Dissertation: Product Development for Distant Target Groups
An Experimental Study for the Silver Market
In my PhD project, I explore how cognitive distance (e.g. individual difference in age or social distance to the target groups) potentially influences the representation of distant target group’s customer preferences and whether user involvement measures can help to compensate for potential negative effects due to large distance between the developer and the audience.
The share of elderly people increases continuously. This trend is already evident in western countries but current forecasts also see it happen in the emerging markets, e.g. in India or China. Currently, the highest proportions of older people are in Japan and Germany. Here 25% -35% of the population will be aged 65 or over in the near future. In addition to socio-political changes, demographic aging poses a challenge for companies because products and services must be developed to the needs of this emerging target group in order to defend market shares of products and services.
Product developers who develop solutions for this target group have to create solutions based on customer needs which are not necessarily their own. Additionally, silver agers are like children, most likely not represented in corporate product development teams. Therefore, developers have to either rely on their own representation of this target group and or acquire necessary knowledge from other sources. User involvement entails techniques and methods to include the voice of the customer into the new product development process. The lead-user approach or conducting observational studies are examples of user-involvement methods.
For this dissertation project, I developed an experimental setting to study both the influence of cognitive distance as well as different degrees of user involvement. The goal is to accurately address silver ager needs in valuable product and service ideas. To conduct the study, I formed a consortium of two global aviation players, the University of Twente, Senior Senior Research Group, Deutsche Seniorenliga e.V. and the Dutch senior organisations ANBO and Unie KBO. A large-scale silver ager user survey and a workshop series at the industry partners’ premises was conducted to improve the air travel experience of silver agers. The actual use value of the generated ideas was assessed by experienced judges of Senior Research Group.
Publications + Publications -
Working paper:
Lew, J. H., Marwede, M., & Herstatt, C. (2015). Does cognitive distance affect product development for distant target groups? Evidence from the literature using co-citation methodology (Working Paper No. 89). Hamburg.
https://www.tuhh.de/tim/downloads/arbeitspapiere/Working_Paper_89.pdf
Conference Paper:
Marwede, M., Herstatt, C., (2016). Product development for distant target groups – An experimental study. R&D Management Conference 2016 (forthcoming). Cambridge, UK
Andere Journal Artikel:
Behrendt, A., Marwede, M., & Wittmann, R. (2014). Building cars with less capital. McKinsey Quarterly, September 2014.
http://www.mckinsey.com/industries/automotive-and-assembly/our-insights/building-cars-with-less-capital