
The 3 engines of Perception Engineering
The 3 engines that can produce Change in your city are: Innovation (it’s how we create new things), Experiences (it’s how people experience them) and Storytelling (it’s how we communicate them).
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING = CHANGE
1 Innovation
There are 2 types of innovation: Product Innovation and Process Innovation. Both have a direct impact on perception.
The main reason why innovation doesn’t work is because it’s not taken seriously. It sounds cool to have an innovation project but it is often not approached methodically. Not having an Innovation Method is like not having a business plan. Without a method, how do you identify the right Tools + Team + Tracking for your project?
Successful innovation is never “boss had an idea and it’s great”.
It’s method, not luck.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING = CHANGE
2 Experiences
The Art of Design
Experiences are created mainly through design: web, mobile and XR experiences to real-life environments and happenings, product experience design, audio & multi sensorial experiences, and all the branding tools that help us shape a unique universe for our city and the city’s products.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING = CHANGE
3 Storytelling
The Art of Conversation
Storytelling is no longer a monologue, as it used to be. It’s mainly Social. All the conversations we’re having with the city’s audience through social media, customer service, marketing communications, public relations.
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING = CHANGE
The big soul-searching journey
Perception Engineering is a journey, that begins with the big question: why. Forget about what you do. Why are you doing it?
Are you really creating the change you want to see in the world? Because if you’re not, why not? People are more motivated to engage with a city that is driven by a big “Why”.
And i’s easier to hire good people, because good people need to fight for a good cause. And it’s easier to differentiate yourself from other cities, because each big “Why” can be answered in a unique way. So if the “Why” is so important, why not start from here?
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING
Summary
WHAT IS PERCEPTION ENGINEERING
Perception Engineering
is not the good ol’ marketing
is not some fancy bla-bla
is ethical
is visionary
is holistic
is strategic
is human&machine
THE PRINCIPLES OF PERCEPTION ENGINEERING
Perception is reality
The one percent
A good product
The perfect fit
The 80/20 rule
The other half
Perception = feelings
The precious one
The unfair advantage
Change for them
PERCEPTION ENGINEERING = CHANGE
Perception Engineering exists to produce Change
How do we produce Change?
Perception Engineering = “P3”
The 3 Toolkits of Perception Engineering
Strategy+Creativity+Technology
The 3 Engines of Perception Engineering
Innovation+Experiences+Storytelling
Let the big soul-searching journey begin
The heart of Perception Engineering
SAY HELLO
We’re happy to answer any question you might have. Drop us an email at office@heraldist.com or use the form to send us a message.