The Innovation Handbook
CONTENTS
Introduction
3
Investigate
30
What is Innovation?
4
Find
53
The LIFE Process
13
Experiment
75
Learn
15
Resources
85
2
This handbook will help you to: Understand what insights are
Create insights Generate, develop and adapt ideas
Turn your ideas into robust propositions Test ideas quickly and cost effectively
3
What is Innovation? There are many ways to describe innovation: “The future delivered”
“Turning an idea into a solution that adds value”
“The application of ideas that are novel and useful”
“Creativity is thinking of something new. Innovation is the implementing something new”
“Finding and applying new ways to add and capture value” 4
Innovation is not…
•
Simply copying or rebranding ideas already in the marketplace
•
Blind allegiance to an idea. Innovators are agile and adaptable
•
Following your gut, rather than the insights
•
Just a great idea. You need to make it a reality!
•
Spending money on something new without testing/validating if it works
•
Inventing something new. Just because it is new, it doesn’t mean it is innovative
5
Is Innovation important?
Innovation is the cornerstone of sustained economic growth and prosperity. The best innovations can change the whole marketplace for the better.
Take Google. Their global dominance is driven by a culture of innovation. Employees are actively encouraged and supported to innovate. 20% of their time is specifically allocated to pursuing side projects they are passionate about. This has led to some game changing innovations for Google including Gmail, Google Maps and Google Docs.
6
Innovation is a strategic priority •
Innovation is a strategic priority at The Royal British Legion
•
Everyone is encouraged to embrace innovation as part of their role
•
Innovation must be part of the culture, not just a process
•
We look outside the charity for inspiration, but are considerate of our tradition and history
•
Everyone at The Royal British Legion should have the right tools to turn opportunity into innovation
7
What is the Innovation team?
“The Innovation & Planning Team support the directorate to deliver more holistic communications, challenge the portfolio and reinvigorate our innovation work� - Claire Rowcliffe, Director of Fundraising Partnered with Planning, we are a small team of passionate innovators working within Fundraising Operations. Each year, we work with team to collaborate across the Legion to undertake a strategic review of all products to ensure we maintain a balanced portfolio of products and future proof our income. Headed by Chanel Blake, the Innovation Team has been working to implement an innovation mind-set across the organisation. 8
Our expectations How we work as a team and with others. •
Work with urgency: not rushed and overwhelmed, but with pace and momentum
•
Action led and objective driven: focused on the objective to deliver work on time and to brief
•
No surprises: transparent about how we work, sharing changes in projects in good time, keep stakeholders engaged within and outside of the legion, punctual
•
Solution led: present problems, barriers or challenges to (your manager or team) with considered solutions
•
Team centred: we are mindful of the teams wellbeing, making time to reflect, and time to support and listen to each other 9
Different types of Innovation
Risk
We are working across the entire spectrum of innovation
Transformative Innovation
Strategic Innovation Incremental Innovation
Return 10
Examples of Innovation Incremental Innovation
Strategic Innovation
Transformative Innovation
Small improvements or upgrades to existing products, services, processes or methods.
Developing completely new value propositions.
Innovation which changes the shape of the business or the marketplace.
This usually takes place within teams.
Strategic innovation is governed by the Innovation Board and delivered by the Innovation Team.
Pan-sector innovation is delivered by the Executive Board.
11
But it’s not only about success…
Don’t get disheartened if things don’t work out. Failure is part of the process. In fact, we expect there will be times to fail fast, learn and crack on.
12
The LIFE Process We use the LIFETM process. It is a bespoke insight-based concept-to-completion framework developed by our partners at Good Innovation. It is based on a more than 75 years of charity, commercial and public sector innovation experience.
Learn
Investigate
Find
Experiment
Learn as much as you can, spot potential opportunities and narrow your focus.
The hunt for insight. Time to truly understand your audience; their desires, needs and wants.
Using insights as strong foundations, create your new ideas.
Time to test and validate your new ideas. Ensure your new concepts are viable. 13
What does a successful idea look like? A good idea hits the sweet spot when it is desirable, feasible and viable
The audience want it
Desirable
Feasible We are well placed to do it
Viable We can deliver it at a profit
14
Learn
Setting the scene. Define your research question, review the available information, begin to understand your audience and explore the marketplace. Learn as much as you can, spot potential opportunities and narrow your focus. 15
Start by setting out the challenge Always start with a clear articulation of the challenge, objectives and success factors: •
What problem are you trying to solve? (i.e. A product isn’t working)
•
What are you trying to achieve? (i.e. Growth in sign ups to an event)
•
What expertise do you have access to? What more do you need?
