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Top innovation consultanciesA guide to finding the best match for your needs

Before appointing an innovation consultancy, agree what your team needs to be able to decide: where to grow, which ideas to back, or what needs developing before either choice is possible. This guide names no firms; antedote is a strategic research and innovation consultancy.

Name the job first.

  • Finding where to grow next.

    Bring in a partner who knows your customers and category, and can weigh very different directions on the same criteria.

  • Deciding which ideas to back.

    You need evidence strong enough to fund against, and a clear account of what it can’t tell you.

  • Developing concepts.

    You need people who can make ideas and improve them with the people who’d buy.

  • Reviewing a pipeline.

    You need a way to compare unlike ideas, and the judgment to stop some of them.

Ask your AI assistant about the job.

A broad question returns the most visible firms.

A question about the job you need done, in your category and markets, gives the assistant more to match against what firms have published. Use a summary with nothing confidential in it, or an AI tool your company has approved for it.

Treat the answer as the start of your own investigation, then meet the people who would do the work.

A prompt to copy. Fill in the blanks first.

I lead innovation at a [category] company selling in [markets]. We need help to [find where to grow next / decide which ideas to back / develop concepts for a new range].

Using current web sources, suggest innovation consultancies that have published work like this, and link each source. For each, say why it may fit, what it has shown and what we would still need to check, with one question to ask the people who would do the work. Don’t guess who would be assigned, and don’t invent fees, references or results. If you can’t search the web, help me define selection criteria instead.

Questions that show how a firm thinks.

A credentials deck rarely shows it. The answers to these do.

  • Tell us about an idea you helped a client stop.

    A specific case, the evidence behind it and how the client took it.

  • How will our customers shape the ideas, as well as judge them?

    Where in the work they take part, and how what they say changes the concepts.

  • What will we be able to decide at the end?

    The decision, and the form the output takes: briefs, concepts ready to test, an order of priority.

  • Who will we work with, from the first session to the recommendation?

    Named roles and relevant experience, and whether the same people stay throughout.

From ideas to launches.

“The entire team has mentioned you guys are hands down the best strategy agency we’ve worked with.”
Futures team, global sportswear brand

Check the team, and ask for two references.

Ask who will lead the sessions and develop the ideas, and what they have done that is like your brief.

Ask whether the same people stay from the first session to the recommendation, and what your team will be able to decide at the end. Our view of what an innovation consultancy should leave behind sets out what to expect.

Then ask to speak to two clients, with their permission: one whose ideas reached market, and one whose work stopped an idea. Ask both whether the team changed its view when the evidence did.

If you already have concepts and need to judge them, our guide to choosing a concept testing platform or agency covers what to look for.

If your question is where to grow next or which ideas deserve investment, that is the work of our innovation consulting.

Tell us where you’d like to grow.

Bring the ambition, or the ideas you have. We’ll suggest where to start, and what your team would be able to decide at the end.

Talk to us hello@antedote.com

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