Really New Stories: The Effect of Early Concept Narratives on Consumer Understanding and Attitudes

Really New Stories typically describe a use setting and a main character - the hero - who is using a really new product. In this doctoral thesis, Ellis van den Hende explains why early consumer input during the development of really new products can be remarkably frustrating to new product managers and product developers. Ellis elucidates how Really New Stories can present information about the new product concept in a way that is evocative and relevant for consumers. She tests and discusses the positive effects of Really New Stories on consumer understanding and attitudes and provides practical guidelines to put Really New Stories to work. To summarize, she explains how Really New Stories successfully contribute to the new product development process. Ellis van den Hende (1981) received her graduate and postgraduate training in product development and innovation management at Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands. Her research has been published in International scientific journals, such as the Journal of Product Innovation Management. Please email the author for the latest versions of the papers in this thesis ([email protected]). Thank you for your interest in this thesis!Product Innovation ManagementIndustrial Design Engineerin

The story is as good as the real thing: early customer input on product applications of radically new technologies

Early customer input on applications that use radically new technologies is crucial for gaining an understanding of the benefits and value of these new technologies. Potential customers should have a clear understanding of a new technology application before they give their input on it. Prototypes provide a clear picture to the customer, but are seldom available in the early (predevelopment) stage. Therefore, a customer research technique that provides valuable input is needed. The aim of the study is to show that product narratives provide valuable input from customers in the predevelopment phase of a discontinuous new product development (NPD) process. This study compares a product narrative with a benchmark condition of a working prototype, a nonnarrative, and two conditions that have been added to make a comparison possible. Confirming this study's prediction, the analysis of variance results show that no differences are present between the narrative text with drawn images and a prototype demonstration on all dependent variables (i.e., evaluations of the product, interaction, ease of use, and aesthetics). Differences in customers' evaluations are only present when the narration is removed from the text with drawn images. Regression analysis confirms that narration is the key variable that predicts the evaluations of the product, interaction, ease of use, and aesthetics. The mediating role of narrative transportation provides explanation of these findings. Narrative transportation is a mixture of attention, imagery, and feelings that people experience when they watch a movie or read a narrative. According to narrative transportation theory, transported consumers immerse themselves in what they watch or read and have vivid images in their mind, see themselves in the scene of the action, experience emotions, and forget the world around them. This study shows that without narration, texts with drawn images are insufficiently vivid to transport the reader to enable him or her to imagine using the really new product, and consequently, provide evaluations similar to prototype evaluations. The narrative character of the utilized technology application presentation provides vivid imagery of the technology application, thereby compensating for a lack of realism. To conclude, an easy-to-apply product narrative successfully explains a technology application that uses a radically new technology to a customer before prototypes have been completed

To Be or Not to Be in Thrall to the March of Smart Products

This article explores how perceived disempowerment impacts the intention to adopt smart autonomous products. Empirically, the paper builds on three studies to show this impact. Study 1 explores the relevance of the perceived disempowerment in respect of smart autonomous products. Study 2 manipulates autonomy of smart products and finds that perceived disempowerment mediates the link between smart products’ autonomy and adoption intention. Study 3 indicates that an intervention design―that is, a product design that allows consumers to intervene in the actions of an autonomous smart product―can reduce their perceived disempowerment in respect of autonomous smart products. Further, Study 3 reveals that personal innovativeness moderates the role that an intervention design plays in product adoption: an intervention design shows a positive effect on adoption intention for individuals with low personal innovativeness, but for those with high personal innovativeness no effect of an intervention design is present on adoption intention. The authors suggest that managers consider consumers’ perceived disempowerment when designing autonomous smart products, because (1) perceived disempowerment reduces adoption and (2) when targeted at consumers with low personal innovativeness, an intervention design reduces their perceived disempowerment.Marketing and Consumer Researc

Narrative transportation in concept tests for really new products : are all protagonists equally convincing?

