Customers don't want a 1/4-inch drill; they want a 1/4-inch hole.
So said Ted Levitt and his article, "Marketing Myopia," stands as a classic.
In my own experience at Hewlett-Packard Medical Electronics, our engineers were positively charmed by their inventions, but what the savvier marketing folks understood was that the patient's vital signs were not the central reason the equipment was purchased - although it was very important - but more to the point, the physicians and staff wanted a trend line.
We "hire" products to do jobs.
Some years ago there was the "CB craze." The Citizen's Band radios were all the rage, especially among truckers. Driving an 18-wheeler, alone, over miles of interstate can be a lonely life and the CB radio became an instant fixture. There was even a hit single about truckers called "Convoy" where the CB radio was a "star."
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