Psychologically based innovation and design development

DE | EN

INNCH | innovation guided by research

Together with you and your customers, we develop psychologically sound innovations and designs that are novel and directly connect with people’s lives

We are Monika Heimann and Michael Schütz, an interdisciplinary team of experts in depth psychological analysis and art direction

To this end, we think and work bey­ond the box: For us, psy­cho­lo­gi­cal rese­arch, stra­te­gic thin­king, and prac­ti­cal crea­tion are part of a holi­stic pro­cess. The basis for this is InsightArt®—our agile, inter­di­sci­pli­nary rese­arch and deve­lo­p­ment con­cept deve­lo­ped over 15 years, which trans­la­tes psy­cho­lo­gi­cal insights directly into con­crete ideas, designs, and imple­men­ta­tion-ori­en­ted solutions.

We accom­pany you through the entire inno­va­tion pro­cess, from initial explo­ra­tion to mar­ket-ready pro­to­ty­pes. Always in focus: the deeper needs and desi­res of your cus­to­mers. Wit­hout han­do­vers, trans­la­tion los­ses, or unneces­sary breaks.

This not only results in via­ble solu­ti­ons in a short time. Our col­la­bo­ra­tive approach also ensu­res that all rele­vant stake­hol­ders par­ti­ci­pate in the inno­va­tion pro­cess with their heads and hearts and actively help shape it.

We accompany you according to your objectives

Design Guide

Design Guide: communication development

We sup­port you in the deve­lo­p­ment of crea­tive and at the same time stra­tegy and tar­get group con­form designs for com­mu­ni­ca­tion, pack­a­ging, pro­duct or store.

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When designs opti­mally ‘dock’ with people’s psy­cho­lo­gi­cal moti­ves and inner visual worlds — their ideas, wis­hes or desi­res — they can achieve the com­mu­ni­ca­tion goals and solve the rele­vant mar­ke­ting tasks. Design-led rese­arch and rese­arch-led crea­tion the­r­e­fore link up right from the start.

In work­shops or indi­vi­dual inter­views with the tar­get group, the rele­vant image motifs, sto­ries, color spaces, key­words, etc. are deter­mi­ned as part of the depth-psy­cho­lo­gi­cal explo­ra­tion, using spe­cial psy­cho­lo­gi­cal-design methods such as co-design or a visual trig­ger ana­ly­sis, sup­ported by the sel­ec­tive use of gene­ra­tive AI. From this, the rele­vant design code and the rele­vant search fields for the desi­red design are deve­lo­ped, if neces­sary sup­ple­men­ted by a design ana­ly­sis of the competition.

An InsightArt®manual in “design lan­guage” con­ta­ins all rele­vant design com­pon­ents as well as pro­to­ty­pi­cal design drafts in addi­tion to the psy­cho­lo­gi­cal basics. It is inspi­ra­tion for the deve­lo­p­ment of the final designs: in col­la­bo­ra­tive InsightArt®teamLabs, in coope­ra­tion with your lead agency, exter­nal crea­ti­ves and desi­gners or directly from us. If requi­red, they can be tes­ted for final optimizations.

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Innovation Guide

Innovation Guide: Product and offer developmen

Tog­e­ther with you, we “des­troy” old thought pat­terns and deve­lop pro­duct and offer ideas that are inno­va­tive and at the same time customer-centric.

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By taking a deep look at people’s moti­ves and using crea­tive inven­tion prin­ci­ples, we con­sciously leave behind old paths. This crea­tes space for inspi­ra­ti­ons and ideas that are novel or even dis­rup­tive and at the same time hit the right nerve with consumers.

InsightArt®research unco­vers the deeper needs ‘behind’ the super­fi­cial desi­res of con­su­mers and pro­vi­des the pivo­tal point for idea deve­lo­p­ment, the “psy­cho­lo­gi­cal code”.

A SWOT ana­ly­sis and con­ver­sa­ti­ons with your employees reve­als poten­ti­als and oppor­tu­ni­ties of your com­pany and your team and con­nects the inter­nal with the exter­nal view.

