Sometimes shoppers don't know what they really want. Here's how SharkNinja deals with that problem

"Some innovative products are designed to solve a specific pain point for consumers, while others will address a problem they don't even realize they have. Take soggy sandwiches, for example. A focus group wouldn't necessarily highlight the need for a cooler that keeps sandwiches from getting soggy-but once the problem was identified, it helped inform the design of Ninja's line of FrostVault coolers, according to Michelle Crossan-Matos, the chief growth officer of SharkNinja."

"Engineers and inventors are steeped in data that they can then leverage along with insight and empathy, in order to create the wide range of innovative products SharkNinja has become known for, Crossan-Matos said during a panel discussion this week at the Fast Company Innovation Festival in New York. "It's the marriage of intuition and data that makes all the difference," she said."

"Sometimes, customer insight causes a company to shift its focus, as was the case for Sunday. When the company was founded in 2018, the initial goal was to create a non-toxic, natural line of lawn care products, to serve as an alternative to the conventional legacy products. That was before realizing that homeowners didn't know how to care for their yards, said Brad Smith, the company's president."

""We learned pretty quickly that it wasn't just enough to develop a good, solid non-toxic product," Smith told the audience at the panel. "We also had to invest in relationships with these customers and provide content and personalized guidance to make them successful using our product in their yards." Sunday has since expanded how it collects information that will inform its product strategy, including gathering soil samples from customers to be added to its "world's largest soil database.""

Engineers combine data, insight, and empathy to build products that solve both clear and latent consumer problems. Identifying unnoticed issues such as soggy sandwiches informed the design of coolers that prevent sandwich sogginess and inspired product lines like FrostVault. Data-driven intuition guides the creation of a wide range of innovative consumer products. Customer insight can shift company strategy from only delivering non-toxic lawn-care products to offering education, relationships, and personalized guidance. Collecting customer soil samples has created a large soil database that feeds an AI tool called Sunny to deliver customized lawn-care recommendations and improve customer success.

Read at Fast Company