SIU PRSSA Southern Illinois University Public Relations Student Society of America
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Developing a product or service demands… well, demand. Providing the market with a product or service that is in high demand, is the drive and purpose of any new venture. The ability to know in advance, the tastes, demands, and specifications desired by consumers has proved difficult in times past. Previously, focus groups, telephone surveys and other forms of pre-internet market research had been gold standard of feedback. With the advent of the digital age, the landscape of consumer centric market research has changed.
Instantaneous feedback and communications provide today’s product developers with an unprecedented ability to decern the whims of the market. One such example stands tall among the rest, GoDaddy and their “Customer Council.” GoDaddy describes the Customer Council on their website as such,
“We invite GoDaddy customers, based on their goals and how they’re using our stuff, to represent that segment of users on the GoDaddy Customer Council. We float questions and ideas to the group, and then let their feedback help set the course we take as an organization.”
With this council, GoDaddy receives feedback that fuels and informs new product and service development. Another, perhaps unexpected, example is that of LEGO. The toy brick building company: LEGO, operates a website where enthusiasts can submit their own LEGO designs. Designs with over 10,000 fan supporters can be summitted for expert review and added to the LEGO catalogue. A fun opportunity for the supporter/designer in question, is they could be hired at LEGO. LEGO practically outsources new product design to consumers; at the same time, they provide enthusiasts with a way to share designs and their passion with other LEGO enthusiasts.
Corporations in a wide variety of markets have adopted similar strategies to the ones mentioned above. Businesses such as Unilever, General Mills, DeWalt and IKEA are a few examples of corporations adopting consumer interaction as a leading guide for new product and service development. A future lead by consumers is sure to produce many exciting new products and services going forward.