•
Your KPI’s (make sure to include both hard and soft metrics)
•
Personal motivations and desires for the project
•
What is in and out of scope?
Many of these questions can be answered in a kick-off session with your key stakeholders. This can work as an information-gathering exercise for you but also helps to engage an the project team in the early stages. 16
Project planning While the Innovation Team work rapidly, gathering insights and turning these into marketable products needs time. Timelines will vary from project to project, but consider these tips: •
Clearly state milestones, decision points and deadline. Get these in diaries early.
•
Be realistic with your project team’s capacity.
•
Always add in time to pivot. Things will change.
•
You don’t have to do everything yourself. Who else is available to help you?
•
There are lots of experts in the Legion who can add value to a project. 17
Managing stakeholders Managing stakeholders is key to the success of any project. When planning your approach, consider:
•
Who might be involved with your project?
•
What will their roles be?
•
When will you check in with people?
•
Who needs to be at sessions / involved in each stage?
•
Who is responsible for making key decisions? 18
You already know a lot! The matrix of knowledge is a helpful tool which can help you group your knowledge together and identify where you will need to focus your research
Know
Don’t Know
What you know you know
What you don’t know, you know
This information will be a key starting point for the project
Make a record of this, it might come in useful later
What you know, you don’t know
What you don’t know, you don’t know
This will be the immediate focus of your research
Always be open to finding out new information and exploring new areas
Don’t Know
Answer
Know
Question
19
Your research question This is the question you will centre your research around.
Here are some examples of research questions: •
What is the best audience for a new rowing event?
•
How can we reach parents of serving personnel?
•
Why do people buy mugs and how can we make
our new offering stand out from the competition? •
Who doesn’t buy a Poppy for Remembrance and why? 20
Learn tools: Desk Research Desk research is the process of gathering data from existing sources to help find out more about the audience. 1.
Select you key areas of focus. If you are developing a new product for dog owners, you may want to find out, how big your audience is, how/why they shop, what they care about and what else is in the market.
2.
Find lots of relevant and reliable resources.
3.
Select and collect key pieces of information (don’t forget to record the source).
4.
The more you find out, the more questions you will have. Make lots of notes and don’t be afraid to pursue new avenues you hadn’t thought of before.
5.
Summarise the information you have gathered. 21
Learn tools: Portfolio Review A portfolio review helps you take stock of all the skills, resources, and products you currently have and helps you find where there is scope to make a difference. In fundraising, this might involve:
1.
Creating a list of all the fundraising products we offer
2.
Identifying the audiences these products target
3.
Looking at the wider marketplace to see what the competition is offering and who they are targeting
4.
Identifying where there are opportunities to tap into a new audience or repackage an existing idea to reach a new audience. 22
Here is one we created earlier‌ When we were exploring the marketplace for an extreme, adrenaline fuelled survival course, we created this view of the marketplace:
23
Learn tools: Customer Segmentation Customer segmentation is the division of potential consumers into groups. You could group people by: • Demographics (age, family structure, income, location) • Needs • Habits • Buying characteristics • Brand preferences • Hobbies • Aspirations 24
Learn tools: Expert Interviews These can be internal and external interviews. Don’t be shy. People love being called an expert. 1. Establish who your experts could be. Don’t be fooled by titles and responsibility, the best people are often working on the ground.
2. Get in touch, get them excited about your project and find some time to speak with them. 3. Get prepared. Form a structured list of questions. Make sure your questions are open ended, have a good flow and are relevant to your research question. 4. At the interview be clear, and give them space to answer fully. Don’t be afraid to probe answers and make sure you take clear notes! 25
Time to reflect This is a good time to take stock of how far you’ve come and, knowing what you know now, judge whether you’re in a good position to continue to the next stage of the project. •
Are there any big surprises?
•
Am I going in the right direction?
•
Would it be beneficial to pivot and find a new path?
•
Is there still an opportunity for me to add value?
26
Welcome to the start of your innovation journey! What is your research question?
What do you think some of the answers might be?
