Title: Using warm-up stages before measuring preferences for innovative products

Authors: Roland Helm; Christoph Buhren; Reinhold Pabst

Addresses: Strategic Industrial Marketing, University of Regensburg, Universitätsstrabe 31, 93053 Regensburg, Germany. ' Institute of Economics, University of Kassel, Nora-Platiel-Strabe 4, 34127 Kassel, Germany. ' Institute of Applied Physics, Friedrich-Schiller-University of Jena, Albert-Einstein-Strabe 15, 07745 Jena, Germany

Abstract: This study proposes two new methods to familiarise respondents with innovative attributes and thereby ensure their stable preference statements within customer tests in the product development process. These warm-up phases differ in how the participants gather information about the product category, namely, independently or in the lab. A qualifying examination tests the appropriateness of study participants as respondents in a following preference measurement task. Both approaches effectively prepare respondents, though the independent search version offers slight advantages. Our study offers useful tools for evaluating the warm-up phases of preference measurement studies.

Keywords: preference measurement; innovative attributes; product development; product innovation; warm-up phases; product preferences.

DOI: 10.1504/IJPD.2011.044186

International Journal of Product Development, 2011 Vol.15 No.4, pp.227 - 248

Received: 21 Dec 2010
Accepted: 06 Sep 2011
Published online: 27 Feb 2015 *

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