How far can you rely on a concept test: the generalizability of testing over occasions

Ling Peng and Adam Finn

In practice, product managers have to assume consumer evaluations of concepts generalise from the time (and research environment) of concept testing to the time (and market environment) of market introduction.

How far can you rely on a concept test: the generalizability of testing over occasions

Ling Peng

Lingnan University

Adam Finn

University of Alberta

Introduction

Concept testing, whether traditional (Moore 1982) or conjoint (Green & Wind 1975), is an important tool used to assess the likely market demand and the best customers to target with potential new products early on in their development (Page & Rosenbaum 1992; Ozer 1999; Crawford & Di Benedetto 2006). It uses customer response data to pick likely winners from among the many likely losers, and so is used to help allocate product development resources. Improving...

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