Institute of Technology

Department of Biomedical Engineering

BIOMEDICAL DESIGN I--BMEG4241
CHAPTER THREE
“CUSTOMER NEED IDENTIFICATION”
By Aschalew A
12/31/2022 1
Outline
Introduction
Steps in customer need identification

12/31/2022 2
Introduction
The process of identifying customer needs is an integral part of the
larger product development process.
Is most closely related to:
• Concept generation,
• Concept selection,
• Competitive benchmarking, and
• The establishment of product specifications.

12/31/2022 3
 Figure: The customer-needs activity in relation to other concept development activities.

12/31/2022 4
Cont.…
Need: is any attribute of a potential product tat is desired by customer.
Identifying customer needs is a process
It has five process
1. Gather raw data from customers.
2. Interpret the raw data in terms of customer needs.
3. Organize the needs into a hierarchy
4. Establish the relative importance of the needs.
5. Reflect on the results and the process

12/31/2022 5
Step 1: Gather raw data from
customer
1. Interviews
2. Focus groups
3. Observing the product in use

12/31/2022 6
Figure: Comparison of the percentages of customer needs that are revealed for focus groups and
interviews as a function of the number of sessions. Note that a focus group lasts two hours, while an
interview lasts one hour
12/31/2022 7
Identifying customers
How many customers to interview?
In one study 90% of customer needs were addressed after 30
interviews.
In another study 98% of customer needs were addressed after 25
hrs. of data collection in both focus group and interviews.
10 interviews are in adequate
50 interviews are probably to many.

12/31/2022 8
Whom to interview
1. Lead users
lead users are customers who experience needs months or years ahead
of the majority of the market and stand to benefit substantially from
product innovations
These customers are particularly useful sources of data for two
reasons:
1. They are often able to articulate their emerging needs, because they have had
to struggle with the inadequacies of existing products.
2. They may have already invented solutions to meet their needs

12/31/2022 9
Cont.…
2. Extreme users
Extreme users are those who use the product in unusual ways or
who have special needs.
Extreme users can help the team identify needs that may be felt less
acutely by the mainstream market, but are nevertheless important
opportunities for competitive advantage.

12/31/2022 10
Customer selection matrix
A customer selection matrix is useful for planning exploration of
both market and customer Variety.
The number of intended customer contacts is entered in each cell to
indicate the depth of coverage.

Table: Customer selection matrix for the cordless screwdriver project

12/31/2022 11
The art of eliciting customer needs
data
To elicit an honest expression of needs
Not to convince customer of what he/ she needs
Some helpful question could be
• When and why do you use this type of product?
• Walk us through a typical session using the product.
• What do you like about the existing products?
• What do you dislike about the existing products?
• What issues do you consider when purchasing the product?
• What improvements would you make to the product

12/31/2022 12
Effective interaction with
customers
Go with the flow
Use visual stimuli and props
Suppress preconceived hypothesis about the product technology
Have the customer demonstrate the product and/or typical tasks
related to the product
Be alert for surprise and the expression of latent needs
Watch for non verbal information

12/31/2022 13
Cont.…
For a fundamentally new products?
Users have no experience
Interview question about the task or situation in which the product
will be applied.

12/31/2022 14
Documenting interactions with
customer
Audio recording
Notes
Video recording
Still photography

12/31/2022 15
Step 2: interpret raw data into
customer needs
Customer needs are expressed as written statements and are the
result of interpreting the need underlying the raw data gathered from
the customers.
Each statement or observation may be translated into any number of
customer needs.

12/31/2022 16
Table: Customer data template filled in with sample customer statements and interpreted needs.

12/31/2022 17
12/31/2022 18
 Guide lines for writing need
statements
Express the need in terms of what the product has to do, not in terms
of how it might do it.
Express the need as specifically as the raw data.
Use positive, not negative, phrasing
Express the need as an attribute of the product.
Avoid the words must and should.

12/31/2022 19
 Examples illustrating the guidelines for writing need statements
12/31/2022 20
Step 3: organize the need into
hierarchy
List of 50 to 300 need statements
Organizing this needs into a hierarchical list.
Into a set of:
Primary needs(most general needs),
Secondary list
Set of Tertiary need (for complex product)

12/31/2022 21
Step by step procedure
1. Print or write each need statement on a separate card or self-stick note
2. Eliminate redundant statements.
3. Group the cards according to the similarity of the needs they express.
4. For each group, choose a label
5. Consider creating super groups consisting of two to five groups.
6. Review and edit the organized needs statements.

12/31/2022 22
12/31/2022 23
Figure: Hierarchical list of primary and secondary customer needs for the cordless screwdriver.
Importance ratings for the secondary needs are indicated by the number of *’s, with *** denoting critically
important needs. Latent needs are denoted by !
12/31/2022 24
12/31/2022 25
Step 4: Established the relative
importance of the needs
The hierarchical list alone does not provide any information on the
relative importance that customers place on different needs.
Yet the development team will have to make trade-offs and allocate
resources in designing the product.
A sense of the relative importance of the various needs is essential to
making these trade-offs correctly.
There are two approaches
1. Relying on the consensus of the team members.
2. Basing the importance assessment on further customer survey.
12/31/2022 26
 Figure: Example importance survey (partial)

12/31/2022 27
12/31/2022 28
Reflect on the results
Have we interacted with all of the important types of customers in
our market segment?
Are we able to see beyond needs related only to existing products in
order to capture the latent needs of our target customers?
Are there areas of inquiry we should pursue in following up
interviews or surveys?

12/31/2022 29
Cont.…
Which of the customers we spoke to would be good participants in
our ongoing development efforts?
What do we know now that we didn’t know when we started?
Did we involve everyone within our group/organization who needs
to deeply understand customer needs?
How might we improve the process in future effort?

12/31/2022 30
Project tasks
Prepare questionnaire for need assessment (put it on appendix on final report)
Prepare customer selection matrix
Perform customer need identification for your opportunity
Take photos while performing need assessment (put it on appendix on final report)
Interpret raw data into customer needs
Organize the need into hierarchy
Established the relative importance of the needs
Write your reflection on the result and the process (max 1 page )

12/31/2022 31
 “Design is not just what it looks
and feel like design is how it
works” Steve Jobs

“Great design has creativity and strategy” M. Cobon

Thank you
12/31/2022 32