Product Innovation

3 Steps to Make Product Innovation Work For Your Business

Knowing What Product Innovation is and How to Use It

Product innovation has to do with changing the end result of your business offerings so that they are better capable of solving the problems your customers face. It has to do with ideas that are then chosen, developed, and introduced regarding your products. There are many different ways for this process to occur, as well as certain steps that you need to take in order to maximize your potential for success.

Ways in Which Product Innovation Can Occur

Typically speaking, product innovation would refer to coming up with a brand new product or service that will best suit the needs of your customers so that you can bring it to market, and they will purchase it. However, beyond brand new offerings, there are other possibilities for product innovation, as well. They include:

·         Improvements to existing products – here, a current product offering is examined and studied, so that changes can be made to it for better function or features can be added to better meet the needs of the customer. Adding a no-drip feature to a coffee maker, for example, illustrates this form of product innovation.

·         Combining existing products – with this type of product innovation, two or more products are brought together to become a single product that has all of the same features. For example, cellular phones that can play music and take pictures are actually this form of product innovation, where a cell phone, camera, and MP3 player were combined.

·         Bundling existing products with a service – in this case of product innovation, existing products can be sold in combination with a service. For example, digital cable boxes combined with a cable television service, an extended warranty package on an appliance, or cellular service and a mobile phone.

·         Making a product more affordable - product innovation in this sense doesn’t necessarily mean changing the offering itself, but will instead alter the way in which it is manufactured, shipped, or marketed, for example, so that it can be sold at a lower cost. This is seen in virtually every industry, from technology to pharmaceuticals and from clothing to pet supplies. An example can be outsourcing the manufacturing to China, where it may be done much less expensively.

·         Adapting an existing product to a new market – again, another way that product innovation can change your offerings without actually altering the product or service is to find a new market for something that already exists. For example, while the push mower has been in existence for decades, it was – until relatively recently – marketed to people who have a smaller lawn to cut. Nowadays, though, it is also marketed to people who want to save money because they don’t have to pay for electricity or gas, to people who want a better workout from their lawn care, and to individuals who would like to cut their lawns in a more environmentally friendly way.

The 3 Steps for Successful Product Innovation

Of course, once you know the ways in which product innovation can occur, you will likely want to know how you can successfully apply it to your business. Many experts will tell you that there are three key steps to accomplishing this goal, and that they are based on very basic questions that can lead to the right type of inspiration and development. They are as follows.

1.    How is the existing product really used? – this is an important question to ask, because it will help you to understand how your market is truly using your product and whether you can change it in some way or alter your marketing to better reach your target customer. For example, baking soda and vinegar may both be cooking ingredients, but many people also use them for cleaning, unplugging stopped drains, and other uses. Similarly, while paper towels may have been marketed for use as a disposable rag with which to dry hands or mop up spills, they are also used as napkins or an alternative to paper plates. By knowing the alternate uses for your product, you will better understand your customer and what he or she needs from it.

2.    How can your product make its use easier? – once you know how your customer uses your offerings, you can use product innovation to alter the item so that the goal for its use can be accomplished in fewer steps. For example, mops that have an attached soap bottle and sprayer remove the steps of having to dunk the mop in a bucket and then wring out the mop when the customer is washing the floor.

3.    What will your customer do after using your product? – find out the next most common task that occurs after your product has been used. With this form of product innovation, you can find out if there is a single task that occurs among most of your product’s users, and you may be able to alter your product to better suit that next goal. For example, if the next step after using a cutting board is to dump the chopped food into another container, then making it easier to remove the food without spilling it might be a beneficial alteration to the product.

Product innovation can help you to keep your customer happy and keep your offerings at the top of your market on a consistent basis.