POVLITZ Inc | Business and Entrepreneur

Product innovation is one of the most sought after and talked about attributes in business. But all too often, innovation is more theory than practice because initiating and implementing an innovative product is rarely easy. It often takes a genius idea, total commitment, and plenty of money before the breakthrough product is accepted by consumers.

How then do you create a great product? Here are seven lessons for product innovators:

1. Think of things that never existed and ask, “Why not?” Bobby Kennedy’s famous motto is an apt description of the first ingredient necessary to create a great new product. Terrific products come from inspired ideas. When George de Mestral took an annoying burr from his sock and placed it underneath his microscope, creating a breakthrough product like Velcro was the last thing on his mind. He spent the next ten years trying to duplicate artificially what nature made effortlessly.

2. Tap the power of one. The second lesson in product innovation is that one person can make a difference. Look at almost any product and you will invariably find that there was some man or woman behind it who was steadfastly committed to its success. Ed Lowe was nothing but a young, ambitious veteran with tons of unsold clay when he decided that he had an idea for a better cat litter. Crisscrossing the country in his old car, bartering his way into cat shows, and changing cat boxes one at a time is what it took for him to make Kitty Litter a success.

3. Keep it simple, stupid. No, no one is calling you dumb. Rather, the rule—keep it simple, stupid—and its acronym KISS are great ways to remember the third lesson of great products. If you are going to offer something new and improved, make sure that it is simple and does one or two things very well.

4. First is best. Getting your product to market first can often mean the difference between having a winner and being a loser. Post-it Notes were first. Tupperware was first. Pampers were first. Barbie was first.

5. Try, try again. The path of the innovator may not follow a straight line, grasshopper. Getting a product right often takes trial and error, followed by a few mistakes, a couple of bonehead moves, and only then, maybe, a home run. When Dr. Percy Spencer noticed that the chocolate bar in his pocket melted after standing near a magnetron tube, he realized that something unique had occurred. Yet it would take almost 20 years of trial and error before Raytheon could turn that into a microwave oven that could be used by the public.

6. It’s risky business. Creating a great product and getting it out there often takes everything an entrepreneur has to offer. The financial risks involved, not to mention the emotional toll, are considerable indeed. When two auto designers in California created a secret budget and dared their German superiors to take a risk on a car their bosses associated with Hitler, they were risking their careers. And when
Volkswagen agreed to produce the New Beetle, it risked being perceived as a backward-looking company. Great new products require risk; it is as simple as that.

7. Synergy is necessary. Synergy is a concept in which the whole is thought to be greater than the sum of its parts. For a product to succeed wildly, synergy is usually necessary. Take the PalmPilot, for instance. Although Jeff Hawkins is a brilliant engineer, he needed someone who could steer his genius toward business success. That person was Donna Dubinsky. Together, these two made a formidable team. Dubinsky needed Hawkins’s mind, and Hawkins needed Dubinsky’s business acumen. It was their yin and yang, forming a better whole, that allowed them to make the PalmPilot what it is.