Develop your successful new products & services

Question:

Are there areas where you have missed the opportunity to develop high value products and services?

Answer:

At The Alpha Group we make certain that you create, select and develop at least two new high value products and services for your company.

So, how does this happen?

Easy, its a six step-process using the power of the peer-to-peer advisory board.

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Firstly the peer-to-peer advisory board help you identify what is your strategic problem.

For some of us, one of our strategic problems is that our current business just isn’t capable of fast growth. So, if we want to substantially grow the value of our company, one of our options is to build a new business stream alongside our existing business which is capable of high sales, outstanding profit and a good multiplier.

If we want to create our new, high value business stream through innovative new products/services, our challenge is to develop our creative thinking and organise ourselves to make this happen.

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Secondly the peer-to-peer advisory board help you learn an overview of the FastGrowth™ Innovation Process.

To summarise, the FastGrowth™ Innovation Process is a process for creating and selecting promising, innovative products or services. It consists of the following 11 steps.

1 Assess the growth potential of your existing business.

2 Decide your goals for a new business through innovative new products/services.

3 Build your fast growth innovation team.

4 Identify the key needs of your target customers.

5 Identify your means to meet these needs.

6 Creatively match your means to these needs.

7 Generate your initial opportunities.

8 As a team, improve your initial opportunities.

9 Evaluate the risks and financial returns of your opportunities.

10 Select your promising opportunities.

11 Gain commitment from your board to develop your new products/services.

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Thirdly the peer-to-peer advisory board help you decide your goals for new products and services.

you find it is useful to complete this template to give you clarity about your goals.

1 What percentage of annual sales turnover do you want from your new products/services within three years?

What is your Minimum Acceptable Level of Success:

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What is your Highest Level Reasonably Achievable:

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2 What percentage of your annual gross profit do you want from your new products/ services within three years?

Minimum Acceptable Level of Success:

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Highest Level Reasonably Achievable:

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3 What are your key drivers for creating your successful new products/services? Are these to:

a) Offer your existing customers in your core market a wider range of products/services?

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b) Replace your slow growth & low profit products in your core market with much more profitable, innovative products/services?

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c) Get out of your saturated core market and into high growth markets.

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d) What are your other drivers?

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4 What are your goals for your Innovation Team?

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How many promising new products/services do you want your innovation team to create and select? and by when?

Minimum Acceptable Level of Success:

• How many:

Highest Level Reasonably Achievable:

• How many:

By when do you want your innovation team to create and select these promising new products/services?

Minimum Acceptable Level of Success:

• Latest (month):

Highest Level Reasonably Achievable:

• Earliest (month):

5. Which of your Managers, key staff and partners do you want in your innovation team?

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6 How many man hours of your innovation team are you prepared to invest to achieve your goals?

Minimum Acceptable Level of Success:

• Man Hours:

Highest Level Reasonably Achievable:

• Man Hours:

7. How frequently will you and your innovation team meet?

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And for how long?

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8. What will be your key values for building your successful innovation team?

The Values of your Innovation Team:

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Fourthly the peer-to-peer advisory board help you identify the key needs of your target clients and the key means to meet these needs.

To give a focus for your creative thinking, they identify the target client company or target customers to concentrate on, and then identify the key problems and needs that the target client and customers face.

i. Which is your target client company?

e.g. An Aircraft Manufacturing Company

What are the key problems and needs of your target client company?

e.g. your customers, i.e. airlines, face high and increasing fuel costs. So, one of your critical problems is to produce lighter, more fuel-efficient aeroplanes. your need is therefore for good value, safe, lightweight products for your new aircraft.

ii. Who are your target customers?

e.g. UK Farmers

What are the key problems and needs that your target customers face?

e.g. With the economic downturn, theft from farms is rapidly increasing (currently rural theft is £50m p.a. in the UK). The problem is that farmers in large, isolated situations find it difficult and expensive to monitor your equipment and livestock. So. your need is for low cost, durable security systems that deter thieves from your farms.

Then you then identify the specific, key means that your company, (and your strategic partners), have to meet these needs.

you find it helpful to fill out this template for each of your targets.

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1 Your key target client/customer:

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a) your Critical Problems

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b) your Key Needs (Please be specific)

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2 The specific, key means of your own company and that of your partners to meet these needs

a) Broad Category

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b) Your production and processing

i)

ii)

iii)

2. Your marketing, sales & distribution

i)

ii)

iii)

3. Your servicing and support

i)

ii)

iii)

4. Your other categories (e.g. your design skills)

i)

ii)

iii)

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Fifthly the peer-to-peer advisory board help you generate and improve your initial opportunities for new products & services.

you utilise the creativity of your innovation teams to expand and improve these initial ideas.

