10 Types of Innovation - The Art of Discovering A Breakthrough Product

5/28/22, 11:55 PM 10 Types of Innovation: The Art of Discovering a Breakthrough Product
10 Types of Innovation: The Art of Discovering a Breakthrough
TECHNOLOGY
10 Types of Innovation: The Ar

Breakthrough Product
Published 2 years ago on July 1, 2020
By Jeff Desjardins

MARKETS TECHNOLOGY MONEY HEALTHCARE ENERGY MAPS MINING GREEN FEATURED COM
https://www.visualcapitalist.com/10-types-of-innovation-the-art-of-discovering-a-breakthrough-product/?utm_source=bambu&utm_medium=social&ut… 1/13

The Art of Discovering Breakthrough Products

As venture capitalist Peter Thiel once put it, “competition is for losers”.
It’s inevitable that every company must be out there battling for market share, but you d
really want to be in a situation where the competition is so stiff that any potential upside
eroded away in the process—―a scenario known as perfect competition in economics.
To avoid perfect competition, companies must strive to build an economic moat that give
sustainable competitive advantage over time. While these protective moats can arise from
number of different sources, in today’s information economy they most often arise from
power of innovation.
But where does innovation come from, and is there a universal framework that can be ap
help consistently make big breakthroughs?
The 10 Types of Innovation

In today’s infographic, we showcase the culmination of years of in-depth research from D
an innovation-focused firm now owned by Deloitte.
After examining over 2,000 business innovations throughout history, Doblin uncovered t
breakthroughs don’t necessarily stem from engineering inventions or rare discoveries.
Instead, they observed that innovations can be categorized within a range of 10 distinct
dimensions—and anyone can use the resulting strategic framework to analyze the compe
stress test for product weaknesses, or to find new opportunities for their products.
Here are the 10 types of innovation: 

# MARKETS
Innovation TypeTECHNOLOGY MONEY HEALTHCARE
Description ENERGY MAPS MINING GREEN FEATURED COM
# Innovation Type Description

1. Profit Model How you make money
2. Network Connections with others to create value
3. Structure Alignment of your talent and assets
4. Process Signature of superior methods for doing your work
5. Product Performance Distinguishing features and functionality
6. Product System Complementary products and services
7. Service Support and enhancements that surround your offerings
8. Channel How your offerings are delivered to customers and users
9. Brand Representation of your offerings and business
10. Customer Engagement Distinctive interactions you foster
From Theory to Practice

What does innovation look like in practice?
Let’s see how well-known businesses have leveraged each of these 10 types of innovation
past, while also diving into the tactics that modern businesses can use to consistently ma
product breakthroughs:.
Innovation Types #1-4: “Configuration”

According to Doblin, the first four types of innovation center around the configuration o
company, and all the work that happens “behind the scenes”.
Although innovation types in this category are not directly customer-facing, as you can s
examples below, they can still have an important impact on the customer experience. Ho
company and products are organized can have a crucial downstream effect, even enablin
innovations in other categories.

Two of the most interesting examples here are Google and McDonald’s. Both companies m
internal innovations that empowered their people to make important advancements furt
downstream.
In the case of McDonald’s, the franchisee insight that led to the introduction of the Egg M
spearheaded the company’s entire breakfast offering, which now accounts for 25% of rev
Breakfast is also now the company’s most profitable segment.
Innovation Types #5-6: “Offering”

When most people think of innovation, it’s likely the offering category that comes to min

Making improvements to product performance is an obvious but difficult type of innova
MARKETS
unless it’s TECHNOLOGY
accompanied MONEY ingrained
by a deeply HEALTHCARE company
ENERGY culture
MAPS MINING GREEN
towards FEATURED
technical COM
innova
such advancements may only create a temporary advantage against the competition.
This is the part of the reason that Doblin recommends that companies focus on combinin
multiple areas of innovation together—it creates a much more stable economic moat.
Apple has a reputation for innovation, but the product ecosystem highlighted above is an
underappreciated piece of the company’s strategy. By putting thought into the ecosystem
products—and ensuring they work together flawlessly—additional utility is created, whi
making it harder for customers to switch away from Apple products.
Innovation Types #7-10: “Experience”

These types of innovation are the most customer-facing, but this also makes them the mo
subject to interpretation.
While other innovations tend to occur upstream, innovations in experience all get triale
hands of customers. For this reason, intense care is needed in rolling out these ideas.

