Role of Digital Communication Platforms

Digital communication platforms serve as an important medium for enhancing communication between product users and product developers. These platforms have significantly changed the way businesses communicate and interact with consumers (Rathore, Ilavarasan & Dwivedi 2016). Further, digital communication platforms have considerably improved businesses’ ability to integrate consumers in the process of product development and improvement (Chan and Ip 2011).

Today, the design approach when it comes to product development has transited from traditional top down to a user-centred design. This is so because product users are more aware of what they need, are connected, and have access to various digital communication channels that help them to be more expressive (Bartl et al. 2012). In the current world, organisations that incorporate consumer opinions and reviews as input during product design have been able to develop exactly what consumers need while improving their existing products to match the expressed needs (Harmeling et al. 2017). Successful product development is found on product attributes and consumer requirements and satisfaction (Berisha-Namani 2013). Product attributes are computed from consumer beliefs and their previous experience, which implies that listening to consumer opinions helps firms develop satisfactory products. Additionally, reviewing consumer opinions and reviews help organisations understand what customers require and what they need to be satisfied, which is significant input for product development.

Digital word of mouth, also known as consumer communication on the internet, has been identified as a significant source of product information, which influences product development (Bakos and Dellarocas 2011). In this digital era, consumers search for information online and once they use a product, they use internet to express their views about the product. This implies that firms seeking to develop products that consumers are looking for should be active in reviewing consumer digital word on mouth.

In line with the above discussion, the aim of this research is to conceptualise the role of consumer digital word of mouth in product development and improvement. The sections of the paper will be introduction, literature review, methodology, findings, and discussion of the findings. Based on the research findings, recommendations will be deciphered.

References

Bakos, Y. and Dellarocas, C., 2011. Cooperation without enforcement? a comparative analysis of litigation and online reputation as quality assurance mechanisms. Management Science, 57(11), pp.1944-1962.

Bartl, M., Füller, J., Mühlbacher, H. and Ernst, H., 2012. A manager's perspective on virtual customer integration for new product development. Journal of Product Innovation Management, 29(6), pp.1031-1046.

Berisha-Namani, M. 2013, "INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY, INTERNET, AND MARKETING", International Journal of Electronic Commerce Studies, vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 103-109.

Chan, S.L. and Ip, W.H., 2011. A dynamic decision support system to predict the value of customer for new product development. Decision Support Systems, 52(1), pp.178-188.

Floyd, K., Freling, R., Alhoqail, S., Cho, H.Y. & Freling, T. 2014, "How Online Product Reviews Affect Retail Sales: A Meta-analysis", Journal of Retailing, vol. 90, no. 2, pp. 217-232.

Harmeling, C.M., Moffett, J.W., Arnold, M.J. & Carlson, B.D. 2017, "Toward a theory of customer engagement marketing", Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, vol. 45, no. 3, pp. 312-335.

Rathore, A.K., Ilavarasan, P.V. & Dwivedi, Y.K. 2016, "Social media content and product co-creation: an emerging paradigm", Journal of Enterprise Information Management, vol. 29, no. 1, pp. 7-18.