Scenario
You are the global marketing vice president at Dyson. You have been asked to attend a meeting with James Dyson, the company's founder. Dyson's CEO and the head of Dyson's New Product Innovation department will also be in attendance.
"Thanks for meeting with me today," James says. "Market intelligence has shown that our major competitors—Hoover, Shark, and Bissell—are all developing new cordless vacuum cleaners with a longer battery life than what's currently available."
James Dyson looks to you: "I need you to participate in a new cross-functional product development team that will research the feasibility of creating a cordless vacuum cleaner that works for one hour on a single charge. We also need to know if there's even a market for this type of vacuum," he says.
"We envision that this new vacuum will be used primarily in the home, but keep in mind, we want to be able to adapt it easily and cheaply for light commercial use. One way of doing this is by using swappable battery packs."
"Have an actionable marketing plan ready for me in three weeks," James says.
You know that to give the CEO the most thorough report, you'll need to conduct an internal analysis of Dyson and an environmental scan for the new vacuum cleaner. You'll need to have a detailed plan for identifying marketing opportunities, and you'll need to research the home and commercial vacuum cleaner industry, market trends, and Dyson's major global competition.
Question:
Now that the environmental scan has been completed, the new product development group needs to conduct an analysis of consumer buying behavior in this industry. Outline how the team would conduct this analysis, while considering both current and potential product users. Your analysis should address how you would determine the following:
What needs are being met by the product purchase? What are the benefits to the consumers? Make sure that you differentiate between features and benefits; go beyond manifest motives and consider latent motives.
Who is involved in the purchase process? Who are influencers, buyers, and users?
Where are the products sold (distribution channel)?
How often are the products purchased? Is there seasonality to sales?
Milestone 2: Present your results in a three-page report (net, excluding cover page, reference list, tables, graphs, and/or exhibits). Be sure to support your work with the required readings, scholarly sources, and reliable nonscholarly sources (such as Bloomberg, Yahoo! Finance, Money, Forbes, Fortune, and Harvard Business Review) using UMUC's library search engine. You will combine the work you have completed in this milestone with the other milestones and submit all work together in the final step.