Writing A Compelling Product Concept

Creating a compelling product concept is a hugely important part of innovation and product development. There is both art and science to writing a compelling product concept - the science coming from having the right elements included and the art from the language used to bring the elements to life.

There are many reasons your organisation should consider writing product concepts. The organisation can better understand the product's importance to consumers. Is there a real need and is the need sufficiently widespread that it is likely to bring an attractive level of business? A product concept will also help communicate the new idea to the consumer, though it is worth noting this is not copy development for a product (notwithstanding the fact that it will likely aid in this process).

There are a number of different formulas, templates and advice on how to go about creating your product concept. However there are a number of core elements common to most - an insight, a benefit(s) and a reason to believe. Many will start with a headline, which is a way to quickly express the main idea in the concept. From here, you would have an insight, followed by a benefit (emotional and / or rational), followed by a 'reason to believe'.

Starting with an insight, the idea is to set up the 'why' part i.e. why the consumer needs the product. It could be defined as the problem to be solved, though this is not always the case. It's essentially the premise for the story you're about to tell. In a recent brainstorming session, my innovation team came up with the idea of "The Swords / City Centre Underground", an underground transport system taking commuters from the city centre to swords in 18 minutes. The insight that we could develop could stem from the research from the American Psychological Association, which shows that those spending 2 hours or more per day travelling to and from work show they are 500% more likely to develop series stress related illnesses. The trip from Dublin city centre to swords is on average 1 hour and 10 minutes each day at peak times and up to 90 minutes at certain times of the year. In contrast our proposed product does the same journey in 18 mins. The emotional benefit to customers could be the removal of stress, while the rational benefit is the time saver of doing the journey in less time. The reason to believe then follows, which is something to give credibility to the product - how can the product deliver the benefit. In the example above, our reason to believe could be something like "It's the fastest way to get from city centre to Swords that doesn't fly".

From here, unsurprisingly the next step is to edit. You might start off with something quite rough but then it's time to refine and focus it so it clearly communicates what you want to consumers. You must have the science and the art down to make a product concept truly compelling!