Sources of New Ideas
•Consumers
•Existing product and service
•Distribution channels
•The federal government
•Research and development
•Methods of Generating Ideas
•Focus Groups – Groups of individuals providing information in a structured format
•Brainstorming – A group method for obtaining new ideas and solutions. There are 4 rules:
–No criticism is allowed by anyone in the group – no negative comments
–Freewheeling is encouraged –the wider the idea, the better
–Quantity of ideas is desired – the greater the number of ideas, the greater the likelihood of the emergence of useful ideas
–Combinations and improvements of ideas are encouraged; ideas of others can be used to produce still another new idea
•Problem inventory analysis – A method for obtaining new ideas and solutions by focusing on problems.
•Creative Problem Solving
•A method for obtaining new ideas focusing on the parameters.
–Brainstorming
–Reverse Brainstorming – A group method for obtaining new ideas focusing in the negative
–Brainwriting – written brainstorming
–Gordon method – Method for developing new ideas when the individuals are unaware of the problem
–Checklist method – Developing new idea through a list of related issues
–
•
•Free Association – Developing new idea through a chain of word association
•Forced Relationships – Developing a new idea by looking at product combination. The new combination and eventual concept is developed through a five-step process.
•Isolate the elements of the problem
•Find the relationships between these elements
•Record the relationships in an orderly form
•Analyze the resulting relationships to find ideas or patterns
•Develop new ideas form these patterns
–
•
•Collective Notebook Method – Developing a new idea by group members regularly recording ideas
•Attribute Listing – Developing a new idea by looking at the positives and negatives
•Big-Dream Approach – Developing a new idea by thinking without constraints
•Parameter Analysis – Developing a new idea by focusing on parameter identification and creative synthesis
•Innovation
•Innovation is the key to the economic development of any company, region of a country, or country itself. As technologies change, old products decrease in sales and old industries dwindle. Inventions and innovations are the building blocks of the future of any economic unit.
•Type of Innovation
•Ordinary innovation
•More numerous innovations usually extend a technological innovation into better product or service or one that has a different – usually better – market appeal.
•Technological innovation
•Personal computer, the flip watch for containing picture, voice and text messaging, and the jet airplane
•Breakthrough innovation
•Penicillin, the steam engine, the computer, the airplane, the automobile, the Internet, and nanotechnology
•Defining new Innovation
(Product or Service)
•One of the dilemmas faced by entrepreneurs is defining a ‘’new’’ product or identifying what is actually new or unique in an idea.
•
•Fashion jeans became very popular even through the concept of blue jeans was not new.
•
•In the industrial market, firms may call their products ‘’new’’ when only slight changes or modifications have been made in the appearance of the product.
•Classification of New Products
•New products may be classified from the viewpoint of either the consumer or the firm. Both points of view should be analyzed by the entrepreneur since both the ability to establish and attain product objectives and consumer perception of these objectives can determine the success or failure of any new product.
•Form a consumer view point
•Form a Firm’s Viewpoint.
•Opportunity Recognition
•A business opportunity represents a possibility for the entrepreneur to successfully fill a large enough unsatisfied need that enough sales and profits result. There has been significant research done on the opportunity recognition process and several models developed.
•Figure 5.5
•Opportunity Analysis Plan
•An opportunity analysis plan is not a business plan, as it focuses on the idea and the market (the opportunity) for the idea – not on the venture. It has 4 sections:
–The Idea and Its Competition
–The Market and the Opportunity
–Entrepreneur and Team Assessment
–The Next Steps
•Product Planning and Development Process
•The refining process – the product planning and development process – is divided into five major stages:
–Idea stage
–Concept stage
–Product development stage
–Test marketing stage
–Commercialization
Product life cycle – The stages each product goes through from introduction to decline.
–
•Establishing Evaluation Criteria
•At each stage of the product planning and development process, criteria for evaluation need to be established. These criteria should be all-inclusive and quantitative enough to screen the product carefully in the particular stage of development. Criteria should be established to evaluate the new idea in terms of market opportunity, competition, the marketing system, financial factors, and production factors.
•E-Commerce and Business start-up
•E-Commerce offers the entrepreneur the opportunity to be very creative and innovative. Its increasing importance is indicated in the continually increasing amount of both business-to-business and business-to-consumer e-commerce sales.
•Using E-Commerce Creatively
•Web Sites
•Tracking Customer information
•Doing E-Commerce as an Entrepreneurial Company
•