February 2018
Measure twice, cut once. Common sense tells us to test the water before jumping in. Inventors need to know who their customers are and what their customers want before spending a lot of time and money on inventing things/services and bringing them to market. Helen Colby, PhD , (assistant professor of marketing, Indiana University Kelley School of Business) treated us to her insights on how an individual on a limited budget can conduct high quality customer research. This brief summary of her presentation doesn’t begin to contain all of her excellent advice. To learn more, talk with someone who was there. When should you do customer research? Whenever the benefit is greater than the cost. Customer research can answer questions about any aspect of marketing that is important to you (eg, what to invent, what to sell, where and when to sell it, how to advertize it, how much to charge for it). How do you conduct research? First a...