27
Who are you going to be working with? Think about who you will need to work with? Why? What value will they add? What does their involvement look like? A RASCI is a great project management tool to ensure roles and responsibilities are clear at the start of any project. It sets out who is responsible, accountable, supporting, being consulted with and being informed at each stage of the process. An example table is below to help get you started.
Step/Task
Who is Responsible?
Who is Accountable?
Who will Support?
Consulting with‌
I will Inform‌
31
29
Investigate
The hunt for insight. Using scientifically grounded analysis to get under the skin of your audience; understanding their desires, needs and wants. 30
The Legion has a supporter-led innovation approach Great innovation is built on a foundation of good insight. It helps you get under the skin of your audience and understand what motivates them to give, to buy, to take the actions they do. Insights provide the fuel for generating ideas.
But, what is insight‌
31
“The discovery of knowledge about an audience, market or process that offers us a previously unseen opportunity to add value�
32
The foundation of great innovation The most powerful insights come from translating large amounts of data into concise and compelling findings. Strong insights can help guide and fuel successful idea generation. New ideas based on insight are more likely to fulfil an unmet consumer need and are much more likely to succeed.
33
Distinguishing fact from insight
FACT What the consumer said or did
INSIGHT Why the consumer said or did it
34
Fact
Observation
Insight
What people do:
What people say:
What people feel:
Women 30+ are big users of Facebook.
“It’s a good way to keep in touch with my friends. I don’t see them as much now I have a little boy.”
I feel a bit like I’m losing my own identity. I’m becoming a bit invisible. I’m scared of missing out.
35
There are two types of insight: HYGIENE •
Generally a functional need
•
What someone needs in order to engage
•
• •
HOOK • A deeper, emotional need • Genuine need or problem that someone has that they want solved
Hygiene insights often have a straight forward solution so the market is quite competitive
• Hook insights are often broader,
Often more likely to appeal to existing supporters who is already engaged
• Much wider appeal – not necessarily
Top of mind, easier for people to articulate
• Often more subconscious and not
deeper and more complex making them more difficult to solve about the cause
readily articulated
Hygiene insights are important as they give us the product ‘must haves’; the Hook insights are what will make people really buy into the product. 36
Examples: HYGIENE •
I like keeping in touch with my friends
HOOK • I rely on my friends to reinforce my identity and self worth
•
My mental health is important to me
• I am struggling to unwind after work, I overthink a lot of what goes on
•
•
I have a sweet tooth, I like to treat myself to a little something on a Sunday
• Being able to reward myself with token
I rely on apps to get me from A to B
• I am scared of being late to
gifts is important and helps me feel relaxed and in control when all around me is unpredictable
appointments in case people judge me
37
How to tell if it’s a good insight Specific - Is the insight specific enough that you easily know what you can do with it? Ideas - Does it start your mind popping with ideas about how you can meet the need? Why - Does it go deeper than observation, does it get to the real ‘why?’ Exciting - Does it make you excited? Relevant - Is it relevant to the audience you’re targeting? Fresh - Is there something fresh about it, have you found something you didn’t know before? Unmet - Is it a need that we can have a role in meeting? Different - Will it help differentiate your idea from competitors?
38
You know you got it right when your audience plays it back to you
Insight I want to make things fair and help others who aren’t as lucky as me
39
How can you generate insights? There are lots of tools which can help you generate strong insights. Here are some of the key tools: •
Trend analysis
•
Interviews
•
Ethnographic diaries
•
Focus groups
•
Surveys
40
Investigate tools: Trend Analysis Explore current and upcoming trends and get under the bonnet to see what is driving them. To help unpack and unlock trends, make sure you ask: •
What are the key characteristics of the trend?
•
What consumer needs/desires does it address?
•
How could you apply this trend to your products?
•
Which audience could this trend apply to?
41
Investigate tools: Interviews Research interviews allow you to get information directly from a sample of your target audience. We use structured interviews, where the interviewer uses an interview guide to lead the discussion. An interview guide is a list of key points and questions developed to explore the research question and meet your objectives. Similar questions are asked of each interviewee, although supplementary questions are asked as appropriate. When preparing an interview guide you need to keep in mind the following points: 1. Introduce yourself and explain the aim of the interview. 2. Create questions that are relevant to your research question. 3. Have a sequence to your topics. Group topics into themes that follow a logical sequence. 4. Make sure your questions are clear and easy to understand. 5. Don’t ask leading questions. Ensure people are free to give their honest answers. 42
Interview hints and tips •
Build rapport. Be open, friendly and personable.
