Proceedings of 5th Asia-Pacific Business Research Conference
17 - 18 February, 2014, Hotel Istana, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, ISBN: 978-1-922069-44-3
Exploring Customer Needs of High-Technology Product:
A Preliminary Analysis of Perceived Needs and Kano Model
Norlia Ahmad
Understanding customer needs is critical in marketing and innovation. High-technology companies
continuously face a challenge in ensuring that new product innovations are not merely a bundle of
cutting-edge features and gadgets, but rather designed to meet customer requirements. The
purpose of this study is to explore the concept of customer needs and examine the relevance of
Kano’s classification of needs for a technology oriented product – a mobile phone. This study
employs interviews with lead users to gather information on their mobile phone usage and
perceived needs of its attributes. Data collection and analysis focus on the ‘must have’, ‘linear
satisfier’ and ‘delighter’ attributes of the Kano Model. A preliminary analysis reveals four categories
of perceived needs; communication, productivity, entertainment and experiential.
Communication
needs include the ‘must-have’ features; productivity needs relate to targeted applications such as
information and financial services that facilitate the user’s daily activities. The two needs are
consistent with Kano’s notion of basic needs (must have) and performance needs (linear satisfier),
respectively. Entertainment needs include services that respond to user’s personal and emotional
needs, while the experiential needs capture experiences that are associated with personalized
contents and aesthetic design. Both of those needs reflect Kano’s notion of exciting needs
(delighter). Identifying specific product attributes and categories of perceived needs offer deeper
insights to develop and administer questionnaires for further research. This study, though
exploratory, highlights the significance of Kano model in understanding customer needs, and
provides a framework to analyze those needs in the context of mobile phone. The proposed
framework contributes to the discussions of marketing and innovation, and is relevant to other
technology-enabled products or services which are ever more pervasive in consumers’ life.
Keywords: Customer Needs, Kano Model, High-technology product
Track: Marketing
______________________________________________________________
Dr. Norlia Ahmad, Associate Professor, International Management Course, Institute of Business and Accounting,
Kwansei
Gakuin
University,
1-155
Uegahara
norlia83@kwansei.ac.jp, Tel: +81-90-9084-8383
Ichiban-cho,
Nishinomiya
662-8501,
Japan.
Email: