Creativity in Product Innovation presents the culmination of years of research on the topic of creativity in marketing. Creativity has been a hot topic for many years in self-improvement books and articles. Creativity in Product Innovation brings a new dimension to the academic philosophies now beginning to emerge on the subject. This new paradigm has been recognized as a breakthrough in major scientific journals (e.g., Science, Journal of Marketing Research, Marketing Science, Management Science and Technological Forecasting and Social Change).

Breaking away from traditional postures, we posit that marketers may hear the voice of the customer by listening to the voice of the product. We further propose that the product itself contains necessary and sufficient information to serve as a basis for innovation, especially in cases of mutable and inconsistent markets. Certain regularities in product development are identifiable, objectively verifiable, learnable and consistent across product classes. These regularities, which we term Creativity Templates, can be used to channel the ideation process and thus enable people to be more productive and focused.

Research indicates that approximately 70 percent of successful new products match one of the Creativity Templates to be described in this book. Likewise, the failure rate of products developed according to the Templates is phenomenally low: only 8 percent as compared to a general failure rate of some 60 percent for all new products.