Because its innovations tend to solve customer problems better, faster, cheaper, etc. than previous solutions, publicizing your company’s innovations can lead to good press for your company.
What are some of the drivers of innovative ideas? You can probably think of others, but here are a few:
- Unsatisfied customers
- Operational concerns regarding, e.g., cost, quality, features, performance, delivery, packaging, etc.
- Technological improvements
- Demographic shifts
- Regulatory changes
- Serendipity/luck
- Imagination/vision
At least several of the items on this list should make complete sense. For example, frequently, by rationally gathering, organizing, and analyzing market feedback, your company can gain critical market insights, learn where innovation is needed, and discover how best to tailor its innovations to truly satisfy the market’s needs.
But regardless of how they are generated, as emerging innovations are identified, they can be analyzed for how well they fulfill the market’s actual needs, how valuable they are likely to become, and how protectable they are. Assuming an innovation meets identified criteria, including economic criteria for profitability, such as risk-adjusted return on investment, strong IP protections can, and realistically must, be sought for that innovation.
With sufficient IP protections in place or underway, your company can create and roll-out thoughtful communications that persuasively advocate an innovation’s benefits to its target markets while highlighting the solid IP protections that support the innovation.