From Time Poor to Time Rich

In my years in marketing, I saw a lot of segmentations. You divide a market into groups with more or less similar characteristics, and then target your product at one or more groups. In Shell, marketing our petrol stations, we always struggled with this. Since location and habit are such dominant factors in that purchase, we really had little choice but to target everyone – at least all drivers. Over the 1990’s we recruited professional marketers from Fast Moving Consumer Good (FMCG) retail, and I often ended up fighting their ideas. I remember a beautiful segmentation into five groups that they came up with, seemingly to work globally. It was very neat, yet I could never work out what we were supposed to do with it.

More basic segmentations, for example by price consciousness, age, gender, with or without kids and so on, have obvious application but little competitive advantage. The segmentation that had the most resonance with me was always between time rich and time poor. I bought the theory and saw how to use it.

Increasingly, we are divided between people who never have the luxury of time and those who have too much. People in urban employment with any sort of social life tend to be time poor, in that life is usually a rush and anything that saves time is a blessing. Over the years this segment has grown and the extent of their time poverty has grown too. This mega-trend in society has led to self service and the convenience revolution in many sectors, and has been further fed by the internet. Marketing to this group is a worthwhile challenge, since convenience and speed are attainable goals and the group is ready to pay for them.

In parallel with the growth of the time poor segment, much of society has remained time rich. Retired people, rural people and the unemployed are often time rich. Some others have a time rich life by restricting their activities, either through choice or some lack of alternatives. In marketing, these are people who value an experience, read the small print, and go for coupon offers. They are loyal but can be price conscious too and some lack the funds to be an attractive segment for many products.

Think of some people you know. I expect you’ll find the segmentation works, in that you can place most people clearly in one group or the other, and can relate to the behavioural generalities of the segments. Walk into a supermarket and you’ll see the segments at work. Time rich people often try to spin out a visit, consciously or otherwise. They will use the café, and walk up every aisle and check out alternatives and offers. Time poor people will get their list and escape. The supermarket will often be laid out cleverly to cater well to both groups, though there may be a leaning to one, for example in the time-poor focused urban convenience store model.

The segments reinforce over time. The adage that you should always ask a busy person to do any job for you rings true, since they will often have mental processes tuned to getting things done rather than putting things off or spinning things out. Once unemployed for a period of time, it becomes hard to find the energy and efficiency to present oneself credibly to the job market.

It is a bit of a sad fact of life that we often wish were in the opposite category of segmentations. Think single or partnered off. Time poor people really miss time, yet struggle to find ways to create it, instead filling up any space with new activity. Many of them don’t even know how to relax on holiday! Conversely, time rich people are sometimes anxious for their day to end and cannot appreciate the gift of time through loneliness or lethargy.

It is also true that transitions from one group to the other are stressful, since they challenge our routines and even our values. Retirement is the most obvious such transition, and it is the change of time status that creates the problem for many people. I’m in this transition now – in truth it started a year ago, and I’ve had the big advantages of handling the change gradually and of this being my choice.

The key, I believe, is finding ways to cherish the time you have created. Not by running out and filling it with more frenetic activity, but in other ways. This happens automatically to some extent. For example, I’ve always walked a lot, but now I find myself going a bit more slowly, taking more scenic routes, stopping to breathe and admire and observe and be diverted. I love it. The brain is not switching off, but is learning to cherish the gift of time. Meditation, siestas, really listening to music, and, maybe most important of all, really listening to people are also new gifts.

Will this work long term? I don’t know yet, but I’m optimistic. Perhaps I’ll grow to resent the time, feel challenged by relative inactivity, and even slow down in thought process. I hope not. As with many things, awareness of yourself and the issues playing around you should be the first part of a solution.

If you are time rich, I guess my advice is to cherish the gift of time and use it consciously. I’m open to other advice. Do you have any for me?

What if you are time poor? There are many courses and books about time management. In each case, the starting point is to gain control of your own life. What really matters to you? What is important, and what is merely urgent or habitual? If time is important, how are you going to create it and then not fritter it away? These are good questions to consider, and of course if you are time poor you probably won’t find the time to consider them properly! But I suggest you do. Today, not tomorrow, or when you’ve settled into the job or partnership, or when the latest crisis is over. Summer is a good time for reflection, as even time poor people can slow down a bit then. What is certain is that if the first day you consider the issue is the day you suddenly become time rich, you will find the transition very tough indeed.