Abstract
Mid-sized businesses (MSB) and mid-sized B2B businesses (MSB2B) in particular are often ignored in the research on innovation management. Yet, MSBs are very important for the growth of economies worldwide and it is of utmost importance for their future performance to develop new products. For the successful development of new differentiated products in MSBs, the early identification and consideration of customers’ hidden needs is crucial. Techniques that can be used to generate customer insights are often referred to by the term voice of the customer (VOC). However, extant research has treated this term very inconsistently. This is why, it is difficult for MSBs to decide which techniques are most useful to them. For MSBs, that have limited resources, this is a particular issue and best practices of how MSBs identify their customers’ needs for different types and different phases of innovation projects are lacking.This review aims at clarifying the aforementioned issues for MSB2Bs. Based on an analysis of the limited research on using hidden needs techniques in MSB2Bs, actionable recommendations are derived as to which hidden needs techniques are most useful for MSB2Bs and which best practices should be considered when developing new products in MSB2Bs. Opportunities for academia and practitioners are identified and managerial implications for industrial product innovation in MSB2Bs are discussed.
Highlights
Much of the research on innovation management has concentrated on start-ups, large corporations, and the business-to-consumer (B2C) sector, overlooking Mid-sized Businesses (MSBs) and those operating in business-to-business (B2B) markets
Our findings show that contextspecific research on voice of the customer (VOC) methods, especially in the context of mid-sized B2B businesses (MSB2B), is rare
Our case examples indicate that the major VOC methods we focused on have been employed in a small number of companies, the majority of MSB2Bs are almost certainly unaware of them
Summary
Much of the research on innovation management has concentrated on start-ups, large corporations, and the business-to-consumer (B2C) sector, overlooking Mid-sized Businesses (MSBs) and those operating in business-to-business (B2B) markets. Mid-sized B2Bs (MSB2Bs) often fail to identify customers’ hidden needs, which leads to incremental rather than breakthrough innovation (Cortez and Johnston, 2017; Hadjikhani and LaPlaca, 2013; Seiler et al, 2020; Simon, 2009; Venohr and Meyer, 2007). These techniques are often referred to as Voice of the Customer (VOC) techniques (Cooper and Dreher, 2010; Griffin and Hauser, 1993), but scholars have not considered the knowledge and resources that MSBs need to apply them in a B2B context. We conducted an integrative review of the literature to identify the full range of VOC techniques available and to determine which of them are applicable to MSB2Bs, in terms of the knowledge and resources required. The discussion and conclusions section considers the study’s contribution to research and practice, and identifies areas where further research is needed
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
