Richard Branson was quoted as saying, "You don't learn to walk by following rules. You learn by doing, and by falling over." Launch your first innovation project - by doing.  But you should recognize that a little help from those who have made some of the mistakes doing something similar could help you avoid costs and time-consuming accidents.

 

Here is a suggested outline to help guide planning and executing your new project concept:  

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OUTLINE

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• The Concept - what's the big idea?

• The Opportunity - why should users care?

• Use Cases - how would they use the product?

• Landscape - is it unique in the market today?

• A Process

• Estimating the Investment

• Funding & Resources

• Time-to-Market

• Time-to-Revenue / Return on Investment

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The Concept 

What's your idea and how does it work? Describe your solution from the customer's point of view.  Then describe the mechanics of how it will work. Better yet, cobble up a demo - it can be fake or hacked but is the best way to convey an idea. Videos, click-through prototypes, or even storyboards can be very powerful and be the single most effective way of getting your project supported and an executive fond of the idea. It requires a lot less time and mental energy for them to understand the value and see themselves or your customers enjoying the product.    

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The Opportunity

What unique untapped opportunity or unsolved problem does your solution tap into? It's not a nice way to look at your idea, but put this into one of three contexts - power, money or fame.  Which human desire does it fulfill, and therefore define how it will drive revenue.

• Power.  If the benefit is a user's ability to better control their experience, their data, or their content - if the product or services is great, people will pay for access. Apple has capitalized on putting you in control of your experience...at a premium...every six to twelve months (if you upgrade your phone that often).

• Money. If the you can help save money or generate income, then it is a useful business tool, and people will pay for it. 

• Fame.  If you can help a person or business significantly grow their audience or connection to other large audiences, it can be monetized either through advertising or exclusive access.  This is essentially the way that Facebook and Google drive their core businesses.   

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Use Cases

The idea you have maybe be very novel and cool, but it will need to be useful and needs to solve a problem. That doesn't mean it needs to be used everyday. Emergency products, like a hypothermia blanket or very useful when stuck in the wilderness without heat and are designed for infrequent use. List out all the possible uses for your product. 

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I like to then prioritize them by ranking them according to a) how useful it will be to a user, b) value to the business, and c) difficulty to execute. Then take the top 3-5 uses and go deep on how the product could be designed to address those specific use case's needs. Having the top 2 use cases will be very helpful when pitching the concept for funding and resources.    

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Landscape (competition)

Related to the Opportunity, it's important to ensure your idea isn't already executed well in the market or that your product will have a competitive advantage (cheaper, faster, or simply much better). Have you researched the idea and is anyone else doing it?  How is it different?  Don't worry too much about the competition, but be aware of what's already out there to avoid a me too product.  

 

A Process

Having an agreed to process to vet new ideas can help prevent abandoning an idea prematurely or over investing in one that doesn't solve a big problem. Here's a nice example of a concept development process from a web design firm, called Zurb: http://zurb.com/word/design-process.  

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Having a plan that takes a lays out  set of general steps can really help you stay the course when things get rocky. It is also a great way to educate stakeholders who may not understand what you are trying to do to at least understand how you will get their and how they'll be involved at key milestones in the process. There are a lot of different types of processes, but the simplest one is one I learned as an engineer twenty-five years ago and that has worked in a variety of projects that needed to get going and track success: ASSESS  -->  PLAN  -->  DO  -->  VERIFY. Personally, I like to start with getting a demo together as quickly as possible that illustrates what the user experience could be like and use it to gauge interest from the potential stakeholders who will fund the effort. If they are interested, then come prepared with a proposed plan to build an actual functioning demo using real technology and that can be tested with real users to vet their viability and value of the concept before investing a huge amount of resources. If this litmus test checks out then go into full blown development and invest to get the concept to market. 

 

Estimating the Investment

Costs can vary widely depending on the type of project, but here are some general categories of costs

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Digital Only Projects

• Design - typically small projects range from 2-4 weeks to get the user flow, information architecture, wireframes, concept comps, and interactive comps completed.  A small project would be defined as the development of a website or creating an app that has a well defined set of features. For projects which are breaking new ground and need to experiment with users reactions to prototypes,designers might be needed for a few months and even be on the team throughout the project.  Designers and developers can run between $80-200/hour depending on the market you are in and their level of experience.  

• Development - this completely depends on your project.  If you have no idea, then it is best to get a quote from a development firm and your internal development team.  it's alwasy good t

• Concept Testing - create a visual and interactive prototype to test the idea quickly and get directional feedback.

• Reliability Testing - 

• Alpha Testing (Internal Users)

• Beta Testing (External Users)

• Security - even if it's a pilot, if you connect to online services or collect data, be sure to use basic security practices, such as using https instead of http when possible and additional security layers.  These services can have a monthly cost.  

• Monthly Services - budget for adequate internet bandwidth and online services that you host can be costly.  Amazon helps you calculate your monthly hosting costs: Amazon Web Services Estimator. 

• Measurement - project success can be measured quantitatively and / or qualitatively.  If the former, tools like Google Analytics work great, if the latter, find a good market research or user research company nad have them bid on doing survyeys for you. 

 

Digital + Physical Convergence Projects

Projects that include hardware, enclosures, and modification of the physical environment in which the installation is going, need to be well coordinated with software development.  

• Design - architectural and engineering designs (some may required licensed professionals)

• Permits

• Installation

• Digital Marketing Channels

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Funding and Resources

• Identify your Stakeholders before you identify your team.  These stakeholders can help identify the right resources.

• Build Your Team - build a roster of the types of people you need - don't look at who you have already.  Then look at who you can enlist and where your gaps are.  Break down roles by the deliverables you'll need.  For example, a visual designer will be needed to deliver both mobile and desktop high fidelity comps if you are designing a website, but if it is a new remote control for a TV you'll need an industrial designer.  If you're not sure, you can just send me an email below and we can help build the list.

• You Have a Big Network - you may not know it, but one of your best resources are the people you talk to every day. Your friends, your family, your significant other, your dog, your kids, your teachers, your local cashier at the store.  It's amazing how much you can learn from the people you already know but may have never asked them about your possibly crazy idea.     

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Time-to-Market / Revenue

Your timeline is inherently tied to your resources - the faster you can get to market, the less it will cost you. But overly aggressive timelines that promise unrealistic timelines can lead to execs or the people funding your efforts to lose interest quickly and shift priorities. Setting realistic, best guess expectations on the timeline will line you up for the right level of funding and support. One trick can be to set major milestones and checkpoints which gate the next step of the project - this helps you check whether the actual product being built will fit the market needs. Identify early on the risks and mitigations to schedule slips.  

 

It's important to estimate your revenue projections as accurately as you can, especially if you will eventually be going to VC investment firms.  They will want to see that you have PO's in hand and a positive growth trajectory with which their investment will grow.  If it's a really big idea and requires growing a large audience and network, it could take years.  If it's a very independent product, like a consumer electronics product, it might only take a year - you might event be able to pre-sell the idea on a kickstarter site or to an internal executive who is willing to fund the project for a year. 

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Ultimately, you will need to create a Pro Forma, which will show when and how profitable you expect the product could be. This is a separate topic, but here are a few starter articles:

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• What are Pro Forma Financial Statements

• What it means to create a Pro Forma

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