The product I have chosen as innovative and creative is the 3G TOUCH WATCH PHONE OF LG. This exclusive piece of new technology offers the customer the opportunity of see satisfied two of our most common needs in one: wear the mobile phone in our watch!
LG was pioneer in launching not only a watch that includes 3G connectivity, MP3 reproduction, video-calling, voice recognition… but also its sophisticated design with a touchable screen. LG Mobile Communications CEO sold it as “It’s undeniable the entertainment of this device that seems to be extracted of a spies or a science-fiction movie”
Now let’s talk about the CREATIVITY. The creativity is defined as the capacity of finding new methods of making tasks in new or different ways with the objective of satisfying a certain purpose. And I would call this purpose customer insights or needs. However, I think that if you want a product or a service to be creative it is not enough to find a different way of satisfying an existing need, but this new item or service has to meet some characteristics that make you and your product actually creative.
First of all, you have to be able to find the underlying need, which none else has taken into account or maybe has not found it as interesting as to look for a new way to satisfy it. In my example, LG was the first one that stopped and thought that customers were demanding a new concept of their mobile phones, so that they could wear it as another accessory and, at the same time, developing the concept of the current watches, so that they could offer the customers the same functions of a mobile phone.
Secondly, and with the rapid changes we are experiencing in the field of creativity nowadays, you need to give an ingenious respond so that it can make a great impact in customers’ mind and its consequent reaction to make them be interested in your product. For all of us, both the watches and the mobile phones are part of our daily lives, but none else before had stopped to think of joining them in the same device. However, when this new idea came up it was a surprise to everyone. In my opinion, this capacity of inventing a new product from combining two simple and existing ones is what makes the product different and unique! This is what I would call ORIGINALITY.
Another important characteristic of the product is that it has to be elaborated. I am referring to the level of detail, development and complexity of the new product. In the case of the watch-phone, one characteristic that makes it be elaborated is the high-quality features it offers in such a small watch and, overall, the design of the touchable screen that, in my opinion, gives it a sophisticated style.
The last characteristic I would remark is the internal coherence, if the product is actually useful and makes sense, which actually the watch-phone does, as long as you usually wear a watch and use the mobile phone, of what I am pretty sure that everyone who read this blog agrees.
To finish with the reflection of the creativity, I will talk about the INNOVATION. I left this for the end because from my personal point of view, creativity involves innovation. Something innovative offers the customer a new alternative to solve a need or a problem, but also raises the uncertainty of if it will be better than the existing solution. Here is when the customer has to decide if the new product offers him an advantage, efficiently or economically talking, comparing with the existing one. Referring to the LG 3G watch- mobile, customers have to decide if it is worthy paying a higher price for the comfort of wearing both watch and mobile in one, for the features it offers, or for the sophisticated design. Here is where the role of each customer’s insights plays.
Very related to my personal creative and innovative device is the article of “The new, faster face of innovation”. As we can observe, all the innovation we are experiencing nowadays is around the development of the new technologies. What the article calls ‘the innovation of rapid innovation’. Because all this new items that are coming up, from the MP3 to the later MP4, then the iPods, the iPhones, the watch-phones… as well as the new ways of communication as Facebook or even Skype are making our lives cheaper, faster and more comfortable. We have to bear in mind that in the future the change and development of new technologies will be even faster, so the opportunities to find something new to invent will be more complicated, or not! If you find the way to look behind the customers and search for their insights so that you can come up with something innovative and creative to satisfy their needs!
