Designing Products

Chapter 8
 Product: Anything that can be offered to a market for attention, acquisition (getting hold of), use or
consumption that might satisfy need or want. It includes physical objects, services, persons, places,
organizations and ideas.
Service: Any activity or benefit that one party can offer to another that is essentially intangible and doesnot result in the
ownership of anything.
Three levels of Product:
1- Core product: The problem solving services or core benefits that consumers are really buying when they obtain a
product.
2- Actual Product: A products parts, quality level, features, design, brand name, packaging and other attributes that
combine to deliver core product benefits.
3-Augmented Product: Additional consumer services and benefits built around the core and actual products.e.g
Installation, warranty, delivery / credit and after sales service.
Classifications of products:
1- Consumer products: products bought by final consumers for personal consumption. There are four types of
consumer products:
A- Convenience Products: those products that a customer usually buys frequently , immediately and with a minimum of
comparison and buying effort. Eg soap etc.
B- Shopping products: these are consumer goods that the customer, in the process of selection and purchase,
characteristically compares on such bases as suitability, quality, price and style. E.g furniture, clothing etc.
C-Specialty products: These are the consumer products with a unique characteristics or brand identification for which a
significant group of buyers is willing to make a special purchase effort. E.g Honda , Mercedes Benz, BMW.
D-Unsought products: Those consumer products that the consumer either doesn't know about or knows about but does
not normally think of buying. E.g Life Insurances
E- Industrial products: products bought by individuals and organizations for further processing or for further use in
conducting a business. Three groups of industrial products are: 1- material and parts ( raw material, manufactured
material) , 2- capital items( these aid in buyers production or operations e.g computers etc) , 3- Suppliers &
services.( paper supplies , advertising )

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Product Line: A group of products that are closely related because they function in a similar manner, are sold to same
customer groups, are marketed through the same types of outlets or fall within given price ranges. E.g Honda making
different cars, Nike produces several lines of shoes etc.

Product Line Stretching: Downward Stretching: The company may add a low end product to its product line .
Upward Stretching: The company may add a high quality product to its product line.
TWO way Stretching: The company may decide to add products or stretch their lines in both directions. E.g
Marriott marquis is for Top Executives whereas Marriott is for middle managers etc.
Product Mix: The set of all product lines and items that a particular seller offers for sale to buyers .

PRODUCT MIX WIDTH AND PRODUCT LINE LENGTH

Product mix width

Product Detergents: Toothpaste: Deodorants: Fruit Juices, Lotions
Line Ivory snow Gleem Secret Citrus Hill Wondra
length Joy Denquel Texsun Camay
Ariel Complete Sure Lincoln Rain tree

Brand: A name, term, sign , symbol or design, or a combination of these intended to identify
the goods or services of one seller or groups of sellers and to differentiate them from
those of competitors.
Brand Attributes: e.g. Mercedes suggest attribute as well engineered, well built, durable,
high prestige, fast, expensive
Brand benefits: e.g durable is translated into functional benefit that there is no need to
buy a new car every few years .
Brand values: e.g Mercedes buyers value high performance, safety and prestige
Brand personality: e.g Mercedes buyer projects a wealthy, middle aged businessman

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Brand Equity: The value of a brand based on the extent to which it has a high brand loyalty, name awareness,
perceived quality, strong brand association and other assets such as patents, trademarks and channel relationships.
E.g Brand Equity of Coca Cola is 36 Billion $, Marlboro 33 Billion $ and Kodak 10 Billion $.

Packaging: The activities of designing and producing the container or wrapper for a product.
Package includes : product primary Container ( e.g bottle holding OLD spice after shave lotion)
Secondary Package: ( card box containing the bottle of OLD spice after shave)
Shipping Package: a box that contains 12 dozens of bottles of OLD Spice after shave)
Labeling: These may range forms simple tags attached to products to complex graphics that are part of a
package. The label might describe several things about the product e.g Who made it, where it was made, when it
was made, its contents, how to use.

PRODUCT LIFE CYCLE:

Introduction Stage: The stage at which the new product is first distributed and made available for purchase.
Growth Stage: At this stage, a products sales start climbing quickly
Maturity Stage: The stage in the product Life Cycle where sales growth slows or level off.
Decline Stage: The product life cycle stage at which a product sales DECLINE. This could be due to shift in
consumers taste, increased competition and technological advancement.

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