Customer New Product Development Research Articles

Exploring traditional and new web-based methods to involve customers in new product development

This research seeks to understand the extent to which 'new' web-based methods of involving customers are being applied in New Product Development (NPD). There are distinctive capabilities offered by both traditional and new web-based methods, but little is known regarding the uptake and use of these new approaches. Semi-structured interviews with R&D managers in six leading companies were conducted. Each interview was recorded and transcribed. The interviews sought to identify the methods viewed as being most effective and to determine views on the use of web-based methods in contrast to traditional approaches. Results indicate that new web-based methods are being used, but mostly superficially as a means of collecting feedback after product launch and there is limited use of these methods for customer involvement during product development. However, there is a growing awareness of the need to use them more effectively. Implications for managerial practice are also derived.

Exploring traditional and new web-based methods to involve customers in new product development

This research seeks to understand the extent to which 'new' web-based methods of involving customers are being applied in New Product Development (NPD). There are distinctive capabilities offered by both traditional and new web-based methods, but little is known regarding the uptake and use of these new approaches. Semi-structured interviews with R&D managers in six leading companies were conducted. Each interview was recorded and transcribed. The interviews sought to identify the methods viewed as being most effective and to determine views on the use of web-based methods in contrast to traditional approaches. Results indicate that new web-based methods are being used, but mostly superficially as a means of collecting feedback after product launch and there is limited use of these methods for customer involvement during product development. However, there is a growing awareness of the need to use them more effectively. Implications for managerial practice are also derived.

Customer participation and new product performance: Towards the understanding of the mechanisms and key contingencies

In a study of 243 firms of varying sizes across 14 different industries, we investigate the effect of customer participation on new product development performance. We confirm that overall customer participation is positively related to new product development performance and that the effect is mediated by innovativeness. We also demonstrate that these effects are contingent upon absorptive capacity of the firm in question such that firms with high absorptive capacity stand to gain more from engaging their customers in new product development than firms with low absorptive capacity, especially at the later stages of the NPD process. The results are robust to alternative estimation techniques, measures employed to operationalize key concepts, and the industrial makeup of the sample. Post hoc analyses provide non-trivial managerial implications for the decision makers at the firm level.

Unlocking the power of big data in new product development

This study explores how big data can be used to enable customers to express unrecognised needs. By acquiring this information, managers can gain opportunities to develop customer-centred products. Big data can be defined as multimedia-rich and interactive low-cost information resulting from mass communication. It offers customers a better understanding of new products and provides new, simplified modes of large-scale interaction between customers and firms. Although previous studies have pointed out that firms can better understand customers’ preferences and needs by leveraging different types of available data, the situation is evolving, with increasing application of big data analytics for product development, operations and supply chain management. In order to utilise the customer information available from big data to a larger extent, managers need to identify how to establish a customer-involving environment that encourages customers to share their ideas with managers, contribute their know-how, fiddle around with new products, and express their actual preferences. We investigate a new product development project at an electronics company, STE, and describe how big data is used to connect to, interact with and involve customers in new product development in practice. Our findings reveal that big data can offer customer involvement so as to provide valuable input for developing new products. In this paper, we introduce a customer involvement approach as a new means of coming up with customer-centred new product development.

Customer co-creation in B2C e-commerce: does it lead to better new products?

The business-to-consumer e-commerce platform facilitates direct reach to customers and is especially conducive to large-scale customer co-creation. Many major e-commerce businesses have begun to leverage the platform to co-create with customers in new product development (NPD), in anticipation of new products that are more innovative and sell better. Yet, empirical evidence for the impact of customer co-creation is still scarce. This study investigates the impact by distinguishing among different co-creation tasks (idea co-creation and decision co-creation) and NPD stages (product design and commercialization). Based on the co-creation and innovation literature, it is hypothesized that idea co-creation has a stronger impact when there is also decision co-creation. Further, co-creation in the product design stage is expected to have a stronger effect on product innovativeness, while co-creation in the commercialization stage has a stronger effect on product sales. The hypotheses were tested with data on 107 actual products. Looking beyond a homogenous conceptualization of co-creation enhances our understanding of how it influences different aspects of new product success. This is also one of the earliest studies to report empirical evidence for the impact of customer co-creation in e-commerce. The findings offer specific insights into the co-creation tasks and NPD stages to open for customer co-creation in practice.

