Innovation in business

Innovation in business

Read a blog post about being innovative in business to practise and improve your reading skills.

Do the preparation task first. Then read the text and do the exercises.

Preparation

Reading text

What does it mean to be innovative in business?

In order for a business to survive in today's world, it is important that we regularly review what we are doing and how we are doing it. By considering new ideas and new ways of doing things, and trying to innovate, we can improve on our products/services, increase sales, reduce costs and make our processes more effective and efficient. Innovation is key to increasing profits.

There are several ways a company can be innovative with their products and services. Today we will look at four of them.

1. Using the latest technology to improve your product/service

When we think of innovation, we often think of new technologies. While they might be impressive, we should not use new technologies just because they are available. It is important to consider how the technology can improve our product/service and make a difference to our customer. Companies that produce cars, toiletries, household appliances, etc. often have a large R&D department to work on making their products better.

2. Responding to customer demands by changing what is on offer

By listening to customer feedback, we can get their opinions on how we are doing and find out about what it is that they want. We also need to be aware of changes in customer demands and keep up with the times. When fast-food restaurant McDonald's realised that the market wanted healthier choices, they introduced fruit and salads, while removing the 'super-size' option from their menus.

3. Offering a new product/service to reach new customers

Your business might be doing well, but there is no growth or development and there is a risk that your competitors might take away some of your customers. Innovation sometimes means developing a new product that targets a different market. Although video games were often played by boys, in 2006, video games giant Nintendo introduced the game console Nintendo Wii, successfully targeting girls and older customers with games like Cooking Mama and Brain Training.  

4. Changing the way you provide a service

By looking at the changes to the customer's lifestyle and needs, we sometimes realise that there might be better ways to serve them. Customers who do not have a lot of time might prefer to have their food or their shopping delivered to their homes, or they might like to do their banking online rather than in an actual bank.

Not all innovation will bring success to our businesses, but it can give us the opportunity to grow and learn more about what we do and what our customers might want.

Discussion

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Submitted by Dmytro on Tue, 10/11/2020 - 19:53

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The newest technology I use is an app that provides me the opportunity to tap into working system via smartphone while being wherever I am with access to Internet.

Submitted by Fardhan on Fri, 06/11/2020 - 07:59

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In today's era, there are many technologies that are very developed, one of the innovative technologies I use is the telephone, assisted by the internet network, everyone can access and talk by telephone without having to meet face to face.
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Submitted by Aghaton on Fri, 30/10/2020 - 14:37

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I think technology has brought a mega change in innovation. Nowadays, people/businessmen have come up with many astonishing ideas applied through technology.Say computer technology. Take for example the packaging system of these days and the printing technology through computer designing has helped a great deal in promoting the product worldwide.

Submitted by Moon on Thu, 22/10/2020 - 16:06

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I think we should also be innovative not only in business but also in our lifestyles. We always do same things that we used to. But,it might be so boring for us sometimes.
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Submitted by danisep on Thu, 24/09/2020 - 22:06

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I like technology and I can see that the majority of new innovative products are released only first in the United states, I don't like that. the most recent innovative technologie that I’m using is cloud gaming Geforce Now, it's a platform where you can play computers video games without need a gaming computer, you can play even in your smart tv, games that need a expensive computer to run to a 120Ghz even in 4K, you just have to pay the monthly rate and if you can you could buy a controller.

Submitted by Nobu1230 on Tue, 11/08/2020 - 14:26

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I appliciate that we can use internet and that is the most valuable innovative thing recently.This is because internet allow us to communicate with people across the world whenever and whereever.By connecting to the internet,we can get all information,product and service.If people who lived a hundred years ago see the internet society,they would be surprised.
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Submitted by Hennadii on Wed, 05/08/2020 - 09:59

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I think all of us can enjoy the results of the Second Digital Revolution, which is happening right now. Smartphones changed our lives completely. Now, when we've got access to the Internet wherever we are, the whole business changed. The way to advertise products, the way to promote new ideas, the way to shop, etc. Now you can order a pizza or taxi even if you at the forest. You can book a hotel or buy tickets to the plane sitting at the hairdresser's chair. We become watching TV less and that's bad for TV ads, but contextual advertising in smartphones it's a huuuge help for business.

Submitted by IKEDA on Thu, 30/07/2020 - 17:24

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I came up with many of the latest technologies. Among them, the most innovative thing is the internet, I think. "Internet" has changed the way of communication for humans, so our lifestyle has been coming to a new era. It must be the fourth revolution in human history.