Lead User Innovation

Summary: Tips from my experience
Tips for stage 2: Trend identification
à� The most important trends are market trends (aggregated user needs),
technology trends or general social/legal/economic trends might
sometimes also play a role
à� Look also for trends in analogous markets that might spill over
à� Users are market experts – talking to users will help to get an idea of
important (not yet covered) needs (market trends)
à� Usually more than 10 trends are identified as being relevant, do not
follow more than 3 trends for lead user identification (the selection of
trends shall reduce the solution space
à� Selection of most important trends can be done by looking at their
relevance for the target market, their fit with the search field and the
number of sources that back the trend
à� Evaluation tools can support decision processes
à� Use interview partners as evaluators (similar to Delphi methods)
Source: Poetz (2008)
© Marion Poetz 2011