B2B vs B2C Innovation
I just had a conversation with a consulting firm that specializes in B2C innovation. Now they are being asked to do some B2B innovation. They asked me, “What’s the difference between innovation in a B2B and a B2C environment?”
Although in many respects, the innovation efforts are similar, there are quite a few differences which are worth noting. Yes, B2B can invest in collaborative product development and other more sophisticated methods/technologies. However, in this entry, I want to focus on the “softer” and less quantifiable differences between them. These mainly have to do with what your customers really want. Business buyers have different motivations than consumers.
Businesses Want You to Improve Their Business
Quite often, businesses buy from you because they want you to improve their business. You can reduce their costs, improve their effectiveness, or increase their business in some way. This requires a different mindset when studying customer needs. Although focus groups and discussion boards may be helpful in designing a new toothbrush, they are not as practical in a B2B environment. Instead, you need to observe their business. Back when I was a leader in Accenture’s business process reengineering practice, I discovered something interesting. The most valuable use of reengineering is not to improve your processes, but rather to improve your customer’s processes. Observe your customers. Map their processes. See how your products/service can improve their business. And don’t forget to reengineer the interface between your business and your customer’s business. As Michael Hammer (the father of Business Reengineering) used to say, “Make yourself ETDBW – Easy To Do Business With.” (the graphic above shows the three levels of process improvement)
Businesses Want You to Help Them Provide Better Product/Service to Their Customers
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My Quought of the Day
My friend, Rajesh Setty, has been collecting “Quoughts. He describes these as questions that provoke thought. In particular, he wants to know, what is one question that you wish someone had asked you when you were young…and why?
My response will be posted on his site soon – along with his commentary. But I thought I would share my response with my readers first.
My Quought is:
“What matters most?”
Why did I choose this quought? There are two reasons:
- Einstein once said, “If I were given one hour to save the planet, I would spend 59 minutes defining the problem and one minute resolving it.” From my personal experience, most people (and organizations) spend 60 minutes finding solutions to problems that don’t matter. So relevance is one aspect of “what matters most.”
- Recently, I have been asking myself, “Is what I do significant?” I know my work changes organizations. And I like to believe that it also changes lives. But is the change significant? Lately I have been restless. I think the reason is that I want greater significance in my life.
The second point, significance, is something I am wrestling with right now. In fact, I have decided that this will be my theme for the rest of this year. As we move into the last third of the year, maybe it is time for you to revisit your theme. If you are not familiar with my concept of themes, please read my article on the topic.
Maybe it is time to ask yourself, “What matters most?” What matters most to your organization? What matters most in your personal life? What matters most to your family? When you focus on the things that matter most, you have more time. And you can spend that free time on more things that matter.
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Resolutions That Work
Making Resolutions That Work
Like dinosaurs and gas-guzzling SUVs, is the traditional New Year’s Resolution rapidly becoming a thing of the past?
According to a survey by Stephen Shapiro, the answer is a resounding “Yes.”
In a survey of 1012 Americans, only 45% of Americans now say they write up New Years Resolutions down from 88% of Americans who did so in the past. The random telephone survey was conducted by Shapiro, author of “Goal-Free Living,” with the assistance of Opinion Research Corp. of Princeton N.J. The survey has a margin of error of 3%.
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Why Innovation?
Yes, innovation can help you develop new products. But it can also be a useful tool for helping you:
- recession-proof your business,
- reduce costs,
- increase service levels to customers,
- increase overall employee performance – and retention, and
- de-commoditize a commodity business.
Innovation can help your organization adapt, evolve and grow so that you don’t become irrelevant. When the pace of change outside your organization is greater than the pace of change within, you will be out of business.
Please read our innovation articles and other resources to help you get started with your innovation efforts.
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The Biggest Winner!
A few years back, I helped the Quill Corporation (a division of Staples) launch their innovation efforts. To introduce innovation to the employees, we kicked things off with a competition – “The Quillionaire” – based on the reality TV show, “The Apprentice.” You can read about the work we did then in an article published in the European Business Forum (pdf).
Since then, Quill has done a great job of keeping innovation alive.
“Across the organization, associates have contributed to Quill’s growth by providing innovative ideas and solutions for challenges and opportunities,” said Larry Morse, President of Quill Corporation. “We launched a program a few years ago to facilitate our ability to become a company of ideas. It is this wellspring of ideas coming from all over the company that is helping fuel our growth and will assist us in remaining competitive into the future,” he added. [Read more]
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