•
Use open body language. Sit with open arms, lean slightly forward and get rid of any barriers like laptop screens.
•
Ask lots of open questions.
•
Including broad emotional questions can reveal what really drives people. For example: -
What really gets your our of bed in the morning?
-
What makes you proud?
-
What is the best/worst experience you’ve had with…
-
If you were to go back to, what would do differently?
•
The three WHYS... Never be afraid to keep asking ‘why’ to dig down to get some deeper, emotional and more meaningful insight.
•
The power of silence. Give your respondent lots of time to think and respond.
•
Take lots of notes, ask a scribe to join you or record your interview for later (remember to ask permission first!). 43
Investigate tools: Ethnographic Methods Ethnographic methods look at audiences in their natural setting; understanding their behaviour, how people interact with one another and their environments. It requires you to immerse yourself within your chosen audience. Methods include: •
Collecting and analysing written correspondence between people.
•
Observing people within an environment.
•
Asking participants to keep a diary, collecting information about experiences, feelings, motivations, wants and desires.
44
Example ethnographic diary entries
“This is a photo of my friend and I - we had not seen each other for nearly three years.”
“My daughter was praised by an old friend, this makes me feel so proud.”
“My niece in Australia’s first grandchild. 5 days before she was born her daddy was accidentally killed.”
“…my daughter got a gold star from nursery, it made me feel proud, it made me feel like I’m doing a good job and that maybe I am a good mum after all.”
“…my son waved back at the homeless man whilst everyone else ignored him… it made me realise how judgemental grown ups are and how I want to protect his innocence.” 45
Investigate tools: Surveys, Polls and Questionnaires These are data collection tools used to gather information about individuals as well as businesses. They can be used to capture facts, behaviours and/or opinions. They can capture a lot of information about respondents quickly and at a relatively low cost.
You can administer these over the phone, in person or online.
46
Surveys, Polls and Questionnaires hints and tips •
Write questions that are simple and to the point.
•
Use words with clear meanings.
•
In a multiple choice question, cover all options without overlapping.
•
Avoid double-barrelled questions.
•
Offer a “don’t know” or “N/A” option for questions that don’t apply.
•
Avoid offering too few or too many options. You can always add in an “other” category.
•
Make recall easy. It can be difficult for respondents to accurately recall information from weeks or months ago.
•
Don’t be afraid to get a second opinion before your questions go live.
47
Investigate tools: Focus Groups A focus group is a carefully planned group discussion, led by a moderator, designed to gather opinions on a defined topic.
When to use a focus group: • To delve deeper into issues identified through research. • To collect additional information to prepare for larger scale research or tests. • To test the marketing of a new idea with the target audience. When not to use a focus group: • To make major decisions. Focus groups can provide a wealth of ideas and feedback, but they are still the thoughts of a small groups of people. • To save time and money in the research process. Focus groups require a great deal of planning and effort in order to be effective. It is not an easy fix for the insight stage. 48
Distilling your insights When you have all your data, it’s time to distil the all important insights. Summarise Find the strongest insights, quotes and pieces of information from everything you have so far.
Synthesise Group information together into audience needs / themes. Sometimes you might have regroup your ideas and adapt your boundaries to get the best results. These final groups will represent your insights. Focus Distinguish your hygiene insights from your hook insights. Decide which hook insights will be the most feasible to build on and take onto the next stage. 49
Time to reflect Take stock and see if you’re going in the right direction. These questions will help you decide to take the project forward or pivot the objective. •
Are my findings as expected?
•
What are the big surprises?
•
What didn’t I know before?
•
Have I learned something that will make a difference
/ help answer my research question? •
What would I have done differently second time around? 50
51
52
Find
Using insights as strong foundations, create your new ideas. Throw in plenty of creativity, mix with blue sky thinking, push new concepts to the limits and finish them off with a sprinkling of commercial rigour. 53
Getting your insights ready Your hero insights will form the basis of idea generation so it is important to present them well. •
Turn your insights into punchy personal statements to make them sound human and engaging, ‘I am…’
•
Think of some questions which will help people develop ideas to meet the insight; ‘How can we… fix this… change this… give them back their…?’
•
Never lose sight of where your insights came from. Include quotes directly from your target audience to ground your work.
