That’s a Great Idea. But I’d Rather Have One That Works.
Posted by Scott Dunn on June 26, 2008
A nutritionist came up with the ultimate dog food and his co-workers liked the idea, but it flopped. Nobody tried it on the dog.
You should shove a thousand pounds of “attitudes” and trade them for an ounce of behavior, if you want a product success.
An article in the WSJ talked about some great new design successes, and they all had one ingredient: they came from product users, not from an engineer’s dream.
- Women said that a golf club maker’s six iron carried farther than their four iron. So the line was redesigned so each club worked the way it should with women – not with strong teen-aged men.
- An auto maker discovered that the Chinese cared more about the comfort in the back seat than in the front. They then reversed the priority in the design.
- Segway predicted sales of up to 100,000 a year, but they average under 10,000. “People found them impractical and couldn’t use them to replace driving, walking or biking.”
- The Susan B. Anthony silver dollar (1979) was supposed to replace dollar bills, but no-one wanted to carry more coins. “That’s why people have bowls full of change in their dressers.”
- A dozen German car execs came over and virtually lived with American drivers. They were astounded. We didn’t think of our cars as an ultimate driving machine, but as our living rooms. Why? Because America is big and it takes longer to get there. Voila, and duh!
The sales took off to the point where the owner has enough revenue to attract a buyer and sell the joint!
This is called “embedded” research, sort of like “embedded reporters” in the war zone, where the journalists eat, sleep and suffer with the troops.
If you don’t want to, or don’t have the money to fund a big survey or a bunch of focus groups, there is a better way instead. Try investing quality time with you customers. They have answers that will work.
George Lemmond
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