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Drivers and Consequences of Narrative Transportation: Understanding the Role of Stories and Domain-Specific Skills in Improving Radically New Products

This article investigates the role of transportation in concept tests (i.e., a vivid mental image of a new product concept and the way of using it) for radically new products. Based on transportation literature, the article proposes that concept descriptions in a story format can stimulate transportation. Further, the article builds on the literature on domain-specific skills to propose that technological reflectiveness (i.e., the ability to think about the impact of a technological product on its users and society in general) and product expertise increase transportation. The article explores the effect that transportation has on the ability of consumers to enumerate the advantages and disadvantages of a radically new product and on their ability to provide valuable concept improvement ideas (i.e., ideas that are highly novel, feasible, and beneficial for consumers). A quasi-experiment with 253 participants demonstrates that a story format, product experience with related product categories, and technological reflectiveness increased transportation with regard to radically new products. The empirical research also showed that transportation facilitates the enumeration of the advantages and the disadvantages of a concept, resulting in more valuable concept improvement ideas. These findings suggest that innovation managers should strive to evoke transportation in concept tests for radically new products, as transportation allows consumers to provide more valuable input.Marketing and Consumer Researc

Narrative transportation in concept tests for really new products : are all protagonists equally convincing?

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Narrative transportation in concept tests for really new products : the moderating effect of reader-protagonist similarity

The authors investigate the benefits of using a narrative (i.e., a storyline featuring a protagonist) to convey product information in the evaluation of really new product concepts by consumers. In the context of early product evaluation, the imagination of consumers can be guided by a narrative about a protagonist who uses the new product in a series of actions and events. In this way, a narrative can present information about the new product concept in a way that is evocative and relevant. The authors build on narratives research and study the implications of different protagonist focal characters. Further, the role of a protagonist focal character in facilitating consumer evaluations is examined, and evaluation formats (narrative versus attribute/benefit listings) are compared. Utilizing three empirical studies, this research looks at the potential effects of protagonist (dis)similarity with the reader on transportation and new product evaluation both in narrative and bulleted list evaluation formats. Study 1 shows an interactive effect of reader–protagonist similarity and evaluation format on transportation and product evaluation. The results from this study show that reader–protagonist similarity is needed for a narrative to be effective. Studies 2 and 3 provide further understanding of the effects of reader–protagonist (dis)similarity. Study 2 shows that the negative impact of a dissimilar protagonist can be mitigated by explicitly instructing the readers to imagine themselves as the protagonist, thus enabling them to fully experience the storyline. Study 3 decomposes the reader–protagonist dissimilarity and shows that not all protagonists dissimilar to the reader deliver a negative outcome. A dissimilar protagonist that is not from a dissociative out-group for the reader effectuates a positive result. Finally, the underlying process for the observed effects is demonstrated: narrative transportation is shown to mediate the observed effects in all three studies. With these studies, the authors advance narrative transportation and social identity theory. Furthermore, the research provides practical guidelines for how narratives should be constructed and utilized to obtain consumer evaluations of product concepts in the new product development process

Narrative transportation in concept tests for really new products: the moderating effect of reader-protagonist similarity

The authors investigate the benefits of using a narrative (i.e., a storyline featuring a protagonist) to convey product information in the evaluation of really new product concepts by consumers. In the context of early product evaluation, the imagination of consumers can be guided by a narrative about a protagonist who uses the new product in a series of actions and events. In this way, a narrative can present information about the new product concept in a way that is evocative and relevant. The authors build on narratives research and study the implications of different protagonist focal characters. Further, the role of a protagonist focal character in facilitating consumer evaluations is examined, and evaluation formats (narrative versus attribute/benefit listings) are compared. Utilizing three empirical studies, this research looks at the potential effects of protagonist (dis)similarity with the reader on transportation and new product evaluation both in narrative and bulleted list evaluation formats. Study 1 shows an interactive effect of reader-protagonist similarity and evaluation format on transportation and product evaluation. The results from this study show that reader-protagonist similarity is needed for a narrative to be effective. Studies 2 and 3 provide further understanding of the effects of reader-protagonist (dis)similarity. Study 2 shows that the negative impact of a dissimilar protagonist can be mitigated by explicitly instructing the readers to imagine themselves as the protagonist, thus enabling them to fully experience the storyline. Study 3 decomposes the reader-protagonist dissimilarity and shows that not all protagonists dissimilar to the reader deliver a negative outcome. A dissimilar protagonist that is not from a dissociative out-group for the reader effectuates a positive result. Finally, the underlying process for the observed effects is demonstrated: narrative transportation is shown to mediate the observed effects in all three studies. With these studies, the authors advance narrative transportation and social identity theory. Furthermore, the research provides practical guidelines for how narratives should be constructed and utilized to obtain consumer evaluations of product concepts in the new product development process