“Innovation” (along with web 2.0, social networking, etc) is certainly a business concept du jour. Cited frequently in mission statements and CXO interviews… but not well executed in practice.
Why? I think one reason is that “Innovation” creates a mental leap straight to “Product / Service Innovation”. Too many companies believe that real innovation means they have to evolve their core offering(s) or develop new products and services.
Certainly product / service innovation is one source… but truly remarkable people and companies also drive (and expect) innovation in supply chain management, customer experience, networking, etc.
Take Prince for example. The guy is the King of channel innovation… er, Prince of channel innovation. It was recently announced that his new CD, Planet Earth, will be distributed in the UK via “The Mail” newspaper. It will also be handed out at his upcoming concerts to every ticket holder (same as with his last album, 3121). Naturally, this has greatly irked the dominant, old-school channel - music stores (see the article link above).
Why are the music stores so offended? Well, Prince is circumventing them and so they’ll no doubt lose some revenue / profit. But more fundamentally, if I was them, I’d be pissed that I didn’t have any channel innovation to offer. Music stores have been selling music the same way for decades… and now are being lapped by piracy, online sales, and other less conventional channels (a la Prince).
While not a huge Prince fan, I have to give him kudos for finding a new way to get his music into fans’ hands… and expose non-fans to his music. What other examples of channel innovation have you seen? What people and companies are circumventing traditional channels in media, consumer products, services, etc?
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