Measuring Involvement of a Network of Customers in NPD

The new product development (NPD) literature is rife with suggestions to involve customers in the innovation process, and many firms collaborate with customers. But the extant literature does not offer much guidance concerning the nature and quality of involving such a network of customers. This paper contributes to the extant literature on customer involvement by identifying a comprehensive set of metrics to measure the involvement of a network of customers in NPD. It introduces metrics describing three aspects of customer involvement: (1) the rationale for involving a network of customers in NPD, (2) the network of customers involved in NPD, and (3) the interaction process between manufacturer and customers at the level of individual customers. These metrics help to understand the roles of customers, the timing of their involvement at each stage in the development process, the type and number of customers that are involved, as well as the frequency and intensity of their involvement.The use of these metrics is illustrated by a study of customer network involvement by Irish business‐to‐business companies. Forty‐six percent of the sampled firms (n = 1400) were actively involved in NPD, but very few of them involved customers in the early stages (n = 77). The involvement of customers in early NPD stages is significant, although manufacturers tend to go back to the same customers repeatedly. The intensity of customer involvement is also extensive, but even more so during the later NPD stages, especially for new products as opposed to product improvements.By incorporating a network perspective, the proposed metrics for customer network involvement provide a new approach for researchers to study the involvement of customers in NPD.

Leveraging Social Network Sites in New Product Development: Opportunity or Hype?

Leveraging social network sites is high on the list of priorities for a lot of businesses that are eager to find more effective ways to reach, learn about, and engage customers in new product development (NPD). However, the rapidly changing landscape of social network sites can be difficult to navigate successfully and doubts remain about whether and how they can be used to good effect. In fact, empirical research confirming a positive relationship between the use of social network sites inNPDand business performance is scarce.This paper reports on research examining the use of social network sites for three purposes, namely for market research guiding the development of new products, for getting customers to collaborate in theNPDprocess, and for new product launch. The results of this research suggest that the benefits expected from using social network sites inNPDare largely not being realized by businesses. Using social network sites to conduct market research leading into theNPDprocess was not found to contribute to business performance, and in fact was found to have negative relationships with both profitability and market growth. Using social network sites to get customers to collaborate in theNPDprocess was found to be positively related with innovativeness but not with market growth or profitability. Finally, using social network sites for new product launch was where the most positive indications were seen, since this was found to be positively related with innovativeness, market growth, and profitability.Thus, it appears that while businesses may get good results from using social network sites for product launch, they still have a learning curve to traverse before they can successfully use them for market research or customer collaboration inNPD. While there is currently a great deal of enthusiasm—even hype—about the potential opportunities of using social network sites forNPD, this research suggests that businesses should move carefully and recognize that just jumping on the social network bandwagon will not insure success.

Do customers improve new product development efficiency? Revealing the impact of manufacturing-based absorptive capacity

In order to collaborate with customers in new product development efficiently, companies need to maintain some inherent competence that allows them to both understand the external party’s processes ...

Marketing strategy and customer involvement in product development

PurposeThis paper aims to investigate the impact of a firm's marketing strategy on involving customers in new product development. Special attention is to be paid to three facets of a marketing strategy: product differentiation, competitor orientation and brand profiling emphasis.Design/methodology/approachA survey with quantitative questionnaires was used in the context of relationships between Norwegian suppliers and international buyers.FindingsTwo facets of marketing strategy, product differentiation and competitor orientation, positively impact customer involvement. Furthermore, specific investments dedicated to the relationship are also positively related to customer involvement, and customer involvement increases customer profitability.Research limitations/implicationsThe study relies on data from the suppliers, and future studies should also include customer data to explore possible effects of the customer's marketing strategy on joint involvement in new product development.Practical implicationsThe study shows that managers seeking to involve customers in product development should carefully develop their marketing strategy and build commitment through specific investments.Originality/valuePrevious studies show that firms can benefit from involving customers in new product development. This paper extends knowledge in the field by exploring how different facets of the firm's marketing strategy can increase or decrease the possibilities for involving customers.

