Dossier: successful innovation

How fast can you launch new products and services, scale up or scale down sales channels, or provide a better customer experience? The technical complexity of a business often determines its innovation speed. We look at how to transform the 5 key blockers in technology into accelerators for your business. Expert:Raymond Muilwijk, Center of Excellence Lead Technology

Not every innovation leads directly to improvement. As a company, when approaching innovation, you have to start the process by identifying the most important issues before you can begin to determine the correct strategy. But how do you identify the problems that are worth solving? And how far into the future can you reasonably predict?

An idea is often the first step towards a better future, and it’s no different in product development. A backlog full of crystal-clear priorities – epics, stories, bugs, and tickets – is a wealth of ideas for the future. Having the time and budget to actually work all these ideas out is something else altogether. How do you validate an idea without risking a serious chunk of your budget? There are many situations where you would like to present an idea to your target group, just to find out whether it is financially feasible, but you can never be certain that an idea is worth the financial cost of testing. A negative result after testing can be expensive. There are industries that operate at such a scale that a 2% drop can run to the millions. That’s why caution is advised.

Developing new digital products and services in healthcare can take a while. And yet, innovation is very important in this sector where budget cuts are a daily occurrence. How do you develop innovative ideas for healthcare quicker, and test them to create solutions that get to see the light of day? In this article, we give you 7 tips to use straight away.

Research demonstrates that companies that shape products and services, in a co-creative process with their end users, can benefit from as much as a 32% higher revenue growth than their competitors, over 5 years. It’s little wonder that Design Thinking — a solution-oriented methodology, in which issues are defined directly from listening to the needs of the end user — is gaining ground. Bas van Dun and Dylan Fanego, digital strategy consultant and UX designer at iO, explain: "Sometimes the solution does not lie in the app or website that you initially had in mind".

Earlier this year, we launched the Opportunity Report: a collection of visions and insights from our experts to help you stay ahead in the new year. On 9 March, during our online event “Accelerating your business in 2023”, we brought these insights to life. One of the live sessions at this event was hosted by Uilke Duinstra (Service Line Director Strategy), who talked about ways to help businesses and organisations validate innovations faster and gain management’s support. In this article, we’ll share the key takeaways from Uilke’s session with you.

In the beginning of this year, we launched the Opportunity report 2023. A collection of visions and insights from our experts to help you get the most out of the new year. On the 9th of March during the Opportunity online live event we brought these insights live to an interested audience to speak and discuss how to ‘Accelerate your business in 2023’. In this article, we’ll share the key takeaways from Raymond’s session with you - just a few of the many ways modern technology plays the part of enabler for digital transformation.

Developing innovation strategy is key for success in today's ever-evolving market. Together, we develop an innovation strategy to create more relevant value.

Every new era requires new fuel, and the AI era is no exception. Simply collecting raw data is not enough to effectively utilise generative AI – you also need to process and interpret the data. The vector database bridges the gap between data and AI, enabling valuable output and optimal customer experiences. In this article in our ‘Get a taste of AI’ series, you will learn how vectors work and gain the tools to apply them in your daily practice. The term “vector” may not be familiar to the general public, but its impact certainly is. Vectors provide more accurate results and recommendations in search engines and recommendation engines, improving the user experience. They add context and relevance, making the difference between a positive and a negative experience. But how does this work exactly? And how can your organisation leverage vectors for AI?

When you understand AI’s full potential you can use it purposefully. But how do you translate the versatile possibilities of AI into the specific context of your everyday business operations?

AI language models, better known as Large Language Models, such as ChatGPT are hot. For some, they are a fine piece of pastime, for others an important tool to achieve business goals – not in the least for SEO and SEA. As they gain plenty of popularity, the complexity of the picture is also becoming clear, just the capabilities of AI. It becomes important to fully understand their potential, and their limitations, before you start working with them.

Anyone who has tried ChatGPT knows that we are at the dawn of a new era. A lot of businesses want to respond to these developments, but often still regard generative AI as a black box. The complexity and lack of transparency can lead to timidity and restraint, while AI as a technology offers a lot of unique opportunities and possibilities. Do you want your business to get ahead of the curve? Then you have to give AI a try: experiment, learn and apply. Experimentation is the only way to learn how and when AI can deliver value to your business operations.

What troubles organisations these days? That’s what Kristof Bossuyt and Nina de Graaf (iO) asked a number of our clients. The result? Four challenges almost every company in Europe faces these days.

