The Strategic Advantages of Digital Product Innovation

Redefining product and service development in a digital age

For most modern product- and service-driven enterprises, the strategy for standing out in a blood-red ocean is by continuously innovating product and service offerings, each time improving the value the customer receives. The need to innovate is innate for commercial organizations already. Furthermore, today, it must be an integral and vital part of the product and service development and innovation agendas of competitive corporations.

Whereas innovation was previously driven mostly from within, today strategic R&D teams drawn inspiration for innovation from the environment. This includes but isn’t limited to being inspired by consumers, emerging trends, geopolitical changes, sustainability goals, dwindling natural resources, the competition, and more.

 

Product and service innovation has gone digital, too

Because product and service innovation are taking place at unprecedented rates today, naturally, much of it is aided by digital processes and tools, too. Ideation, MVP (minimal viable product) creation, concept testing, product innovation, project management, and other functions are best handled by dedicated business software and applications. Utilizing such tools effectively can significantly impact the speed of innovation and time-to-market – two crucial success factors in a dynamic, quickly evolving business landscape.

Following a structured approach to product innovation and management, aided by digital tools and technology, pays off in the long run.

 

A lean approach to digital product innovation

In the core of “lean” principles that many production companies adhere to, is the idea that organizations should learn fast and fail fast. This is an effective approach to digital product innovation, too. It should not take years to discover whether a proposed innovation is bound to succeed or fail. Effective, lean strategies help test concepts quickly, efficiently and relatively inexpensively.

When it comes to adopting lean approaches to ideation and innovation, the startup culture can come in handy, even within large businesses. Recently, many enterprises and corporations have adopted the startup model in their R&D departments, even if it isn’t feasible to run the entire organization this way. In doing so, they have discovered the ability to swiftly react to market trends, changing course of action as needed, without investing huge resources in terms of time and money.

 

Digital product innovation in manufacturing

Many large-scale, industrial manufacturers today are faced with enormous pressure on their ability to produce innovative products quickly, cheaply, and efficiently. Digitally advanced competitors are making this battle even more difficult, prompting many to invest in digital tools, as well as the production and sale of digital products. Augmenting one’s physical product or service offering or integrating virtual products, tools, and services, can add an unexpected revenue stream and positively impact the top line.

A simple example of such digital offering would be software updates or data visualizations for a certain model of engine, automobile, or robot, that would enhance its operations and productivity. The options for offering such digital enhancements to hardware and machinery are virtually limitless. This can provide an important source of recurring revenue for many manufacturers, allowing them to monetize existing assets.

Next steps in your digital product innovation process

If your enterprise is interested in adding digital products or services to your existing portfolio, apps offer one lucrative possibility. By building dedicated enterprise app platforms, you can fully control and manage the pricing, delivery, and usage of your digital product and services by users.

Taking full advantage of such new opportunities can be challenging, though, working with an experienced digital product development partner can alleviate many of the kinks in the process. Not only does this partner need to understand software design and development, but they also need to be highly skilled at digital and physical product integration, building IoT services and apps, and understanding the needs of manufacturers and their customers.

Finally, having multi-industry expertise and knowledge can be invaluable, too. Luckily, Verhaert Digital checks all these boxes and more. To find out why, drop our team a line; we’d be happy to tell you more about the synergies we can achieve together.

 

Copywriter inadanova.com