•
Bring your insight to life with images.
•
Get a second and third pair of eyes to read over your work to make sure everything is clear.
54
Here is an example from when we were developing a new product for the military community‌
55
Creating ideas Great ideas are most often a team effort.
Facilitated idea generation sessions (ideation sessions) are one of the most effective ways to bring together experts, creatives and audience members to generate ideas from your insights. This can be done in house, externally within the local community or online.
56
Setting up an ideation session Recruit a good mixture of experts from different areas.
Arrange an environment where people will feel relaxed and inspired. Good hospitality is important. A good supply of tea, coffee, snacks and sweets will ensure people are comfortable and alert. From the outset, encourage wild ideas and ensure people build on the ideas of others. Only have one conversation at a time. Stay focused on the topic. 57
The right content for an ideation session Set your expectations at the start of the session. Remind everyone of the objectives, roles and outcomes of the session. Let people know how you got to this point. Present a quick overview of your approach and key findings. Include an exercise to help loosen people up and get everyone to think openly.
Be visual and present your insights with confidence. Go armed with some stimulation (examples of similar innovation in the marketplace) 58
Creative techniques There are plenty of creative ideas you can use to generate lots of new ideas Here are some of our favourites: •
Pen Portraits
•
Quick Fire Ideas
•
Breaking Assumptions
59
Creative tool: Pen Portraits Pen portraits allow you to take the perspective of your supporter. They provide a focus for the team, as well as giving different perspectives that need to be taken into account. • Create a fictional profile that represents your audience. Think of the person as a whole not just as a donor • Write down all their unmet needs and group into insights that can be expressed as I want, I need or I believe • Create ideas to solve those needs 60
Creative tool: Quick Fire Ideas Get your participants to fire out their ideas on small templates as quickly as they can think of them. A bit of time pressure helps people think outside the box, break down their assumptions and lower their inhibitions.
For each idea, make sure your participants capture: •
A name
•
The insight it addresses / area of the market
•
A short description to flesh out the idea
61
Creative tool: Breaking Assumptions This tool forces participants to think beyond the organisation and create ideas that work when the usual rules no longer apply by systematically breaking down internal assumptions. •
Select a target audience or industry
•
What assumptions do you make about them?
•
What assumptions do you think they make about you?
•
Reverse or break these assumptions
•
What ideas are possible in this new universe?
62
Some examples of Breaking Assumptions Assumptions we might make about retirees:
But, what if…
• They aren’t physically active
• They are physically fit and up for a challenge
• They have lots of free time
• Their social commitments mean they have very little down time
• They don’t know how to use social media
• They use Instagram and Facebook regularly
• They like lots of details
• They don’t have time to read dense emails
• They’ve though about their future and have already made a will
• They’re burying their heads in the sand until they’re forced to do something about it
• They voted for Brexit and are worried about the impact of immigration on social services
• They voted for Remain and believe immigration makes the United Kingdom a richer place to live and work 63
Shortlisting When you have all of your ideas you will need to filter them down and choose a shortlist to build into fuller propositions. Here are a few hints and tips: •
Work with a colleague, two heads are always better than one.
•
Group similar ideas together, but make sure you don’t lose any innovative nuances.
•
Remember your KPI’s for the project. Sometimes the best looking ideas won’t fulfil the brief.
•
Don’t be put off by the name, badly articulated ideas can have good elements which you can build on and turn into something new.
•
Try and get a good spread of ideas together.
64
Building ideas into proposition When you have some ideas to work on, it’s time to work with a team of experts to build them up, strip them down and reinvent them to build up a fuller proposition. Here are some of the tools you can use: •
Idea Templates
•
Six Thinking Hats
•
The Customer Journey
•
Sweet Spots
•
The Marketplace
•
Financial Modelling 65
Building tools: Idea Templates A template to help people consider some of the factors involved in turning the idea into a reality. Capture a sentence or two for each of the following:
•
The name
•
The slogan
•
What is the concept?
•
How will it work?
•
Who is this for?
•
Why do they want it?
•
How will this idea make money?
