How to Make an Idea Great
An innovation may have been invented a long time before, but if individuals perceive it as new, then it may still be an innovation for them. For example: in 2018 PepsiCo launched a marketing campaign “Celebrating Every Generation". They introduced limited edition cans with the same old designs from the 50s, 60s, 70s, and 80s. Even though the designs are old and almost everyone has seen them before, it was perceived by consumers as an innovative idea. So, what are the attributes of a great innovative idea?
1. Relative Advantage
Relative advantage is the extent by which a particular group of users perceive innovation as better than the idea or practice it replaces.1 An innovation’s consequences* may create uncertainty, and uncertainty is an important obstacle to the adoption of innovations. To reduce the uncertainty of adopting the innovation, individuals should be informed about its advantages and disadvantages to make them aware of all its consequences.2
*Consequences are the changes that occur in an individual or a social system as a result of the adoption or rejection of an innovation.
2. Compatibility
Compatibility is the degree to which an innovation is perceived as consistent with the existing values, past experiences, and needs of potential adopters. An idea that is incompatible with the norms and values of a social system will not be adopted as rapidly as an innovation that is compatible.3
Any new idea is evaluated in comparison to existing practice; so the more an idea is compatible with existing ones, the more it produces more certainty in the eyes of potential adopters.
3. Complexity
Complexity is the degree to which an innovation is perceived as relatively difficult to understand and use. The complexity of an innovation, as perceived by members of a social system, is inversely related to its rate of adoption. In other words, new ideas that are simpler to understand are adopted more rapidly than innovations that require the user to develop new skills and understandings.4
4. Trialability
Trialability is the degree to which an innovation may be experimented with on a limited basis. A person “trying out” an innovation is one way for an individual to give meaning to it and to find out how it works under one’s own conditions. A personal trial can dispel uncertainty about a new idea.5
Trialability is more important to earlier adopters than late adopters because earlier adopters have no precedent available to follow when they adopt, while later adopters will use other peoples’ trials as reference.
5. Observability
Observability is the degree to which the results of an innovation are visible to others. Some ideas are easily observed and communicated to other people, whereas other innovations are difficult to observe or describe to others. The observability of an innovation, as perceived by members of a social system, is directly proportional to its rate of adoption.
Those new product offerings that i) are tangible, ii) have social visibility, and iii) whose benefits are readily observed (without much time gap), are more readily diffuse than those that are intangible, have no social visibility, or whose benefits accumulate over long periods of time6.
1 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877042815039221
2The Turkish Online Journal of Educational Technology – TOJET April 2006 ISSN: 1303-6521 volume 5 Issue 2 Article 3 http://tojet.net/articles/v5i2/523.pdf
3Rogers, E. M. (2003). Diffusion of innovations. New York: Free Press
4Niruban, Ganesh. (2019). APPLYING ROGERS’ DIFFUSION FRAMEWORK - “USE ROGERS’ (2003) 5 CHARACTERISTICS OF INNOVATIONS (RELATIVE ADVANTAGE, COMPATIBILITY, COMPLEXITY, TRIALABILITY, OBSERVABILITY) TO EXPLAIN THE SUCCESSFUL DIFFUSION OF THE IBM PC IN THE 1980S.”. 10.13140/RG.2.2.34136.75520.
5Rogers, E. M. (2003). Diffusion of innovations. New York: Free Press
6https://nptel.ac.in/content/storage2/courses/110105029/pdf%20sahany/module%208l40.pdf
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