Time to market is the time between the conception of an idea to reaching the market as a finished product. A finished product could be a marketing campaign, operational process or a physical product. Optimizing the time to market is instrumental in offering a competitive advantage in an ever-moving market. A shorter time to market shows proof of innovativeness. It also increases your ability to respond to market opportunities in a good time. Here are some ways to improve your time to market:

Take charge of your workflow

Managing and optimizing your workflows is among the first steps when looking to improve your time to market. Being on top of your workflows helps you identify unnecessary steps you can eliminate. You can see the bottlenecks that threaten to prolong the time to market and do away with them.

Optimize approval processes

Don’t get it twisted. Approval processes are vital in any product or campaign launch. They ensure the smooth running of things and, in turn, create the best final product. And yet, these approval processes can be painstakingly tedious and time-consuming, more so because they involve many stakeholders. Assessing the approval processes and finding ways to shorten where possible helps reduce the overall time to market.

Leverage the magic of automation

Automation can be a game changer in optimizing the time to market. Automating most of your processes and workflow minimizes human errors and saves time. Automation holds the keys to infinite opportunities to save resources, time and improve time to market.

Invest in effective and efficient project planning

You can never underestimate the power of detailed planning. Effective and efficient planning throughout the project scope is instrumental in reducing the time to market. An excellent project planner coupled with reliable technical leaders is the best driver for the optimal time to market.

Encourage collaboration

The dream team can shorten the time to market. Purpose to create an environment that fosters collaboration and commitment instead of competitiveness. A competitive environment where the team members feel like they have to duke it out for raises and promotions undermines teamwork. Encouraging a sense of purpose in all your team members will build commitment to a common goal. They will feel like the projective objectives intertwine with their personal values. Use teamcenter to bring together the teams and processes for an optimal work environment and the best product lifecycle management. Personal initiative, together with a collaborative spirit, shortens the time to market, giving you an edge over the competition.

Finally, allow room for adaptation

The fact of life is that most things do not fall in place according to plan. When launching a product or campaign, it is not uncommon to have sudden regulation changes and shifts in demand and marketing demands. Unless adaptable, such changes can throw you off your game, prolonging your time to market. Or worse, making you launch a substandard product. The most important tool you have to counter bumps on the road is strategic adaptability and the ability to morph as required. Foster an adaptability mindset in your organization. It does not stop with the leaders or team. Your workflow systems and tools need to operate with the same flexibility.

Conclusion

Time to market is the aggregate of stakeholders’ efforts, workflow strategies and team effort. And a short time to market is the cornerstone of a successful business.