The Product Life Cycle, as known as PLC,
has been shortened in those days because of the speed of change in the world,
which is caused mainly by technology advances.
In this society, no one expects to keep the
same product for about 10 years, and this tendency also applies to the industry
such as automobile and electronic products. If you go to one of the retailer like Best Buy, and you will see many products with the highest technology at that time. However, you can see the more developed products in the same store after a couple of years.
Therefore, the standard of technology development is always moving from time to time, and there are no reasons for consumers to keep the same products for a long time span.
What are the R&D strategies for this
situation?
 |
| Most recent type of washing machine |
So, how the people in R & D or branding
teams are solving this matter?
I have heard an interesting thing from my past
professor in Japan. Also, this statement can be supported by our experiences as
one of the consumers in this society.
Because they are not expected to be kept
for a long run, the recent products are designedintentionally to have a short-product life span!
Imagine that you purchase the washing machine, and 2 years later you find something wrong with the product. But, you are going to move to other city, so that you do not have to repair it.
This is not because of the poor quality of the product, but because of the definition of the product. Both suppliers and consumers do not expect to use the one product for their entire lives.
The Case in Japan
 |
| the old-type of washing machine |
After the loss of the Second World War,
Japanese society experienced the dramatic industrial development in 1960’s.
Until the early 2000, most of the products are supposed to use over 10 years.
Last year, I went back to Japan and I noticed there was the old-type washing
machine in my grandmother’s house. She told me that she had used that machine
for about 15 years with subtle repairs. On the other hand, the washing machine
in my house was getting in a bad condition, even though it spent only a couple
years.
As the cases above, most companies are adjusting this rapid changing society and customer tendencies in the world.
The Possible Failures of New Product Marketing
Since the society is changing every seconds of time, all the new product marketers need to think and act fast as much as they can.
they do not have time to keep thingking until they find the 100% sure answers. It is impossible, because the society is still changing while they are thinking.
Some conpanies use other consulting conpanies for this reason, becuase they are the professionals of Marketing Researches. However, the people in manufacture companies should correctly define the premise, assumptions of their marketing researches.
As the Cooper says in his book "Winning At New Products", one of the reasons of failing new product marketing is the poor marketing research.
As the MBA schools teach to their students, marketing teams should correctly and reasonably define the premise, assunptions, and conclusion.
If I work as one of the marketing team members, I am going to do not only the "creative activities", but also the radical researches, which most of the "marketing fans" hate.
References
Robert G. Cooper; Winning At New Products
References
http://image.search.yahoo.co.jp/search?tt=c&ei=UTF-8&fr=top_ga1_sa&fr2=sfp&aq=-1&oq=&p=sony+high-tech+washing+machine&meta=vc%3D#mode%3Ddetail%26index%3D6%26st%3D0
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