In an InsightArt®manual we map the pos­si­bi­lity space and show the most pro­mi­sing inno­va­tion directions.

Ideas and pro­to­ty­pes on a high crea­tive level are deve­lo­ped in InsightArt®teamLabs, among others by using pro­fes­sio­nal crea­tive stra­te­gies and gene­ra­tive AI. Pro­to­ty­pes are tes­ted again on con­su­mers if necessary.

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Concept Guide

Concept Guide: Marketing concept development

We sup­port you in the deve­lo­p­ment of mar­ke­ting con­cepts and mock­ups that are cen­te­red on the needs of your customers.

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In ite­ra­tive loops of sys­te­ma­tic mockup crea­tion and cus­to­mer feed­back inclu­ding psy­cho­lo­gi­cal ana­ly­sis, as well as team reviews with all stake­hol­ders, we work with you to deve­lop a cus­to­mer jour­ney, adver­ti­sing mate­rial or online interfaces.

The results are available after approx. 2 weeks of inten­sive, agile and prac­tice-ori­en­ted col­la­bo­ra­tion — in the form of pro­to­ty­pes that can be used directly in mar­ke­ting (with slight adjus­t­ments by Brand if neces­sary). Psy­cho­lo­gi­cally sound, they create more con­ver­sion and enable you to pre­sent them more con­vin­cin­gly to inter­nal interfaces.

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Future Guide

Future Guide: Psychological future scenarios

We make cul­tu­ral trends trans­pa­rent and sup­port you in deve­lo­ping sce­na­rios and future concepts.

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Con­crete oppor­tu­ni­ties and risks can be unco­vered and new busi­ness areas and stra­te­gies for your own com­pany can be deve­lo­ped. Because despite all the uncer­tainty that the future holds, psy­cho­lo­gi­cal needs are a relia­ble constant.

A psy­cho­lo­gi­cal cul­ture study rela­ted to your busi­ness sec­tor is expan­ded with methods such as life­world col­la­ges, cul­ture samples or sci­ence fic­tion nar­ra­ti­ves. Deve­lo­p­ments in the cur­rent world of con­su­mers’ lives and ima­gi­na­ti­ons can be unders­tood in depth in this way. This is sup­ple­men­ted, for exam­ple, by utopias/dystopias or the crea­tion of images of the future.

An InsightArt®manual “Trends” with pro­ba­bi­lity eva­lua­tions for dif­fe­rent future sce­na­rios gives you inspi­ra­tion in addi­tion to more secu­rity for plan­ning. Based on the sce­na­rios, we deve­lop inno­va­tive con­cepts for future busi­ness areas or the reo­ri­en­ta­tion of exis­ting ones for the future tog­e­ther with you in an InsightArt®teamLab.

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The approach is desi­gned indi­vi­du­ally for each inno­va­tion pro­ject and the tools used are adapted – or new ones are inven­ted if necessary.

Our book on design psychology

2nd, updated and exten­ded edi­tion (2025)

MoniMichaBuch

Monika Heimann, Michael Schütz:
Wie Design wirkt. Psy­cho­lo­gi­sche Prin­zi­pien erfolg­rei­cher Gestaltung

Rhein­werk Design 2025

“A suc­cessful refe­rence book for the media designer”
(Aka­de­mie Druck+Medien Nord-West to the pre­vious edition)

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2nd, expan­ded and revi­sed edi­tion 2025.

New in this edi­tion: Based on the latest psy­cho­lo­gi­cal approa­ches, the book deve­lops a con­tem­po­rary theory of design and design deve­lo­p­ment. You will learn how to com­bine design with psy­cho­logy and use this to deve­lop designs that really make an impact. This is essen­tial, espe­ci­ally in the age of AI: effec­tive design is more than just fol­lo­wing rules or cal­cu­la­ting patterns.

➔ Book at the publisher

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InsightArt® Design Guide on video

Project examples (anonymized)

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Innovation Guide

Design Guide

Future Guide

Design Guide

Concept Guide

Innovation Guide