In the early days of the internet, online shipping was precarious at best—but Amazon’s
introduction of Amazon Prime and free expedited shipping for all members has been a g
changer for e-commerce.
Executing on such a promise was no small task, but today there are 150 million users of P
worldwide, including some in metro areas who can get items in as little as two hours.
Making Innovations Happen in Your Organization

How can organizations approach the 10 types of innovation from a more tactical perspec
One useful resource is Doblin’s free public list of over 100 tactics that correspond with th 
aforementioned framework.
The one-pager PDF provides a range of typical dimensions for approaching each type of
innovation. In essence, these are all different ways you could consider when trying to
differentiate your product or service—and at the very least, it provides a useful thought
experiment for managers and marketers.
For those interested in learning more on this topic, Doblin also has a highly-rated book as
other accessories that leverage the above framework.
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RELATED TOPICS: # Innovation # Business # Types Of Innovation # Breakthroughs # Ideas # Discoveries
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
The Top Downloaded Apps in 2022

Whether they’re providing a service like ride-sharing or acting as a mere source of
entertainment, mobile apps have become an integral part of many peoples’ day-to-d
lives.
But which apps are most popular among users?
This graphic uses data from a recent report by Sensor Tower to show the top 10 mos
downloaded apps around the world in Q1 2022 from the Google Play and Apple App
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Social Reigns Supreme

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CONTINUE READING
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
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Synthetic
10 Biology: The $3.6The
Types of Innovation: Trillion Science aChanging
Art of Discovering Li
Breakthrough
We Know It
The field of synthetic biology could solve problems in a wide range of industries,
medicine to agriculture—here’s how.
Published 3 weeks ago on May 10, 2022
By Carmen Ang
How Synthetic Biology Could Change Life as we Know it

Synthetic biology (synbio) is a field of science that redesigns organisms in an effort t
enhance and support human life. According to one projection, this rapidly growing
of science is expected to reach $28.8 billion in global revenue by 2026.
Although it has the potential to transform many aspects of society, things could go
horribly wrong if synbio is used for malicious or unethical reasons. This infographic
explores the opportunities and potential risks that this budding field of science has t 
offer.
What is10Synthetic Biology? The Art of Discovering a Breakthrough

Types of Innovation:
We’ve covered the basics of synbio in previous work, but as a refresher, here’s a qui
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explanation of what synbio is and how it works.
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5/28/22, 11:55 PM 10 Types of Innovation: The Art of Discovering a Breakthrough Product

10 Types of Innovation: The Art of Discovering a Breakthrough

10 Types of Innovation: The Ar

10 Types of Innovation: The Art of Discovering a Breakthrough

10 Types of Innovation: The Art of Discovering a Breakthrough

The Art of Discovering Breakthrough Products

The 10 Types of Innovation

Here are the 10 types of innovation: 

# Innovation Type Description

2. Network Connections with others to create value

3. Structure Alignment of your talent and assets

4. Process Signature of superior methods for doing your work

5. Product Performance Distinguishing features and functionality

6. Product System Complementary products and services

7. Service Support and enhancements that surround your offerings

8. Channel How your offerings are delivered to customers and users

9. Brand Representation of your offerings and business

10. Customer Engagement Distinctive interactions you foster

From Theory to Practice

Innovation Types #1-4: “Configuration”

10 Types of Innovation: The Art of Discovering a Breakthrough

Innovation Types #5-6: “Offering”

Innovation Types #7-10: “Experience”

10 Types of Innovation: The Art of Discovering a Breakthrough

Making Innovations Happen in Your Organization

Get your mind blown on a daily basis:

Your email address

RELATED TOPICS: # Innovation # Business # Types Of Innovation # Breakthroughs # Ideas # Discoveries

DON'T MISS UP NEXT

CLICK FOR COMMENTS

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE

10 Types of Innovation: The Art of Discovering a Breakthrough

The Top Downloaded Apps in 2022

10 Types of Innovation: The Art of Discovering a Breakthrough

The Top Downloaded Apps in 2022

But which apps are most popular among users?

Social Reigns Supreme

increase compared to Q1 2021

How Synthetic Biology Could Change Life as we Know it

What is10Synthetic Biology? The Art of Discovering a Breakthrough

MISC / 2 weeks ago ENERGY / 3 weeks ago POLITICS / 2 weeks ago

MARKETS / 3 days ago TECHNOLOGY / 3 weeks ago MARKETS / 4 weeks ago

10 Types of Innovation: The Art of Discovering

ABOUT SUBSCRIBE VC+ MASTHEAD PRESS CENTE

CONTACT US FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS STORE USE OUR VISUALIZA

Copyright © 2022 Visual Capitalist

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