Five Opportunities for Innovation in the Emerging Environment
- August 23, 2022
- Posted by:
- Category: Blog
1. Address customer feedback
As a starting point, ask yourself: are customers dissatisfied with your products, services or processes? In the current environment, being easy to deal with has become a key reason for doing business with a particular company. Make sure that adverse feedback is captured and addressed immediately, and corrective action is communicated to the concerned person or company.
Corrective action can not only ensure the continuation of a business association but also pre-empt similar feedback from other customers.
2. Go beyond existing customers
While existing and long-standing customers keep your business running, growth opportunities lie elsewhere. Speak to customers who have stopped buying from you, have never bought from you, and those who have a negative impression of your company. Know the reasons that keep them away from doing business with your company.
These groups can open up an entirely new market for you through new products and services, value-adds or simply a different way of servicing them.
3. Study other innovative companies
There is more to growth than customer feedback alone. Study what other innovative companies are doing to grow their business. These include both, the ones in your industry but operating in other geographic markets and those outside your industry but known for their innovative practices.
What are they doing right? Do their innovations work for your company? Examine how their best practices can be adapted to your business and implement them.
4. Examine emerging trends
Current trends are a good indicator of market dynamics. In the post-pandemic era, virtual interaction has driven people to pursue individualist experiences such as self-education and self-fulfilling goals.
To gain insight into such trends, attend virtual events and webinars by thought leaders and experts within your industry and outside. Subscribe to research and trend-reporting services to have an ear to the ground.
5. Look within
While the first four approaches encourage you to examine external agencies, it is your leadership and team that eventually determine how efficiently your company can tap growth opportunities. Both must be aligned with the company’s goals.
Strategic workshops are an effective way to achieve this alignment. Teams usually work in silos with prescribed systems and procedures, leaving little room for interaction and exchange of ideas. Such workshops bring people from different teams together, breaking walls and enabling a better understanding of each other’s contribution to the overall objective.
Keep workshops short and focused. Attention tends to waver if sessions are stretched beyond 2-3 hours. Preparation in advance is essential to have productive workshops. Make sure all participants have the material well in time to contribute to the discussion.
Now that you have the basics in place, make the best of the opportunities thrown up by the emerging environment.
For more innovative practices, why not connect with our expert team? Write to us at [email protected] today.