Out Of Box Experience Market Research
What can Out of Box Experience Market Research Do for My Business?
- Ensuring that your products are easily unboxed and setup, ensuring that the initial experience that your customer has with your device is positive.
- Minimize the calls to your technical support call centers, thus reducing costs.
- Ensure that the sales representatives in the stores that sell your products can tout the fact that the setup is simple due to great planning and engineering (often used as a product differentiator - think Apple products).
- Reduce product return due to customers mistakenly believing that the product is failing, when in fact they've simply plugged the wrong cable in.
What is Out of Box Experience Market Research?
This is a newer type of research, and it's typically referred to as "ooh-bee" for short. This type of research is most often done one products that are functionally more complex (and typically more expensive - such as computers or gaming equipment) and are often done in special facilities such as focus groups or even more special facilities that are designed especially for Out of Box Experience market research.
The "out-of-box experience" is typically the first impressions that are created as an end user (customer) attempts to unbox the product and make any necessary adjustments or connections to get the product to function and connect with any other devices that are necessary. The point of this type of research is to ensure that the Out of Box Experience is a simple, intuitive process that requires as little technical training as possible (one example of a change that most likely came out of OOBE research is the color coded cable ends that have become common on many TV's, computers and stereo equipment).
How Does Branding Market Research Work?
The research includes recruiting a respondent who is likely to purchase a product in this category, and doesn't have any special technical training (such as being an IT Manager or an electronics guru). They are typically asked to come to a special facility and are given sealed box just like they would receive out of a retail store, or from a UPS driver if they ordered it through the web or by phone. In most cases there is one person in the room with them that simply instructs them to act as though it was a brand new product of their own and unbox it and set it up. The respondent is asked to "think out loud" as much as possible so it's clear when they're unclear where their decision points are, and how they decide which route to take.
All the tools that are necessary are made available, and the person that is present is very careful to avoid saying anything that could provide clues or direction as far as how the setup should be done. With particularly complex products these sessions can last for 2 or 3 hours when problem arise.
