CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT AND TESTING

Concept Development and Testing

The new product idea that survives the Idea Screening stage, then moves to the next stage, i.e, Concept Development and Testing.  Kotler and Armstrong (2009) suggested that attractive ideas must be refined into testable product concepts. Product concept tests could be defined as the evaluation of a new concept idea, before a prototype is created.  The concepts are tested with a group of target consumers to find out if the concepts have a strong consumer appeal. This stage assesses preliminary figures for demand, cost, sales and profit probability with regard to the new product (Lamb, Hair and McDaniel, 2009).

There are a set of questions that should be analysed, which can help determine the profit probability of the product. Questions such as What is the likely demand of the product?, What is the risk of failure? Would the product enhance the image of the company's overall product mix? and so on (Charles, Hair and McDaniel, 2009). The answer to such questions will help the company decide the strongest marketability of the product (Kotler and Armstrong, 2009). 

Concept development stage in the New product development (NPD) process, in which product concept is developed into a physical product in order to ensure that the product idea can be turned into a workable market offering (Kotler and Armstrong, 2009). Lamb, Hair and McDaniel (2009) commented that the marketing of the product should begin at this stage with respect to the product's packaging, branding, labelling, and a map out of the promotion, price and distribution strategies.  

Examples of Concept Development and Testing would be:

The Fifa Quality concept tests for Footballs, which is a testing procedure used in order to assess the quality testing and certification of footballs to ensure global consistency in top match footballs. These footballs are tested under laboratory conditions, subjecting them to even tougher conditions than they will endure during the game to maintain the quality criteria set by Fifa. After the completion of the quality certification programme, the footballs are then approved to be manufactured and distributed. 

The marketing strategies of the footballs are then planned in the later stages of the New product development process (NPD) through various marketing affiliations of FIFA(2010). Thus, this completes the stage of concept development and testing stage of Fifa quality concept footballs.

Relating Concept Development and Training to Dunk Pad,

After the screening stage of the desired product (Dunk Pad), the product needs to be developed and tested to increase market profitability. The product as described earlier, is an initiation for amateur basketball athletes to improve their skills and efficiency to dunk in the game of basketball. As products like the Concept One Shoes by APL have been banned by the National Basketball Federation due to being an performance enhancing snickers (APL, 2011). This prevents the selected product (Dunk Pad) from facing any consequences of being disapproved as it is an training kit to guide amateurs to get the skill of dunking right which can improve the effectiveness of scoring, prevent rejections and motivation for an basketball athlete for any height to attempt to dunk.

This concept can be developed further by production of different colours, latest designer themes, materials and sizes which can attract customers from various backgrounds. This development can help increase sales as amateurs can have it in their backyards, public playgrounds, schools & universities, etc and could be used for various other purposes such as yoga mat, gymnastics and wrestling surfaces and household purposes once they get old.

This can be further developed through questionnaires and feedback forms. An approach can be made to communicate with the consumers and officials of local basketball clubs, professional training clubs, schools and universities, sports retailers,  etc to help develop the selected product to increase market profitability.

References

·         Kotler, P., & Armstrong, G. (2010). New product development and product life cycle strategies. Principles of Marketing (13th ed., pp. 282-296). New Jersey: Pearson.

·         Lamb, C. W., Hair, J. F., & McDaniel, C. (2012). Developing and managing products. MKTG (pp. 171-178). Mason: South Western - Cengage learning.

·         Propulsion Labs. (2011). Magento - Open Source ecommerce. APL Basketball Shoes. Retrieved November 29, 2013, from http://www.athleticpropulsionlabs.com/concept1-blackgreen.html Copied to Clipboard!

·         FIFA. (2010). FIFA.com - Quality-Concept. FIFA.com - Quality-Concept. Retrieved November 29, 2013, from http://footballs.fifa.com/Quality-Concept