Product Life Cycle & Development Process

 

A product goes through 4 stages of life cycle: -

1.      Introduction of the product: When the product is launched in the market; spends more on advertisement and marketing of the product; sales are low and extensive promotions take place.

2.      Growth Stage: Sales will gradually start increasing; profits will also rise.

3.      Maturity Stage: Here, the market saturates and the sale starts declining.

4.      Decline Stage: The product is no longer relevant in the market. E.g.; Blackberry phones, Nokia, etc. 

New product development process: -

There are 8 stages/steps of new product development. They are as follows:

1.      Idea Generation – The company comes out with different ideas. Brainstorming sessions are done for idea-generation by the internal/in-house sources such as R&D team as well as external sources.

 

2.      Idea Screening – The ideas which are according to our vision and mission are kept whereas the other ideas are discarded. We also calculate ROI at this stage.

 

3.      Concept Development and Testing – The ideas that have a potential to become successful products, their concepts are developed in this stage.

 

4.      Developing Marketing Strategies – Distribution channel, pricing of the product, promotional and advertising channels and strategies are included in this stage.

 

5.      Business Analysis – The risk associated with a project, projected sales and revenue, matching these risks with your financial ability, etc.

 

6.      Product Development - If the idea is considered and the top-level management is satisfied with the idea then the product development takes place. We build/develop the product in-line with the goals of the company. It can take months or even years.

 

7.      Test Marketing – We test the product in front of a set of target consumers. It also covers how your product will be packed and distributed.

 

8.      Commercialization – In this step you distribute the product in front of the entire market i.e.; launching of the product. It requires a lot of initial cost and infrastructure.