My salvation...
OK, so I finally have my own product innovation story to tell…
In the mornings, when I am in my office, I add a little french vanilla cream to my coffee. That’s just my thing. Don’t do that when I am on the road, or meeting someone in a coffee shop.
So, for the longest time, I used the International Delight brand. Love the taste. Still do. And I even think it has slightly less fat/carbs/calories (whatever) than the other brand I would use IF International Delight wasn’t in the store.
But there was one thing I hated about using International Delight. When I had to open a new container, I would have to remove that silly little tinfoil thing covering the opening. I hate that thing. I mean hate. I would pull and grab, grab and pull. Inevitably, I would have to grab a knife and stab at the damn thing as if I were killing a large animal.
Anyways, just the other day I was at the store. I needed more cream. Publix was out of International Delight. So I picked up a container of Nestles Coffee-Mate, which was always my fall-back option. The next morning, when opening the container, I noticed a new (at least new to me on my coffee creamers) innovation. It was the plastic tab ring where you slip a finger into the loop, and gently pull a plastic seal right off the container.
I’ve seen this before, on milk cartons, orange juice and such. But never on my coffee containers. It was a most glorious moment. I wanted to cry. And for once, I didn’t have to waste a whole knife to open my coffee creamer.
So, at the end of the day, I am now officially a Nestles Coffee-Mate consumer of french vanilla coffee creamer. And all it took was changing my customer experience on opening the container (one shouldn’t appear to be a deranged killer when opening coffee creamer).
The lesson here? To bring in new customers, you don’t have to necessarily re-brand yourself. You don’t have to spend one billion dollars on an advertising campaign. You don’t have to film a video that you hope and pray ends up going viral.
All you have to do is think and act creatively to make the customer experience a better one. And oftentimes, it is the LITTLE things that can have a dramatic impact on whether your products sells.
So seek to make a customer’s life easier. To make their life better. Faster. Simpler. More productive. More efficient. Less costly. More profound. More enjoyable. You get the idea. The story will spread. I promise.
You never know what may happen. Someone out there may even write a small blog post about their experience…
What product innovation stories can you share?
