How Insights Teams Can Become the Innovation Engine Product Teams Need

Innovation is often seen as the domain of product teams whose charter is to develop, refine, and launch offerings that drive competitive advantage. But product teams alone can’t make innovation happen. They need a steady supply of fresh insights, consumer perspectives, and market intelligence to guide their efforts.

That’s where insights teams should be stepping in. Unfortunately, too many insights functions remain in a supporting role, delivering rearview-mirror reports rather than actively shaping the future. The best insights teams operate differently: they embed themselves in product decision-making, influence strategic direction, and surface opportunities that would otherwise be missed. Here’s how insights professionals can better support and drive product teams' innovation efforts.

• Stop Just Answering Questions—Start Posing Them

Most insights work begins with a request: a product team wants data on market size, concept validation, or competitive positioning. While these are necessary inputs, a reactive approach means insights teams are always one step behind. To be true partners in innovation, insights professionals must proactively identify emerging shifts, tensions, and opportunities.

This means surfacing new questions before product teams think to ask them. For instance, rather than waiting for a team to request a study on sustainability perceptions, an insights leader could initiate an exploration of how Gen Z’s evolving sustainability expectations are creating white space for new product formulations, packaging strategies, or services.

• Prioritize Depth Over Breadth

It’s tempting to cover all bases—tracking every trend, running countless surveys, monitoring every competitor move. But great innovation insights don’t come from covering more ground; they come from diving deeper into the right areas.

One of the most effective ways to go deep is by engaging with Catalytic Customers—highly engaged, knowledgeable, and forward-looking users who push categories forward. Unlike early adopters, who primarily try new things for the sake of novelty, Catalytic Customers are deeply invested in making products better. They critique, experiment, and articulate needs that mass-market users will eventually feel.

By consistently engaging with these customers (through ethnographic research, advisory panels, or co-creation sessions), insights teams can surface nuanced, actionable insights that directly fuel innovation.

• Make the Data Work Harder

Insights often die in the form of static PowerPoint decks. Even when great research is conducted, it rarely has a sustained impact unless it’s embedded into the product development workflow.

To avoid this, insights teams should think like product marketers—crafting narratives, designing interactive dashboards, and running live working sessions to ensure insights don’t just get delivered, but drive decisions.

One powerful method is to use scenario planning. Instead of just reporting on consumer sentiment shifts, create future-state scenarios that outline how those shifts could shape market dynamics in three to five years. This allows product teams to develop innovations that anticipate rather than react to change.

• Advocate for Experimentation, Not Just Validation

Traditional research often functions as a gatekeeper—testing whether a concept will succeed or fail. But in fast-moving categories, waiting for high-confidence validation can be a liability. Instead, insights teams should advocate for lower-risk, iterative experimentation.

This could mean pushing for more in-market testing, where scrappy, prototype-driven approaches allow teams to gather real-world feedback quickly. It could also involve helping product teams structure A/B tests, limited rollouts, or simulated environments where they can learn in real time rather than making big bets based on pre-launch research alone.

• Embed in Product Sprints

Innovation isn’t a linear process, and neither should insights be. The most effective insights teams work alongside product teams in an ongoing capacity, not just at the beginning or end of a project.

One way to do this is by embedding insights professionals directly into product sprints, where they can provide real-time input, adjust research plans dynamically, and ensure that consumer perspective is part of every iteration. This moves insights from a report-driven function to an active, co-creative force.

Rethinking the Role of Insights

For insights teams that want to play a bigger role in driving innovation, the shift is clear: move from being a service function to becoming a strategic driver. That means anticipating rather than reacting, engaging deeply with the most influential customers, and ensuring research doesn’t just inform but transforms how product teams work.

Innovation doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Product teams need more than just data—they need insights partners who challenge assumptions, uncover hidden opportunities, and push them to think bigger. That’s the real power of an insights team that’s ready to lead, not just support.