Perceived parity among products and services threatens businesses.

"But the reality is that many don't matter much, or at least not much more than the others in their competitive set. The reality is that most of the nearly 1 billion products and services making up the global marketplace each meet acceptable thresholds of performance. Most are good-enough-enough and because true innovation is rare, they're interchangeable and functional customer switching costs are de minimis."

"Think about your phone, the detergent under your sink, the clothes in your closet, the car in your driveway, the apps on your home screen, your bank, the agencies, and even the game-changing AI platforms, sure, you've got preferences, but at a functional level are they materially different than the others from which you could choose? They're not."

"Consider that since 2005: The number of companies globally has almost doubled. The number of service businesses globally has doubled. The number of products on shelves physical and digital has increased 3000%, thirty-tupling to 600 million globally. (Amazon and Walmart each sell what's been estimated to be near 500 million SKUs.)"

Irrelevance is identified as the primary threat to businesses worldwide. Most of the nearly one billion marketplace offerings meet acceptable performance thresholds and are functionally interchangeable because true innovation is rare. Consumer switching costs are minimal, so preferences rarely reflect meaningful functional differences. Since 2005 the number of companies and service businesses roughly doubled and product SKUs increased roughly 3000%, producing vast choice, confusion, and competition. Tens of millions of new but undifferentiated products and services now require marketing, intensifying the challenge of making brands and offerings matter to customers.

Read at Forbes