by Guest Writer Tim Andren
A great idea brought to life will shoot a business to the moon.
A bad idea, on the other hand, can drive even a perfectly-managed company to the grave.
Startups and existing businesses alike hugely benefit from understanding the importance of practicing regular innovation.
The Foundation
It’s a well-known fact that great companies are made or broken by the products or services they offer. Popular products like Nike shoes or Moleskin journals were once an idea, born on the day they sparked into the imagination of an entrepreneur.
Business lives in the daily activity of people and the decisions they make. Virtually everything we do in our lives, whether it’s for want or need, is enabled by the tools and inventions of entrepreneurs. Given this nature of business, it’s startling why so many entrepreneurs neglect to invest the time or pay much attention to creating innovative solutions for the people who will put money in their pockets.
The results of neglecting to innovate produces mountains of ‘me too’ offerings and brands that are impossible for customers to distinguish. One Google search for a product category will make anybody’s head spin.
Innovate and enable
My high school physics teacher used to always answer student questions about speed or motion with his own question. “In relation to what?”, he’d reply. Mr. Wright wanted qualification. Progress can’t be measured unless there is a benchmark for comparison. The same reasoning applies to businesses of any size. Products like the iPhone or the Post-it Note can only be considered great if they stand out compared to what came before them.
Was the pocket calculator a good idea? Absolutely! What was life like before everyone had the ability to solve math problems with a handheld device? It’s hard to even imagine now. On the other hand, change solely for the sake of change is not a good idea. When Coca-Cola brought out it’s New Coke line it was about as popular as Kanye West after ‘The Great Taylor Swift Fiasco.
The sizzle and the steak
It’s important to look for ways to differentiate not only the product or service but also the positioning of the company brand. It does a company no good to develop a great idea that’s packaged with a poorly-positioned brand or logo that blends into the sea of competition.
The global reach of today’s technology requires a company marketing strategy that differentiates itself in the audience’s mind while creating disruptive ads and campaigns. Nyquil is a great example of this. Vicks recognized how their cold remedy made people drowsy, so they created (and for many years owned) the nighttime cold remedy market.
Slow down and go further
Economies and trends ebb and flow like the tide. The cyclical nature of life guarantees change will always occur. Businesses have to adapt and change along with it. Entrepreneurs must sit down and ask themselves if there is a great idea in their offering. If the answer isn’t positive, it’s time to sit go back to the drawing board, procure some market research, conduct a focus group or create social communities to receive customer feedback.
It can be argued that the majority of time spent developing either a startup or existing business should be focused on ideas first and everything else second. Management, marketing strategies and operations can always be altered, but if a company lacks the foundation of a great idea it has virtually no chance to succeed.
The benefits of maximizing business innovation before investing years of hard work and money will go a long way toward success. As the saying goes – ‘a stitch in time, saves nine.’
Tim Andren is the founder of Guideas, Inc. an innovation and marketing company in Irvine, California. He is also the author of a popular blog. View his full profile here.
Great post, but sometimes it necessarily doesnt have to start with a great idea, but just an idea.
And sometimes we waste too much time looking for a great idea, rather than starting with a simple idea and making it great…
So true. I like the Nyquil example too. This post makes me want to reconsider my business model to try to differentiate it even more. I know you said ‘change for the sake of change’ is a bad idea, but how do you know if you’re doing it for the right reasons? My thoughts are that my idea (can’t say what it is) is good but not good enough. It’s hard because it took a long time for me to come up with it and write out my business plan and everything. So what should I do?
Cheers Joseph. I think we’re saying the same thing in different ways. Like you, I am encouraging people to take an idea and do the extra work to make it different. Different is good, but only if it adds value in the customer’s mind.
The best thing to do (and I advise my client’s to do this all of the time) is to set a time limit for ideation. Parkinson’s Law applies and pushes a finite timeline for completion.
The greatest challenge is to not allow too much time to go by or else stress enters the equation at some point. When that happens, the quality of the ideas drops dramatically.
i have watched several businesses that simply mimic a current business model fail within 6 months. I agree that great ideas, or even unique ideas drive the success of a new business. Several reasons behind this could be down to the support you get when starting out. I started out with the help of Business Link, who gave me £1000 towards PR, Web Design, Media coverage etc. after winning several awards and being nominated for new business of the year, i credit most of the success to the uniqueness and the likeability of the product i was selling.
Thanks Tim, I totally agree with you, We somethings spend too much time thinking, not that thinking is not a good thing, but something it leads to procrastination and as you said
“The greatest challenge is to not allow too much time to go by or else stress enters the equation at some point. When that happens, the quality of the ideas drops dramatically”.
Great post, very informative and the last paragraph:
“The benefits of maximizing business innovation before investing years of hard work and money will go a long way toward success. As the saying goes – ‘a stitch in time, saves nine.’”
is so true – Thank you!
It is really difficult to think that my idea is not a innovative one. I think this should be left to the consumer of you product. As Steve Jobs says, “People dont want it until u show it to them what they need”.
I think the best thing would be to make a prototype of your product and float it in the market to test it for sometime. I think your consumers are the best people who can tell you whether your product or idea is innovative or not.
What I have experienced in the corporate arena is managers that are for lack of a better term greedy for a buck. Managers want you to develop new ideas and continue to create advanced strategies that the company will gain recognition for, I know that is business. Good managers hire creative employees to make them look good, the downfall to this is if you can not develop ideas for the good of the company, many times you are relieved of your duties.
Prototyping is a good idea Rahul. Sometimes it’s not always possible depending on the nature of the product. Service-based offerings can be tested by Google ads. The results provide you real-time customer click response. Versioning is important here too.
@Doug It gives you all the more incentive to start your own business. Your best ideas come from your own natural pursuits or possibly the ‘necessity is the mother of invention’ situation that many businesses are having to operate under in today’s economy.
Point of correction Tim. Being an entrepreneur, i stand to say that an idea must first get to the marketplace before it is considered great or not. It is the market that determines if a product is great, not the entrepreneur. I have seen some stupid ideas that turned out to be great ideas simply because the market loved it.
That’s so important Tony. Perhaps I wasn’t clear enough in stating that here because I made it sound like it only would happen after an internal answer.
“…procure some market research, conduct a focus group or create social communities to receive customer feedback.”
You’re right…it has to happen in the nascent stages in order to know test the validity of the idea itself. My post didn’t state that. Funny, since it’s usually my number one piece of advice!
Really like the post
One of the things we’ve learned is that successful entrepreneurs also need to be able to learn from their mistakes and this also means knowing when to quit.
This is a very interesting article, and although it would seem obvious that good ideas are needed to create a success, you have pointed out that this is not enough; the ideas need to be dynamic and relevant to the business climate. I would love to refer to this article in my blog, http://www.globalknights.biz/, with full accreditation…
@Elle We’d be honored. Please let me know when it’s up via email: john [at] youngentrepreneur.com
Thanks!
John
i have watched several businesses that simply mimic a current business model fail within 6 months. I agree that great ideas, or even unique ideas drive the success of a new business. Several reasons behind this could be down to the support you get when starting out. I started out with the help of Business Link, who gave me £1000 towards PR, Web Design, Media coverage etc. after winning several awards and being nominated for new business of the year, i credit most of the success to the uniqueness and the likeability of the product i was selling