Customers can guide us in our innovation efforts

Customers can be an important source of innovative ideas. Many companies conduct customer surveys and focus groups which prove to be a useful channel of the feedback mechanism, in terms of obtaining original views. Customers are good at demanding incremental improvements in products and services, lower prices and predicting significant innovations to meet their needs. Before the fax machine was invented who would have predicted we needed it? Which wearer of spectacles in the 1960s or 70s would have said that he wanted a lens to put on his eyeball or laser surgery to reshape his eye?

Innovation really made it possible. Innovation depends on the customers’ requirement, his necessity and the urge of wanting something new, something useful. For instance, lets take a good example of Haier, a leading Chinese manufacturer of electronic goods such as refrigerators, AC’s etc. Its engineers in rural China were surprised to find that people were using Haier washing machines to wash the vegetables they had grown in their gardens. Turning this unexpected use into a new application, the Haier engineering team came up with a new vegetable washing gadget designed specifically for the people of China.

Please note- Asking customers for feedback is good but observing them can be much better. If you want to gain an edge over the competition and design the Next-gen technology services, have a keen watch over your customer. Look for the pain points of the customer, the headaches and problems that they want to be solved or the unusual combinations of needs or uses. They can give you the insights you need to generate successful innovations in service delivery, technology and operations. So, go ahead, take a plunge….