The PDMA Handbook of New Product Development

13.7. Getting Started

Many customer-focused organizations strive to make the processes described above an ongoing part of how business is conducted. These organizations are always learning from meetings with customers. New concepts are continually being tested and refined. Eventually, these organizations develop almost a reflex for translating customer priorities to new product concepts. When this occurs, the organization builds a growing advantage over those competitors who have a less-effective link between customer understanding and new product development.

Figure 13-7. ILLUSTRATIVE CUSTOMER SEGMENTATION MODEL.

Figure 13-8. ILLUSTRATIVE CUSTOMER SEGMENTATION STRATEGY.

Figure 13-9. SEGMENTATION IMPACT ON NEW PRODUCT STRATEGY.

To become a successful customer-focused company, a strong "test and learn" capability must be established (see Figure 13.10). Figure 13.11 shows a typical application sequence of these market research tools. At the onset of a development effort, a team might choose to conduct an initial broad survey as a means to first characterize the market and its needs. For some of the emerging areas, this might be coupled with an ethnographic study to better understand ...