They generate initial opportunities by selecting the most promising opportunities.

We can meet this need:

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For these people:

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By:

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Then they improve your initial ideas for these new product/service opportunities

I see the Customer Need for this idea as…

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Yes, and the idea would also be useful for…

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Alternatively, the idea would help to…

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We could implement this by…

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Yes, and we could also meet this need by…

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Alternatively, we could…

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What I like about this idea is…

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And they can further refine the idea by repeating this process… until they establish

your Improved Opportunity:

We can meet this need:

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For these people:

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By:

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Sixthly the peer-to-peer advisory board help you select your most promising new products and services.

Using the FastGrowth™ Innovation Process you and your teams will probably eventually produce at least 10 improved opportunities.

Now is the time to select three of the most promising opportunities. The process for selecting these is four steps. These are:

1) Assess the production, sales and servicing risks of each opportunity

2) Financially evaluate your low risk opportunities

3) Summarise each promising opportunity

4) Filter-in your most promising opportunities

you use a worksheet for each of these four stages.

Assess the risks of each improved opportunity

Production Risk (i.e. can you produce it?)

1 = We could easily produce the proposed new product/service using our existing facilities and technology

2 = We have some doubts that we can produce the product/service using our facilities and technology

3 = We have serious doubts whether we could produce the new product/service at all

Sales Risk (i.e. can you sell it?)

1 = We could easily sell the proposed new product/service to our existing clients/customers

2 = We have some doubts that we can sell the product/service to our existing/potential customers

3 = We have serious doubts whether we could sell the new product/service at all

Servicing Risk (i.e. can you service it?)

1 = We could easily service the new product/service from our existing expertise/resources

2 = We have some doubts that we can service the product properly

3 = We have serious doubts whether we could service the new product at all

For each new product/service opportunity, assess the production, sales and servicing risks on the scale 1 to 3. Then multiply the three risks to calculate the combined risk. The objective is to identify those opportunities with a low, combined risk of 1 or 2.

Financially evaluate your opportunities

Using this worksheet, financially evaluate each opportunity with a combined risk of 1 or 2.

1. Estimated Sales

• What is your estimate of the likely 3-year sales of the proposed product or service after launch?

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2 Estimated Development & Launch Costs

• What is your estimate of the cost of developing the proposed new product or service?

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• What is your estimate of the cost of launching the proposed new product or service?

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3 Estimated potential return

• What is an estimate of your likely 3-year gross profit on the proposed product/service after launch?

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• What is your potential financial return from the new product/service over the next 3 years?

Lowest

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Highest

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For each of those opportunities which you can afford to develop/launch and for which there is good/high potential financial return, summarise each opportunity on the worksheet.

Summarise each promising opportunity i.e. those with low combined risk & good/high potential financial return

The title of the new product/service:

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The customer need:

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The proposed new product/service:

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Proposed production:

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Proposed marketing, selling and distribution:

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Anticipated 3-year sales after launch:

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Anticipated development and launch costs:

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Estimated financial return:

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Your conclusions:

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Filter-in your most promising products/services

The title of the proposed product/service:

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The Strategic Factors for your Filter

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A. Your Production Facilities

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1 We can produce the proposed new product/service using our existing, or our partners’ facilities

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B. Your Marketing & Selling Resources

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2 There is a unique proposition for this product/service

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3 The new product/service has a potential long life

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4 We can market & sell the proposed new product/service using our existing resources

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5 We can prevent our competitors from producing/selling this product/service

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C. Your Service Skills

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6 We can service the new product/service using our existing skills

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D. Your Financial Return

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7 Our sales over the next three years from the new product/service

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8 Our gross profit on this new product/service over three years

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9 The cost of developing the new product/service is low:

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10 Our potential return on our investment (ROI) from the new product/service over the next three years is:

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Your comments on the combined risks of this proposed product/service:

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Additional comments from the innovation team on the proposed new product/service:

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Your strategic recommendation to your Board/Management Team about the proposed new product/service is:

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Lastly the peer-to-peer advisory board help you take massive action.

The profound impact on you and your company of developing your successful new products & services is that you will successfully launch one of your new products and services within 18 months, leading to massive increase in value for your company.