Customer Perspective of Value for Innovative Products and Services

Innovation is an important competitive advantage for market success. Faster, cheaper, better are the keywords of the current competitive environment. For this to occur, products and services need to address customer needs in such a way as to fulfil what they expect but in the same time delight them through unexpected and attractive features. The theory of attractive quality uses the Kano methodology, a value components model, when thinking about product features in this way. Unfortunately, the Kano questionnaire mainly analyses customer satisfaction regarding an existing offer, thus a post purchase evaluation. In the case of new and innovative products or services, we do not have prior consumer value or a “standard” to compare it with. Therefore, we must rely on pre-purchase judgment. But what is desired customer value and with what concepts should it be associated with? The present paper aims to delimit customer value pre-purchase perception from post-purchase perception and determine the terms and key words which best represent the customer's perspective in this situation. The ultimate goal is to present a first conceptual step into the development of an alternative to the Kano model for the design stage of innovative products and services.