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Innovate!

On Systematic Innovation and Virtual Products

The original, Hebrew version, of this article was published in "OTOT" - The Israeli Advertiser's magazine, on December 1996.
By Ari Manor, CEO, ZOOZ Ltd.

On April 1st, 1995, just like in previous years, Volkswagen put out an advertisement in the German newspapers that was meant as a practical joke (April Fools Day). The advertisement featured a strange version of the VW Polo, in which each external sections of the car (door, hood, etc.) were painted different colors. To the company’s surprise, the model, named the Polo "Harlequin" (after the famous clown), became a widespread success. In response to the hundreds of phone calls from customers inquiring about the price of the new model and where it could be purchased, Volkswagen's management decided to turn the lark into a real product. Today, the Harlequin sells successfully throughout the world. In light of this success, Seat (which belongs to the Volkswagen corporation) came out with a similar model.

Figure 1: The VW Harlekin car that started as an advertising gimmick and turned into a popular model.

The question remains: How is it that a company with such a large R&D budget, employing some of the top designers in the world, arrived at the idea of the "Harlequin" entirely by chance? Why did the comprehensive market research conducted by Volkswagen and other leading car manufacturers fail to predict the need in the market for an unusually painted car?

The answer to this question seems to lie in today's methods of new product development. Most of the effort in this field is invested in identifying new needs using a wide range of marketing research tools. The common practice is to begin by understanding the customer's needs ("the customer is always right"), and then to develop products accordingly. Although this approach is often successful, it has two patent disadvantages. The first is that it is difficult to find a "surprising" new need which the competitors, who conduct similar surveys and focus groups, are unaware of. The second, more critical disadvantage is that many new products simply cannot be predicted, be it by customers, research or focus groups. For example, if a comprehensive national survey had been conducted in the United States 120 years ago just before the invention of the telephone, in an attempt to locate new communications needs, it is highly doubtful that even a single participant would have suggested "a device that will enable me to converse with my aunt in Detroit from my home in Washington".

Responding to new product concepts 

Similarly, surveys conducted on car design did not yield any specific requests for multi-colored cars. However, when customers actually saw the Harlequin model, many quickly identified its advantages and even sought to purchase "this colorful new car that suits my personality". While consumers are hard put to predict new products, it's quite easy for them to relate to a suggested new product, pointing to its advantages, potential benefits, and the needs it might fill.

We have thus seen that in order to develop certain products, neither needs nor consumers can be taken as a starting point. But where then should the search for such new products begin? One place to start is the existing products themselves. Each existing product contains a hidden treasure of knowledge: its evolution, the various needs which it has filled over the course of its evolution, its various characteristics, etc. Moreover, as we shall see, development of a product belonging to one field can serve as a rich source of ideas for the development and improvement of products in a completely different field.

Over the past few years, a thinking tool called Systematic Inventive Thinking For Marketing has been developed precisely in order to generate ideas for original products and services using existing products. Yanko Goldenberg and Roni Horowitz, researchers at the Open University in Tel Aviv, developed the system in cooperation with the Symbol Peres Advertising Agency and its subsidiary company, SIT (Systematic Inventive Thinking).

The secret behind the system is a two-step process (see fig. 2):

First, one studies a wide variety of original products in search of their common attributes and underlying logic.

Second, the underlying logic identified in the first step is then applied to existing products, creating changes in them that lead to the development of original new products.

Figure 2: SIT uses the underlying logic of a wide variety of original products in order to creatively develop new products.

Following is a description of one such underlying logic and a demonstration of how it can be used to arrive at original ideas. But first, try to see if you can identify the underlying logic common to the following products and services (hint - focus on what makes these products innovative):

• The Polo Harlequin model, as described above .
• A therapeutic mattress in which the center is made of stiffer materials than the sides.
• Shoes with width measurements .
• Bi-focal glasses (geared for both near and far-sightedness).
• Free Domino's Pizza if delivery time exceeds half an hour.

Click here to reveal the answer.


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