subject: Looking Through the Eyes of a Customer [print this page] Looking Through the Eyes of a Customer Looking Through the Eyes of a Customer
Is there such a thing as competing with your product? There are several documented cases when a company spends a lot of time, effort and resources to develop a newer and supposedly better version only to find out that the customers prefer the old version. Several car manufacturers have experienced this and have suffered the ill effects of 'innovation.'
Cars today undergo major makeovers before a new model line is unveiled. Let's face it, before you open the bonnet, what catches your eyes is the cars sexiness. This is the reason why car manufacturers use print postcards to sell their brand. Cars on print postcards give the illusion of luxury, comfort, style. And most importantly, it creates the illusion of being a status symbol. Imagine a red sports car on postcard printing and you would know what is meant here.
Apart from the body, there is also the interior and the accessories. Designers find ways to improve the look and the feel inside. Roomy interiors? Captain seats? In-dash console?
But are people going to buy it?
These are things that influence buyers' decisions. A wrong detail would or an awkward feel of the new design would send the sales crashing.
As product managers, we can get very close to our products. Maybe too close. When we roll out a new version of an existing product, we can fool ourselves into thinking that all of our existing customers will also fall in love with the new version.
What most designers and marketing professionals quickly overlook is that designs or marketing packages should be viewed from a customer's point of view. Sure, there are a lot of hassles and expenses involved. Sure, there is the cost of the new product.
Car companies like all other companies have a challenge on their hands: How would they sell their supposedly newer and better version? Microsoft is faced with this challenged. Their upgrade of their operating system from XP to Vista is creating a lot of problems because apparently, users are not happy with Vista. Users of Microsoft prefer the older version because they think that it is more user-friendly.
The challenge for companies like in the case mentioned above is how do you convince your client base that the new version is better that the previous. The dilemma in this case can be summed up with three options: a) refocus marketing strategies; b) reinvent the product, or c) pull out the product from the market.
A hard decision point but something that can be avoided all together if we just look at our products from a customers' perspective.
