Harvesting new business ideas from customers

Akio Morita, co-founder of Sony, once said:

We don’t ask consumers what they want. They don’t know. Instead we apply our brain power to what they need, and will want, and make sure we’re there, ready

It seems that Domino Pizza is following another path. When the company set out to find fresh ideas on improving its business they opened their doors for suggestions to those who know their brand the best: their customers.

They launched Think Oven, a Facebook platform where customers and fans can submit their suggestions.

The Think Oven Facebook tab has two sections: Projects and Idea Box. Projects is where Domino’s solicits feedback on specific projects.

Idea Box is more open-ended and accepts any ideas people want to submit. After all, the pizza chain’s latest product, Parmesan Bread Bites, was created by Brian Edler, a Domino’s store owner in Ohio.

Of course, you could argue that branded Facebook pages are already used as suggestion/feedback boxes, but this approach organizes the suggestions in one place.

Domino’s is no stranger to public opinion, The Pizza Turnaround was considered a success story and a model of transparency, with a CEO admitting the company’s flagship product wasn’t very good and soliciting brutally honest criticism to improve it.

Will Domino’s Think Oven be as successful as My Starbucks Idea? – the first community forum from the coffee lifestyle brand which set the bar high and received close to 75,000 ideas in less than six months, thousands of votes and hundreds of comments. Let me know what you think.

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Harvesting new business ideas from customers — http://www.torbenrick.eu/t/r/pjt

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