Each and every week the Square Holes team are deep in the bowels of a number of projects, working to mine all of the insights that we can to help grow businesses and support thriving cities.

These insights are used by businesses and organisations to innovate their offerings, move into new markets, track their impact and hone their products and output. Each week we will be sharing a broad insight that we have learnt for you to use in your own work.

Let us know what you find valuable!

Jason: Wide vs narrow

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the balance between brands casting their reach wide versus choosing a narrow focus. Reach can seem logical: more products, more markets, more opportunities. But it can quickly become disparate, a collection of things rather than a clear idea. Virgin is a good example: airlines, finance, gyms, telecoms and more. The scale is impressive, but the breadth stretches the brand across many directions.

A narrow focus is different. It determines where customers are found, where innovation happens, and where investment in people and teams is concentrated. Red Bull shows this well: a remarkably narrow product core, yet an expansive cultural presence.

Narrow can feel riskier, but paradoxically, it’s often the clearest path to growth. Sometimes progress doesn’t come from doing more things. It comes from doing fewer things, far better.

One of my favourite YouTube videos is Steve Jobs launching the ‘Think Different!’ campaign, which was all about getting back to the basics of great products (a narrow focus), great marketing and great distribution. The campaign and strategic focus in 1997 created an approach that led to nearly 30 years of huge growth for the near-bankrupt Apple at the time.

Mahalia: The app that GETS me 

One of my favourite hobbies is op shopping. I love scouring through the racks and shelves on the hunt for past loved treasures. It’s part thrill of the find, and part joy at providing new life to something no longer treasured by someone else. But I also struggle to always find the time to make it to physical stores to trawl through the goods. Enter Depop – an online store where people can buy and sell their unwanted clothing, jewellery, accessories, etc. While writing about customer service this week, I couldn’t help thinking about Depop’s incredible data automation. Every time I open the app, I’m presented with the top finds Depop has curated just for me based on my likes and purchases. It rarely goes wrong. This algorithm is so on point, it’s started to feel like Depop is a friend who can’t wait to show me the latest pick they think I’ll love. And it’s for this reason I keep coming back, and back, and back, and back…

Ewa: A question of morality

This week I found myself thinking a lot about morality. What sparked it was an excellent report from the Pew Research Center. The dataset is fascinating throughout, but one result especially stood out to me: how differently people around the world view their fellow citizens.

In Australia, for example, 85% of people see other Australians as morally good. In the lowest-rated country, the United States, a majority of people see other Americans as morally bad. I’m still trying to process that wide gap in goodwill—and what it might mean for everyday life.

There is something quietly powerful in knowing that here in Australia, the people you pass on the street or meet at the pub are, on average, inclined to see you as a morally good person. It makes me wonder how much of a society’s character is shaped not just by how moral people actually are, but by what they assume about one another.

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