Why innovate? Simply because you have to if you want to stay relevant and survive in this ever-changing world. Innovations are not always about big breakthroughs and game-changers, but quite often about a series of improvements. It is not always about disrupting and changing the status quo, but rather becoming more efficient and original.
Innovations don’t just happen overnight. They take a lot of time, effort, money and a big deal of teamwork. And even then you risk that it might not be a success. But at least you’ll know that you did everything that you could. The Innovation Cloud Platform makes sure you get everything covered in your innovation process and leaves little to chance. It boosts collaboration and engagement in the ideation process, makes sure that everything is on schedule and no resources are wasted in the development phase, and tracks progress once your innovation hits the marketplace. The perfect tool for any of your innovation endeavors.
Innovation takes more than just willingness. They need strategic planning, decision making, structure and technology that will ensure that those good ideas don’t go to waste. Innovations are all about communicating with your team and making sure that everyone has a fair chance of being heard. Great innovation is all about joint effort and collaboration because the innovation process is not a one-man job.
There are often a lot of risks involved if you are working on “the next big thing”. You must think of an original way of resolving a need and still try not to be too expensive. Perfect timing can make or break your innovation. If you wait too long, you risk missing the opportunity, and on the other hand, if you are too early, the consumers might not yet be ready for your innovativeness. But even if you fail, that is just another reason to go back to the drawing board and learn from your mistakes for the next innovation process. In many cases, it is all about trial and error because we learn from our past mistakes.
Innovations are not always about creating a new product or service. You have plenty of room for improving your existing products or services or improving and changing the processes you use. It is all about finding new, more efficient ways of doing or creating something. Even the slightest change in your production process can lead to a big impact on the overall business. Changing your strategy to be more responsive to the dynamics and partnering up with new businesses is yet another perspective to consider. Or branching out into other industries if you notice a gap. Innovation is about different perspectives and an ongoing process of becoming better.
The end goal should always be to create value. In the form of growth, market share and profit for your business and when it comes to consumers, in the form of satisfying their needs in a more superior way. Sometimes, just improving your customers’ experience can make a huge difference, and they might find more value in that, than in a new state of art product or service. Understanding your customers will help you create a better innovation strategy. Innovation Cloud can help you with this as well. With the simple, easy-to-use Crowdsourcing plugin, you can connect with your customers and hear them out about what they have to say. This is all valuable info, and not only will it help your business on having a better grasp on any issue, but your customers will appreciate you taking the time to hear them out, and tend to their needs.
There is no magic formula for perfect innovation. And there is no question whether you should innovate. The pandemic has been a wake-up call and taught us that it can all change overnight and that only those flexible and open to innovation can find a way out. It has never been a question of whether innovating is good for your business because it is de facto one of top priorities. As the end of the year is around the corner, and we might or might not see the end of the pandemic, if your business went into a hibernation mood, just trying to get by, maybe it’s about time to wake up, and put your innovation mood on. Because at the end of the day, being proactive and willing to take the risk will pay off rather than sitting and waiting for the inevitable – being run over by the dynamics of change.
As a proven tool, backed up by experience and technology, Innovation Cloud can help you every step of your innovation process, it is just up to you to get back into the game.
