Why Innovation Must Build from Your Customer Experience

Innovation isn’t just another buzzword. It isn’t a “service” or even a “job”—it’s a way of existence. I’m talking about natural selection in the form of digital Darwinism coming for us all. Companies must adapt or die.

Stagnation over the long term is inevitable for most products and marketplaces, and eventually every company hits plateaus. Perhaps the consumer ages out of the product, or success attracts competitors that erode profits. Communication, sales, and support systems that were necessary early in the product lifecycle become entrenched, putting distance between the brand and the client.

With these pressures in mind, companies set out to innovate to avoid extinction. But it’s not easy to have meaningful innovation when teams are running leaner and everyone is expected to do more with less. The time that people have to sit and actually think has been trimmed out, energy and momentum start to stagger, and as a result, so does breakthrough innovation within the organization.

While companies must continue to develop new, high-quality products, and meaningful new features for established products, there is another approach to innovation they should consider, but is often left on the table: innovating around customer experience goals.

When you focus on customer experience—especially with established goals and ways to measure—then you open up opportunities to create and capture more value.