•
What is your USP (Unique Selling Point)? 66
Building tools: The Customer Journey Consider the journey your customer will take with your proposition. Map everything out from the customers point of view. What do you want them to think, feel and do at each point? You might need to think about: • • • • • • •
How they became aware of your product How they find out more information How they sign up / purchase How the product is delivered How they use the product What customer support might they need How can they extend or maintain the relationship 67
Building tools: Six Thinking Hats The six thinking hats uses the six different ways the brain can be challenged. It is a very effective tool to build ideas, challenge concepts, encourage collaboration and leverage expertise. It gives the team permission to critique ideas without their typical ‘hat’. •
Get together experts from across the Legion
•
Choose a facilitator
•
Everyone ‘wears’ the same colour at the same time
•
Scrutinise ideas using one hat one at a time
•
Make sure you capture all the feedback
68
Building tools: The Six Thinking Hats White Hat
Yellow Hat
The White Hat calls for information known or needed. “The facts and just the facts.”
The Yellow Hat symbolises brightness and optimism. Under this hat you explore the positives and probe for value and benefit.
Red Hat The Red Hat signifies feelings, hunches and intuition. When using this hat you can express emotions, feelings and share fears, dislikes, loves and hates.
Black Hat The Black Hat is judgement; the devil’s advocate or why something won’t work. Spot the difficulties and dangers; where might things go wrong.
Green Hat The Green Hat focuses on creativity; the possibilities, alternatives and new ideas. It’s an opportunity to find ways to make ideas better and fix issues.
Blue Hat The Blue hat is about controlling the process and planning. Use it to look at the next steps. 69
Building tools: Hitting The Sweet Spot Consider if your idea hits the sweet spot. If it does you might be on to a winner. If it doesn’t hit the sweet spot, consider why not and see how you might be able to pivot and adapt.
The audience want it
Desirable
Feasible We are well placed to do it
Viable We can deliver it at a profit
70
Building tools: The Marketplace Look at your competitors in the marketplace and consider: •
What markets is your proposition really competing within? Don’t forget to look outside the charity sector.
•
How big is the market?
•
Is the market growing, stagnant or in decline?
•
What are the trends in the market?
•
Who would you be competing against?
•
Is there space in the market for another product?
•
How can you make your proposition unique? 71
Building tools: Financial Modelling Finally, and perhaps most importantly, consider how your idea will make money.
•
What is the price point? How much will people pay/donate?
•
How much are other players in the market charging?
•
How much will it cost to deliver?
•
How will you need to spend to market your product to potential consumers?
•
What would be the cost of fulfilment?
•
How many consumers will you need to achieve your budget?
72
Here is some space to start to build out your favourite ideas‌
73
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Experiment
Time to test and validate your new ideas. Get the ideas out of the office and in front of your audience to make sure it is a viable proposition. 75
How to decide your next steps By this stage we have a product proposition and a good understanding of the audience. We now need to see if the product works in the market.
The Experiment stage will help answer any remaining questions that we still don’t know the answers to. They are usually the answers that will be key to building your case for fuller investment: •
Will people buy it?
•
How much will they pay for the product?
•
Will they like it?
•
Is the cost per acquisition viable?
•
Can we deliver this proposition at scale? 76
How can you test and validate your concept?
Option 1: A prototype
Option 2: A pilot
Option 3: A full launch
77
What are the different options? Prototype A small scale test, taking your idea to the real world to test if it works and reaches the desired audience. Prototypes are usually required to validate the idea before going to pilot. They are a good way to check systems are working and decide if the product is feasible. Pilot The pilot usually builds from the prototype and what you learned. It involves building a MVP (minimal viable product). It will help you establish, amongst other things; How much will it cost? What is the CPA (Cost Per Acquisition)? What will be the marketing channels?
Could last 4 weeks up to 3 months
Less than £5k spend Up to 100 participants Could last between 4 and 6 months Up to £50k spend 100’s of participants Ongoing
Launch When your product hits all of your success criteria, you will be ready to take it to market.
