The major purposes of this thesis are to investigate the firms’ activities and patterns of communication with customers in the new product development process focusing on the relationship among new product development phases, product innovativeness and communication patterns and to propose effective ways of communicating customers
In this thesis Sub-dimensions of communication patterns are measured in terms of amount, contents, and mode of communication. New product development NPD phases consist of 5 phases such as (1)market opportunity searching (2)idea generation (3)product design (4)product testing & launching (5)profit management. Product innovativeness is measured by 2 variables - market and technological innovativeness. The results of this thesis are derived from 9 cases studies and the integration of case studies.
The major findings are as follows. First, main communication contents are lifestyle, fashion/trend, product awareness, motives to purchase and information about purchased products in the early phase, while they are product satisfaction level, complaints and usage about products in the latter phase. Second, communication amount is relatively the most in the early phase and increasing according to the process of NPD. Third, reactive communication mode in the early phase, while interactive communication mode is stronger in the latter phase. Fourth, communication about customer characteristics is active when product innovative is high, while communication about product usage and purchasing behavior is active when product innovativeness is low. Fifth, when product innovativeness is high, reactive communication mode is stronger while interactive communication mode is stronger when product innovativeness is low.
Additionally, new factors and the relationship related to communication patterns and new product performance are found in this thesis. They are new product innovativeness, market leadership level and the constancy of communication system. New product innovativeness influences communication patterns and constancy of communication system also influences new product performance. Dominant market leaders tend to focus on communication about market, customer, and product, while firms in the market leading group tend to focus on communication about product only.
