Trend-Driven Innovation: Beat Accelerating Customer Expectations

369 Pages·2015·28.71 MB·English

by  H. Mason

Trend-Driven Innovation

Praise for
“If you’re an innovator, designer, entrepreneur or in need of one,
read this book. It is entertaining and pathologically precise, and
unveils a simple and elegant system for spotting early trends that
may reshape our business, community and life.”
Lisa Gansky
— Entrepreneur; Author of The Mesh
“This book is a highly contemporary insight into how the world is
changing that goes beyond the obvious and anticipated. Leaders
who are focused on delivering what people will want should pay
these insights great attention now.”
David Bartlett
— Chairman, Future Industries Fund Advisory Council; Former Premier of Tasmania
“Some of the smartest thinking about the swiftest way to get
the answers to what drives consumers in the hypercompetitive,
hyperconnected era where the customer isn’t just always right, they
are ahead of the commercial producer almost every time.”
Julia Hobsbawm
— Founder, Editorial Intelligence; Honorary Visiting Professor in Networking, Cass
Business School, London
“As an entrepreneur, you intuitively ‘get’ the trend you’re riding.
But as you scale you need to understand how to deal with the next
wave of trends too. Trend-Driven Innovation is a practical guide that
we’re using to do just that.”
Cassandra Stavrou
— Founder, Propercorn
“I normally never promote someone else’s business book—but
this book I could not turn away—the subject is so current and
so relevant—and the writing so captivating I i nished it on one
business trip. Read it.”
Fredrik Härén
— Author of The Idea Book, one of “The 100 Best Business Books of All Time”
“Being CEO of a leading sharing economy startup, people often ask
me how they can spot the next big trend. Trend-Driven Innovation
gives me insights, language and tools to explain how to do that.”
Alex Stephany
— CEO, JustPark
“A book to keep on the desk at all times; a constant reminder that
trends are all around us, and a guide to inspiring fresh thinking and
realizing your own innovative future.”
Mark Haviland
— Managing Director, Rakuten Marketing Europe
“While there is no crystal ball, Trend-Driven Innovation acts like a
lighthouse to steer your ships to a safer business destination. Be
brave and set sail!”
Nicola Belli
— Front End Consumer and Product Innovation Director, Sai lo Spa
“Very thorough, hands-on perspective on the translation of trends
into business opportunities.”
Jakob Sutmuller
— Author of Serious Concepting; Senior Lecturer at Fontys Academy for Creative
Industries
TREND DR IVEN
INNOVATION
Cover design: Maria Isabel Reyes

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Copyright © 2015 by trendwatching.com, BV. All rights reserved.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.

Published simultaneously in Canada.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any

means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Section

107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or

authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood

Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, [phone], fax [phone], or on the web at www.copyright.com. Requests to

the Publisher for permission should be addressed to the Permissions Department, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River

Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, [phone], fax [phone], or online at www.wiley.com/go/permissions.

Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty: While the publisher and author have used their best efforts in preparing this

book, they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of
this book and specii cally disclaim any implied warranties of merchantability or i tness for a particular purpose. No
warranty may be created or extended by sales representatives or written sales materials. The advice and strategies
contained herein may not be suitable for your situation. You should consult with a professional where appropriate.
Neither the publisher nor the author shall be liable for damages arising herefrom.
For general information about our other products and services, please contact our Customer Care Department
within the United States at [phone], outside the United States at [phone] or fax [phone].
Wiley publishes in a variety of print and electronic formats and by print-on-demand. Some material included with
standard print versions of this book may not be included in e-books or in print-on-demand. If this book refers to
media such as a CD or DVD that is not included in the version you purchased, you may download this material at
http://booksupport.wiley.com. For more information about Wiley products, visit www.wiley.com.
ISBN 978-1-119-07631-5 (paper); ISBN 978-1-119-07647-6 (ePDF); ISBN 978-1-119-07632-2 (ePub)
Printed in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Beat accelerating customer expectations with

TREND DR IVEN

INNOVATION

Henry Mason, David Mattin, Maxwell Luthy, Delia Dumitrescu

Designed by Maria Isabel Reyes
[CONTENTS]

1 2 3FOC

U
S
W N
O A
C
N S

Y
H
W
Welcome to the Expectation The Overwhelm Is the What to Run With, When,
Economy Opportunity and How
06 The Expectation Economy 44 Trends 101 120 Post-Demographic
Why your customers are Where to start with Consumerism
(almost) impossible to consumer trends. A license to focus on
please. surprising things.
60 Watch Businesses First,
Customers Second 144 Evaluating Trends for
The counterintuitive Opportunity
secret to customer- Drill deeper into the
centricity. opportunities offered to
you by any trend.
86 Trends in the Wild
Four trends and how we 172 The Consumer Trend Radar
identii ed them. Prioritize and visualize
application of the trends
98 Building a Trend Framework
you’ll run with.
Why you need one; how to
build it; sharing ours.
vi
4 5EXECUTE
6

E
T
A
R
E CU
N L
E T
G U
R
E

Turn Insights into Ideas Realize Your Ideas, Unlock an Opportunity

or Realize They Are Useless Machine

200 The Consumer Trend Canvas 264 The First Yards 286 Your Trend Department
A simple tool for Make those i rst steps Get your colleagues to see
generating compelling, count. around corners.
trend-driven innovation
306 Trend-Driven Ecosystems
ideas.
Tap into and harness
224 The Consumer Trend Canvas external networks, too.
in Action
Practical examples to learn
from.
244 Trend-Driven Ideation
Sessions
Run workshops that
deliver winning ideas.
vviiii
FOREWORD
Alexander
Osterwalder
Cofounder of Strategyzer
and lead author of Business
Model Generation and Value
Proposition Design.
Every business hopes to be value propositions—their testing, convinced large corporations like
successful. But it’s the ability to adaptation, and implementation, 3M, Mastercard, Colgate, GE, and
navigate and understand trends instead of spending money and Nestlé to take advantage of the
that separates the successful resources on the one “right idea.” techniques that so many people
companies from the crowded i eld have found to be successful.
In 2004, I published Business
of “innovators.” If you don’t have
Model Generation, and the The challenge is to use trends to
the ability to understand trends and
accompanying Business Model advance business models (the
their implications to your business,
Canvas, to provide businesses foundation that keeps a company
you run the risk of becoming
with a framework for innovation. alive and able to create proi t)
irrelevant.
My company Strategyzer expands while offering value propositions
A smart business understands how on this mission and provides that attract customers and
to identify trends that may reshape software that encourages constant differentiate you from competitors.
its future. A smart business picks experimentation, failure, and Both of these concepts run the
trends that allow it to experiment iteration. The canvas is used by risk of expiring like yogurt in the
with new business models and millions of people, and we’ve fridge if they are left to sit idle for
viii