Marketing concept testing for new product development

Concept testing allows you to take some of the risk out of new product development by assessing consumer reactions to a fundamental idea or design at its early stage. The objective is to identify which new ideas have the most potential and are worthy of further development.

Here is a video on the well known example of how New Coke failed with consumers:

 

It is clear from this video that the full brand experience is an important part of concept testing.

One of the objectives of concept testing is to forecast the likely sales take-off in year one, to estimate the repeat purchasing levels and to clarify the profile of potential users.

Concept testing and product testing are particularly suited to the online medium because a wide variety of visual and audio stimuli can be displayed and evaluated. By using images and sound files to provide a ‘near-real-world’ test environment, online testing provides you with actionable information about how your concept is perceived by your target audience, and how it compares with others on the market. Even at the pre-concept level, online testing enables large numbers of potential concept ideas to be prioritised and reduced to a manageable number that can be taken to the next step in development and research.

Benefits of concept testing online    
* Cost effectiveness - No need for expensive, physical prototype construction or fieldwork costs.    
* Reduced development cycle - Allows you to bring your product to market sooner.    
* Interactivity - Respondents can interact with high quality images or logos if required.    
* Speed of turnaround - Questionnaire can be distributed and results collected in real-time.    
* Richness of responses - Results show that people tend to be more honest and responses are ‘richer’ in content when completed online.    
* Reduced bias - There is no interviewer bias online.    
* Respondent convenience - Respondents can complete the questionnaire when and where it suits them. They can suspend the interview and come back to it later. This has a positive impact on response rates.    
* Geographical reach - For nation-wide and multi-country research, respondents can be located anywhere.    
* Automated questionnaire delivery - Exact skip and flow control and accurate rotations when multiple concepts are being shown.    
* Time and click-based interaction data - Respondent’s behaviour and level of interaction with each of the concepts can be monitored.    
* Online reporting - real-time results can be provided via our online Snapshot software, allowing percentages and simple cross-tabs to be produced whilst the study is ‘in field’.    
* Verbatim responses - Responses to open-ended questions can be provided directly to the client.    
* Evaluation control - Respondents view concepts from a consistent position and in the required order.    
* Flexibility - Variations on a concept can be tested without incurring significant costs.

For information on how to write a proper Product Concept click here

Comments

[Indrani Pathak]

Hi dear
Nice post you have posted.
I also want to add some more about Concept Testing .
Concept testing is an endeavor used in identifying early on potentially successful products. It focuses on taking into account people’s reaction to a basic idea of the product, helping in making decisions such as pass/fail or go/no go. Concept testing is taken place before a product is marketed. Hence, while promising a high probability of consumer acceptance, the attempt minimizes the research and development costs as well as the marketing costs. For more details please visit us at http://www.lucintel.com/concept_testing.aspx

[Concept Testing]

Hi dear
Nice post you have posted.
I also want to add some more about Concept Testing .
Concept testing is an endeavor used in identifying early on potentially successful products. It focuses on taking into account people’s reaction to a basic idea of the product, helping in making decisions such as pass/fail or go/no go. Concept testing is taken place before a product is marketed. Hence, while promising a high probability of consumer acceptance, the attempt minimizes the research and development costs as well as the marketing costs. For more details please visit us at http://www.lucintel.com/concept_testing.aspx