SUPPLIER INVOLVEMENT IN CUSTOMER NEW PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT: NEW INSIGHTS FROM THE SUPPLIER'S PERSPECTIVE

This paper presents the results from an empirical survey of chemical suppliers, which examines the influence of customer relationship functions on supplier involvement in customer new product development (NPD) from the supplier's perspective. Using multiple regression analysis, we can demonstrate a positive influence between the direct functions (e.g., profit, volume) of customer relationship and supplier involvement in customer NPD. Differentiating between innovative and non-innovative suppliers leads to distinctive differences. While the direct functions are a strong predictor for the supplier involvement in the non-innovative supplier group, in the innovative group only indirect functions (innovation, market, scout and access functions) influence the supplier involvement. These results show that mutual support in the NPD and open network are the imperative triggers for the involvement of innovative suppliers. The obtained results provide theoretical as well as practical implications for the supplier involvement in customer NPD.

Selecting Influential Business‐to‐Business Customers in New Product Development: Relational Embeddedness and Knowledge Heterogeneity Considerations

This study examines how the most influential business‐to‐business (B2B) customers, both existing and potential, involved in providing input to a new product development (NPD) project influence new product advantage. As the relational literature suggests, involving customers who have had close and embedded relationships with a firm's new product organization, such as a firm's largest customers, and customers who have been involved in past collaborative activities, should lead to the development of superior products. To the contrary, the innovation literature suggests that a firm may become too close to its large, embedded customers resulting in less innovation and in lower performing products. Also, the relationship between the heterogeneity of the knowledge of the most influential customers and new product advantage is examined. A contingency perspective is hypothesized such that the degree of product newness sought in the project moderates the effects of both relational embeddedness and knowledge heterogeneity on new product advantage.Empirical findings from a sample of 137 NPD projects support this contingency view. For projects seeking to develop incremental products, where the product being developed is an extension or an enhancement to an existing product, new product advantage tended to be higher in projects using embedded or homogeneous customers. For incremental projects, projects using less‐embedded or heterogeneous customers tended to have lower product performance. For projects following a highly innovative product strategy, new product advantage tended to be higher in projects that involved heterogeneous customers. These heterogeneous customers provided NPD projects with a diversity of perspectives, competencies, and experiences that fostered significant product innovations.The study contributes to the literature by empirically testing relational and innovation theories in NPD projects and by providing evidence on the importance of relational embeddedness and knowledge heterogeneity in selecting influential customers in NPD projects.

Customers' perspectives of involvement in new product development

The involvement of customers in new product development is considered as a successful strategy and tactic to improve new product success. However, the customers' view of this involvement is much less frequently studied than the suppliers' side. In the present paper, the customers' perspective is taken. It is first shown that the locus of initiative for product development involvement is of relevance for identifying different types of involvement. It is then argued that the degree of involvement needs to be measured. Furthermore, since customers have different expertise, they should be chosen according to their ability to appreciate the degree of newness of the future product as well as their potential stage-specific contributions. Furthermore, the costs involved on the customers' side will call for a reward, and these costs might be influenced by the involvement of other customers, either those who compete for the same scarce resources or those who benefit from network effects. This could lead to specific conflicts. Based on available research, this paper conceptualises these problems and makes suggestions for further research. This research might lead not only to a better understanding of customers' behaviour but also to better planning of customer involvement from the suppliers' side. In future, suppliers will better understand the problems of customer involvement from this paper.