One of the themes we’re picking up from Council members is a reckoning that new product development and innovation approaches are badly in need of an overhaul. What’s driving it? Here’s what we’ve heard from marketers at Global 2000-sized companies:
- The recession has fundamentally recast customers’ hierarchy of needs, priorities and in some cases core values, giving rise to the “New Normal” customer
- The “Good Enough Revolution” (an important read) has demonstrated that, in many categories, the returns curve on adding new features has flattened or even inverted
- The increasing participation of our target audiences in digital and social media has presented an opportunity to dramatically reduce innovation cycle time
- The source of consumption growth is shifting to BRIC countries, which is putting more pressure on innovation processes to produce discontinuous innovation for those markets
In 2010, we will research these forces and more importantly, the best practice approaches that marketing leaders can use to retool their innovation engine for this new environment. We anticipate delivering insights and best practices to the membership this summer. Interested in shaping our research inquiry? Please email me (pspenner@executiveboard.com).
For those of you who need help now, here are MLC innovation resources that should help to see you through:
- Ground Yourself in Macroeconomic Forces: Join us for three upcoming webinars on the business barometers in the US, EU, and China with Dr. Roman Cech, PhD as our guide
- Understand How Your Customer Has Changed: start by attending the MLC’s upcoming webinar, Lessons to Remember: Recession-Era Insights Most Managers Will Forget, January 28th, 11:00 EST
- Re-Examine Unmet Customer Needs: apply a customer jobs/outcomes approach to understand your New Normal Customer’s needs—see the Customer Outcomes Surfacing Process Tutorial
- Organize Innovation Around Key Segments: your customer segmentation may have changed—apply these World Class Segment Innovation Solutions to boost your innovation productivity
Or, if you’re starting from square one, visit MLC’s NPD and Innovation Topic Center.
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