Experimentation is a crucial part of innovation. It serves as an engine to innovation, allowing individuals and organizations to test their assumptions and ideas to create value. Experimentation can take many forms, including A/B testing, prototyping, and randomized controlled trials. It is important to experiment to learn, fail quickly and cheaply, and save money.

To conduct effective experimentation, there are six steps that individuals and organizations can follow. They need to define their purpose, list their assumptions, prioritize critical assumptions, design and run experiments, collect data, and review results and decide on next steps. By following these steps, they can gain the highest amount of information possible while doing the least amount of work.

While experimentation is valuable, many organizations do not experiment because they fear failure or believe it is too costly or time-consuming. However, experimentation is necessary to innovate and compete in today’s fast-paced business environment. Organizations that embrace experimentation as a central part of their ethos are more likely to succeed, as they can test anything without management’s permission and use experiments to optimize their offerings and marketing strategies. Companies like Booking.com, Facebook, Google, and Amazon have found experimentation to be an effective weapon in marketing and innovation.