18 November 2009
Build a better mousetrap …
Ralph Waldo Emerson famously observed that if you build a better mousetrap, the world will beat a path to your door. That presupposes a number of issues, including whether anyone knows that you have that better mousetrap available.
Innovation is all about building that better mousetrap; but it's not just the mousetrap's design, it's also about how you take the mousetrap to market and so on.
And innovation shouldn't be confused with invention. Apple has not only built a better 'mousetrap' – in the shape of the iPod and so on – but it has also created a better 'mousetrap' marketing programme. Yet Apple didn't invent that particular 'mousetrap'; it simply did it better – and the world has, indeed, beaten a path to its door.
Here's an interesting statistic: there have been 4400 mousetrap patents issued in the last 150 years. Of those, only 24 have made money and two have generated more than 50% of all mousetrap revenues.
What does that tell us? Designing and patenting a product is one thing; making it a commercial success is an entirely different game. Today, in particular, design cannot be divorced from marketing. If you adopt the 'build it and they will come' approach, you may well end up in the same position as the 4376 unsuccessful mousetrap patenters.
Author
Graham Pitcher
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