7 Steps of New Product Design Process

What is New Product Design (NPD)?

New Product Design (NPD) is the process designers use to blend user needs with business goals to help brands make consistently successful products. Product designers should be well-versed in multiple competencies for developing new product designs. It should meet the consumers’ demands involving the entire product creation process, responsible for discovering and defining a problem and designing a solution.

In the new product design process, product designers need to know how to employ the right processes instead of learning a handful of tools and software.

Stage 1: Idea Generation

During the first stage of the new product design process, generate ideas for product development to provide more than competitors currently offer. The objective is to pool concepts and ideas for a new invention.

To come up with a brilliant invention, the best practice is to source information from the customers by listening to their feedback and gathering practical ideas. Conduct competitive surveys and get their feedback to help you develop new ideas.

Another way to generate ideas is by performing a SWOT analysis that identifies your company’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.

Stage 2: Idea Screening

Once you have gathered information, filter the ideas precisely to evaluate which ideas are feasible. During the screening stage, include crucial factors like price, profitability, competition and longevity.

Learn about your target market and the marketing potential of your products, and you may easily get ideas on what to do next. Filtering ideas is essential to evaluate which ideas should work.

Stage 3: Concept Development & Testing

The concept design phase is sketching many quick ideas for the product. It has to detail the description of the idea from the perspective of the customers. To test the product concept, you may take customers’ viewpoints to evaluate how effective the product will be.

Stage 4: Business and Marketing Strategy Development

After the testing is completed and evaluated, perform vital business analysis and market forecasts. Market analysis involves projecting the target market and the competitive landscape within a specific industry. Performing this stage will enable you to better understand the viability of the product or service before entering the market.

Stage 5: Product Development

With the results obtained from business analysis, the next stage is developing the product’s prototype to correspond to the needs and desires of the buyers. The whole process will hold a trial-and-error approach.

During this stage, collect all consumer feedback and opinions to apply as improvements to your prototype.

Stage 6: Test Marketing & Validation

Once the product is ready to be introduced commercially, analyse and validate the pricing strategy. This strategy aims to see if the customers are willing to pay for your product.

Stage 7: Commercialization

This is the final stage of the new product design process. Set up the forecasted market demand and strategies, and continuously monitor the progress of your product. Continuously pay attention to the key area of improvements of post-product launching.