5 Things to Avoid When Inventing

1. Going All Out on Your First Design

A common mistake many eager, excited, and enthusiastic inventors make is approaching the initial design phase with the intention of creating the perfect product all in one go.

An important step that is taken when developing all well-made, quality products is creating multiple prototypes of your design. As such, trying to create the perfect product from the get-go is an approach to avoid.

Initially, creating a product that takes into account all extra details and functionalities that are unrelated to its primary function is distracting to the overall design process. Especially in the case that you are working with a team of industrial designers, focusing on small details rather than the big picture of your product makes for a more difficult and tedious job.

The best tip for designers and inventors is to approach your design with the goal of creating a simple and clean design in which the focus of the design is simply to fulfil its core function.

2. Hesitate

It’s important to remember that rather than focusing on the idea that you just have to create and invent a product to design, your product will soon enter the market, and a well-known fact about all markets is that you must move fast.

In the world of business and product invention, ideas come and go every day, and although taking the time to rethink your product design and its future in the market is really important, if you feel even the least bit hesitant or weary about releasing your product, don’t let fear or paranoia about going through with your product stop you from creating it.

The best tip for designers and inventors is to be determined and believe in yourself. Don’t allow yourself to give in to your doubts and trust that as long as you keep the goal of your product’s function and purpose alive, you can create a successful product.

3. Not Researching Your Audience or Market

Building, creating, or inventing a product is always more than it seems. Even if you successfully create your product, if you don’t plan and think about its future, your product could fail.

Before approaching a product development firm with a product design, the best tip for designers and inventors is to take some time to sit back and research where you would ideally like to see your product be and where it is most likely to be profitable or successful.

In addition to researching information about its market, think about which audience you see your product being popular with. Understanding both your ideal and targeted markets will make it easier for you to plan a proper business and marketing model that can help gear the success of your product once it’s ready to be released and to which audience it would thrive.

Entering headfirst into a new or wrong market can not only demotivate you but also be the wrong fit for your product and its success.

4. Not Having a Developed Brand

As an inventor, you need both an innovative product design and the unrelenting drive to realize your great idea. But once you build your product, where do you go from there? Building and creating your product is the first step in what should be an exciting journey where you use your product to achieve bigger goals.

The best tip for designers and inventors is to head into your product design with goals and plans for what you plan to do with your product once it is completed. Think about marketing and branding, as both of those aspects are extremely important in the projection of your product once it is finished.

Having a catchy slogan or brand name ready will prepare you to enter your product into the market as soon as possible and ensure it stands out among the competition. There are many advantages to creating a brand, such as in the case of deciding to reinvent or release a second version of your product.

Rather than starting all over again, your reinventing can all be under one brand and consumers who were interested in your first product will recognize your brand when your second product comes out and be more likely to repurchase.

5. Not Reflecting on Your Past Design/Inventions

Not every loss is useless. Most people can learn more from what they have lost rather than what they’ve won or gained. In the world of inventing, every single step involved in creating your design is an opportunity to learn and improve upon what you’ve made before.

It’s a bad idea to completely scrap your past design attempts or prototypes because you think they have no worth. In this case, the best tip for designers and inventors is to look back at what they’ve attempted and grow from their failures by using them to inform subsequent product development.

You’ll find that by learning about what not to do, you’ll learn more about what you should be doing, and thus, your future designs and attempts will more likely be successes rather than failures.

Interested in seeing how another industry is changing through innovation? Learn how the beauty industry is being shaped through innovation in one of our past blogs!

If you have a great new invention and you’d like to learn more about this process, get in touch with MAKO today and visit our website to find out more. Or feel free to give us a call at 1-888-MAKO, and we can set you up on a call with our product analyst!

About: MAKO Design + Invent is the original firm providing world-class consumer product development services tailored to startups, small manufacturers, and inventors. Simply put, we are the leading one-stop-shop for developing your physical product from idea to store shelves, all in a high-quality, cost-effective, and timely manner. We operate as one powerhouse 30-person product design team spread across 4 offices to serve you (Austin, Miami, San Francisco, & Toronto). We have full-stack in-house industrial design, mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, patent referral, prototyping, and manufacturing services. To assist our startup and inventor clients, in addition to above, we help with business strategy, product strategy, marketing, and sales/distribution for all consumer product categories. Also, our founder Kevin Mako hosts The Product Startup Podcast, the industry's leading hardware podcast. Check it out for tips, interviews, and best practices for hardware startups, inventors, and product developers. Click HERE to learn more about MAKO Design + Invent!