by: Pavel Lenshin
Basically what innovation does is making your business unique and often more progressive in its development.
Looking deeper at positive influence of innovation allows us to notice clear tendency from business stagnation to rapid development depending on what level of innovation takes place in business management and planning.
The logic behind is simple if your business is a clone in its product and business structure, it will more likely to experience difficulties in reaching set goals in comparison with more innovative and therefore flexible competitive predecessor. New and well-grounded approaches greatly raise chances of any legal entity to take the lead over competitors, because one cannot beat competition doing the same things competitor does. It takes implementation of the new progressive vision and steps in business development.
Business innovation is an organizational and behavioral strategy any part of running business should be based on. In other words, it is an alternative way of thinking and doing business. There are times where conservative attitude allows securing reached results and accumulating resources for taking next step, still conservatism in Internet surroundings is to be exception rather than rule.
Human is a conservative creature by nature, especially at a mature age. We agree to face any evolutionism when we start private business or under unordinary circumstances (yet 80% of all people don't even want to take a risk of starting their own businesses) but once all problems have been settled, the need for "another angle of viewpoint" vanishes, making us highly vulnerable in the face of external changes and environment.
I used the word "risk" on purpose, as we know, any innovation is a risk. Doing what others do may be a wise strategy for slow moving - low profit development and it may be good for big corporation where gross income in several hundreds million dollars can "leverage" their reluctance for adopting innovative measures.
Small business owner does not have such privilege. For him/her it is usually a matter of survival to be innovative or not.
Innovation is a feature and integral part of starting, running and developing business, especially Internet business nowadays. I laid stress on Internet business for the unique competitive surrounding it possesses. While competition in offline business world may "forgive" some "imperfections" in plans, services, products or marketing due to inability of instantly offering a good alternative, business online instantly presents any visitor with thousands of similar choices that can be reached with a click of a mouse.
For every offline business owner having several direct competitors on the same street is a nightmare, demanding taking unordinary steps in order to "keep afloat". For every online business owner hundreds, if not tens of thousands, direct competitors "on the same street" are a usual and inevitable feature of running online business from the very beginning. Crucial part of making a difference here is to implement innovative-based business tactics on a constant basis.
There are many strategies of unique marketing measures that brought success. I have personally emphasized the importance of creating USP (Unique Selling Proposition), but all of these advices are nothing more than a way of innovation implementation.
Whether you are creating a new product, choosing a web-design, setting up customer support or developing marketing plan - be innovative and unique in your approaches.
Every starting solo professional on the net experiences shortage in everything but probably a desire to succeed, so there is no point in reinventing the wheel. Often we are forced to make a compromise. If we speak about marketing strategy your next move may be well-known, widely-used and, therefore, customer-response-depleted or, on the other hand, innovative, unique and fresh, generating exposure you have never anticipated. Unfortinately many of us go the "conservative" way and that is why are doomed to read success stories of others, trying to reproduce what thousands marketers do vainly.
We are given proven tools that work - USP, time management, branding, viral marketing, affiliate programs etc. they represent the invented axe - a proven tool - with help of which we need to cross the "Internet business ocean" and reach desired point "B", but it is for us to decide how wisely to use given axe.
The first one decided to throw it away and swim across, the second built a raft, the third added oars, while the forth one in addition set a sail with a steering-wheel. What are you going to do? Rationalism teaches you to go the best-known forth way, while innovation - set a second sail or invent a steam engine!