Expenditure is tbc depending on the idea
1000’s of participants 78
What a prototype is and isn’t… •
It is about understanding and validating the basics of the idea
•
It’s not about developing and testing the marketing
•
It is about testing the uncertainties and validating or disproving your assumption
•
It’s not about coming up with the perfect name
•
It’s not about making lots of money
•
It’s not supposed to be perfect
It will change and develop during the testing
•
It’s not going to stay the same
•
It is a creative stage
•
It’s not a focus group
•
It is low cost, quick and agile
•
You should recruit real participants, rather than friends or colleagues to test on
• •
It is about qualitative feedback
79
What a pilot is and isn’t… •
•
To test the unknowns of the business plan
•
It’s not a full market launch
•
It’s not about sourcing and procuring new suppliers
•
It’s not about creating new processes
It’s utilising resources and knowledge of what we already have
•
It’s more hands on – you’ll be carrying out processes manually to get to the end
•
It’s always relating back to the objectives
80
What a launch is … •
It is for when you already know the business knowledge and you know it’s feasible
•
It’s got full backing from the Legion and the key departments
•
It’s got all the necessary processes in place
•
It’s working with new partners
•
It’s working with new suppliers
•
When the proposition meets all the necessary legal requirements
•
It is still a chance to test and optimise
81
Recruiting your product testers To ensure your test is user-led, you will need to recruit supporters/customers/donors from your target audience. • •
• • •
Recruit real supporters. Try not to recruit friends and family. Think about the channels you can use: - Volunteers - Community teams - Retail - Social media Recruitment can take time. Build extra time it into your project plan. Always over recruit. Be honest that it’s a test, but that doesn’t mean people shouldn’t fundraise. 82
Evaluating your successes Evaluation is all about looking back. Looking at what went well. Considering how can we make it better. •
Always start with your success criteria. Which have you met? Which have you missed? Don’t forget to consider both hard and soft measures.
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If you haven't met any criteria… what do you need to improve? How?
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If you have hit your targets, you’re ready to look at the next steps…
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So, what next?
Option 1: Continue
Option 2: Stop and Learn
Your idea is desirable, feasible and viable! You’re now ready to scale up.
Take learnings forward for other products. Could it be repackaged or would the assets benefit the legion elsewhere?
Option 3: Pivot
Take a step back and find a new direction based on solid foundations.
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Resources A collection of useful resources to help you get innovating!
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Glossary of Key Terms Customer Segmentation
The division of potential consumers into groups
Desirable
Appealing to the target audience
Ethnographic Methods
Methods which look at audiences in their natural setting; understanding their behaviour, how people interact with one another and their environments
Experiment Stage
The last stage of our Innovation Process. Time to test and validate your new ideas. Ensure your new concepts are viable
Expert
A person who is very knowledgeable about or skilful in a particular area
Feasible
Ability to deliver something
Find Stage
The third stage of our Innovation Process. Using insights as strong foundations, create your new ideas 86
Glossary of Key Terms Focus Group
A carefully planned group discussion, led by a moderator, designed to gather opinions on a defined topic
Hook Insight
An insight that reveals a deep, underlying emotional need
Hygiene Insight
A surface level insight which reveals a basic functional need
Ideation Session
A facilitated creative session to generate ideas
Launch
This is a fully fledged introduction of new systems / products into the market place
Learn Stage
The first phase of our Innovation Process. Learn as much as you can, spot potential opportunities and narrow your focus
Incremental Inno. Small improvements or upgrades to existing products, services, processes or methods 87
Glossary of Key Terms Innovation
Finding and applying new ways to add and capture value
Interview Guide
A list of key points and questions developed to research particular topics, questions or areas
Insight
The discovery of knowledge about an audience, market or process that offers us a previously unseen opportunity to add value
Investigate Stage
The second phase of our Innovation Process. The hunt for insight. Time to truly understand your audience; their desires, needs and wants
Pilot
A dummy run with a small sample of your audience to establish how an idea works in practice and if an idea is appealing to your target audience
Pivot
Taking a step back and finding a new direction based on solid foundations 88
Glossary of Key Terms Portfolio Review
A review of skills, resources, and products available to you, and how these compare to others in the marketplace
Prototype
A small scale test, taking your idea to the real world to test if it works and reaches the desired audience. Prototypes are usually required to validate the idea before going to pilot.
Research Question
A question that focuses research to meet an objective
Stakeholder
Anyone who has a personal or business interest in a project
Strategic Innovation
Developing completely new value propositions
Transformative Innovation
Innovation which changes the shape of the business or the marketplace
Viable
Deliverable at a profit 89
Basic / Quick-fire Idea Template IDEA NAME:
DETAILS/KEY FEATURES: •
•
•
Idea Building Template IDEA NAME:
TARGET AUDIENCE:
HOW DOES IT MAKE MONEY:
REQUIREMENTS?
BIG IDEA:
If you have any questions or feedback then please do drop us a line at Innovation@britishlegion.org.uk