Service Innovation

Razorfish have just released their consumer experience report for 2008 and it makes interesting reading. (Link) The first thing that hits you is the focus upon the importance of social networking. I read this report just after reading a BBC news article “Bosses should embrace Facebook”, (link) in which Demos report on how companies are […]

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At the recent business days for the Norwegian Design Council (link), Tim Ogilvie from Peer Insight (link) described how design is moving up the value chain in the services era (link to presentation). The presentation started off by commenting that we dont really need more things, but that we are looking for experiences and novelty […]

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I guess I have hammered Starbucks a lot recently, so its nice to write something positive about the prime example of the experience economy. Starbucks has a very nice wizard (link) to help you choose your coffee. A wizard is an aid that breaks a complex decision process up into simple steps, and Starbucks have […]

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I have been writing about the differences between products and services recently, and started to focus upon the aspect of time. Product and graphic designers traditionally haven’t had much practice designing for time – things that happen in sequence during service provision, or a long term relationship lasting years. The focus has been upon the […]

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This might be a little off track for service-design, but I think its worth noting that Google is launching a new browser tomorrow, code named chrome. There are two reasons that I am commenting it here. Firstly, I think that the whole concept of what a browser is, needs rethinking. More and more, we are […]

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Over at common craft, they have created a really good explanation of social media that shows how users can create value and radically change existing business models and customer expectations. The video uses ice-cream sales as a vehicle for explaining social media and shows that it can work on or off the internet. What I […]

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Over at the lonely marketer blog (link), there is a lovely story about how one person has created a change within their organisation, which has had wide ranging impact. Put simply, to find out about employee opinions regarding various themes, an employee puts two chairs out in the busy walkway at the company campus, adds […]

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By Judith Gloppen I was really pleased to notice that an article about Design Thinking had finally found its way into the Harvard Business Review this summer. In the June 2008 issue IDEO’s CEO Tim Brown writes about how design and Design Thinking can be part of the innovation process.  I like Tim Browns definition […]

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I have been following the fall of Starbucks with interest, and a recent comment by John Quelch on the Harvard Business Publishing blog (link) entitled “How Starbucks’ Growth Destroyed Brand Value” caught my eye yesterday.The reason for the renewed interest in Starbucks is the recent announcement that Starbucks is to close 600 stores in the […]

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Colleen Jones at UX matters (link) writes a thoughtful view about the term engagement and relates it nicely to experience design. She gives a definition from the Advertising Research Foundation that in my view clouds the matter totally: “Engagement is turning on a prospect to a brand idea enhanced by the surrounding context.”         In her discussion […]

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