Do you remember when ... the invention of the computer caused a seismic shift in the job market? People unwilling to work with computers were quickly replaced by people who were; and today everyone carries a laptop. Today the same thing is happening with AI. In this webinar, Rodger Werkhoven will share his passion for Artificial Intelligence and introduce you to OpenAI as a love brand.

Do you remember when ... the invention of the computer caused a seismic shift in the job market? People unwilling to work with computers were quickly replaced by people who were; and today everyone carries a laptop. Today the same thing is happening with AI. In this webinar, Rodger Werkhoven will share his passion for Artificial Intelligence and introduce you to OpenAI as a love brand.

Looking for smart ways to achieve your digital, innovation and marketing goals? Join us to discover the opportunities for 2023 in our free online event.

The dot-com bubble, the Covid pandemic, the war in Ukraine: crises seem to be coming in quicker and quicker succession. But for marketers, those crises — from local events in specific markets to global phenomena — also always contain an opportunity. In this webinar, Tim Karpisek, Business Strategist at iO, explains how you can find relevant growth opportunities in times of crisis.

The time for digitisation is now - not later, tomorrow, or next week. At iO we have been telling this same story for some time now, and it continues to be relevant. In recent years digitisation has proven itself to be, and continues to be essential, the user is still central, and the growth of digital consumers has - as was predicted - only accelerated.

Many organisations have a firm grasp on the customer journey. They know the touchpoints and how customers move through them. But looking at it in a more in-depth way – how do we optimise processes and customer contact? – is not something many businesses do. Mostly because businesses don’t look at their operations from the customer’s point of view, but only from that of the organisation. The Service Blueprint takes care of that.

Digital transformation may be a buzzword, but that’s because it’s happening right now. Digitalisation has gained momentum every part of society and it’s showing no sign of slowing down. Consumers have high expectations and now it’s for companies to anticipate their digital needs. iO has the expertise and experience your company needs for effective digital transformation. Digitalisation is a mindset that has an impact on the entire company, from business operations and internal processes to marketing and communication. Customer focused and with a clear vision. Do you want to know more about the benefits of digitalisation, and how to embed it into the DNA of your company? Our experts have bundled their insights and experiences into an inspiring ebook that will help you prepare your brand for tomorrow.

NFTs, blockchain, Web3, metaverse: it's easy to get lost when dealing with the latest technology trends. It seems like everyone is jumping on the boat of the metaverse — and those who stay behind seem to drown. But is that really the case? And how difficult is it to do anything in the metaverse? Fortunately, our experts know how to get things done.

How is it that only 30% of the companies are successful in adopting digital transformation? In large part because it affects every aspect of a business: people, processes, infrastructure, and customers. We walk you through the most common mistakes we see in digital transformation projects so you don’t have to make them yourself. Expert:Tom van Mierlo, Digital Strategist

MediaMarkt is an omnichannel retailer, and that is a very conscious choice. Digital and non-digital channels flow seamlessly into each other, according to Yannick de Bièvre (Head of Marketing BeLux).

The decision to digitise has to start from the customer, not from an internal, business perspective. That's what Leslie Cottenje, CEO of Hello Customer thinks. Technology can help improve customer satisfaction, but the human factor has to be central. She tells you all about her vision in this video.

You can't do partial digital transformation, says Paul Smeets (CTO Cadac). In this video, he tells you more about his vision on digitisation.

"With digital transformation, you can deliver added value to your customers," says Steven De Deyne, Head of Media and Production Competence Center Proximus), it in this video.

Digital transformation isn't just about technology — it’s also about people. Joaquin Zschuschen, Digital Manager at KLM Health Services, talks about customer satisfaction and personalisation.

Steven Van Belleghem (partner iO) talks about the three main advantages he sees in technology and digital transformation: faster than real-time service, hyper-personalisation, and the ultimate convenience.

According to Peter Van Hoecke (CEO Van Hoecke), the client is always central, especially — in digital transformation. By automating, accelerating, and rationalising processes, you help your clients save time — our most finite and valuable resource.

"Digitisation in Belgium is progressing rapidly, but not as fast as it could or I hoped it would," says Thierry Geerts, CEO Google Belgium. He wrote a book, Digitalis, about his vision on digitisation. He talks about how we can — and should — pick up the pace of digitisation.