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You want to impress the brass – you want to wow the boss – you want people to sit and take notice of your innovative idea.
Where do you start?
All great ideas start in one place – with the customer.
Too many times we try to fathom our creative thinking to come up with the great idea that will just click. We are using push rather than pull. How many great ideas died simply because they were no valued by the market? We thought too much about what we wanted to bring rather than what people actually wanted and needed.
We need to think first and foremost from the customer’s chair. Your customer is who you are selling to – and we all are selling by the way – and could be the end product customer of your organization or your boss or other target.
To come up with the next great idea, start with how your customer uses your product or service. Staple yourself to an order and walk through the entire process of how your customer uses your product or service. Pretend you are a customer (or better yet, talk to actual customers) and move step-by-step through the entire process – why you need it to begin with, how you make your decision, making the purchase, using the product or service, and gaining results. Focus on both the functional (how it works) and the emotional (how it feels).
Step back and think about the needs that move your customer to buy from you and specifically how they use your product or service. What are the results they want to achieve and how does it work?
Now look at the experience at all points and think about how additional value could be created to make your customer’s life easier and better. Brainstorm all the ways you could add to your customer’s results – focus on what they want to attain – and narrow down to the best ideas to make the experience better.
The next great idea lies right in front of you with your customer. Start with why your customer buys from you, how your customer uses your product and service, and what your customer wants from the experience of working with you. Find a way to make your customer’s life better and you have the next great idea. Let your customers pull you to the next great thing rather than try to push something on them.
Position your great idea in terms of the customer and adding value and, believe me, people will take notice – in a very good way.
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