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What is a Corporation: Evolution, Features and Purpose
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International Retail Store Design Principles – The Principle of Totality
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Bargaining Power of Customers
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4Ps of Marketing Explained for the Age of Market Fragmentation
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Concept testing is the process of testing new or hypothetical products or services before they are launched. The testing is intended to screen a number of concepts to identify the strongest ones for progression, to improve/refine the base product or service proposition, and/or to forecast their likely success.
Concept testing is mainly used for go/no-go decision for a new product. This decision itself may have several aspects. Below are some examples of situations in which this study finds its usage:
The process of concept testing involves stages such as defining the goal of the study, choosing the sample population, deciding upon a survey format, communicating the concept, measuring consumer response and interpreting the results. Hence the steps are synonymous of most marketing research methods that we had seen in the previous modules.
The expected outcome of the study is to capture the consumer purchase intent. Broadly the questionnaire designed for the survey has 3 main sections though they can vary depending on the product and the research company.
Screener questions are asked to ensure that only valid responses are processed. Let us consider that a company wants to launch a new battery operated scooter/electric bike for college going students (new market).
An important question in the demographics section should be:
If the student stays within 5 miles of the campus, he might not need the scooter at all. Similarly, if he stays too far away, a scooter might not be the optimum mode for commuting. So again, the student must be eliminating while consolidating the results.
Also known as communicating the concept, the new product idea is described to the respondents using several techniques such as:
After describing the product by using one of the applicable methods mentioned above, the purchase intention of a potential consumer can be checked by using a simple likert scale:
❏ Definitely won’t purchase
❏ Probably won’t purchase
❏ Not sure
❏ Probably would purchase
❏ Definitely would purchase
Sources of Error in tested results
Though concept testing predicts the acceptability of a new product fairly accurately, the results may be skewed either positively or negatively in the following situations:
In a nutshell, the goal of concept testing is to develop, refine and nurture new product and service initiatives around solid consumer insights with a view to reducing the probability of failure and increasing the probability of a successful launch and in-market performance.
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