Improve every stage of the product development process

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Automotive Product Consulting Hero
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Integrate Voice of the Consumer

We work with clients to integrate the Voice of the Customer and industry benchmark data into each of the below solutions in order to develop improvement activities that are scaled to the unique culture and conditions of your organization.

Automotive product consulting solutions include:

Customer Requirements Target Setting

How do we know if we’re reaching our quality and satisfaction requirements? What proactive steps can we take to improve end-user satisfaction?

Helps define market requirements and develop priorities for a new model. Those requirements are translated into numerical quality and satisfaction targets reflecting necessary priorities and performance levels.

Benefits:

  • Develop accurate understanding of market/segment/customer requirements
  • Set detailed targets both overall and at the individual attribute level
  • Obtain execution recommendations to support target achievement
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Vehicle Evaluation (VE)

How do we prevent overall vehicle problems from reaching consumers? What vehicle design elements will satisfy consumers?

Provides an independent and advanced assessment of product/system likes and dislikes from the perspective of customers, as well as build quality, material selection, and content examination.

Benefits:

  • Apply corrective action prior to vehicle launch
  • Assist in vehicle and sales delivery modifications prior to formal launch in the U.S. market
  • Reduce potential adverse customer impact, warranty expenses, and improve overall satisfaction with the product and brand

Component Evaluation (CE)

How should this component be integrated into a vehicle in order to prevent defect problems, while simultaneously satisfying our end consumers’ needs? 

Provides a focused examination of a specific vehicle component throughout the design and implementation period to ensure that it is well-integrated into the vehicle from a Voice of the Customer perspective. 

Benefits:

  • Address potential usability issues
  • Maximize component satisfaction through deeper understanding of VoC metrics firsthand
  • Leverage evaluator insight and knowledge regarding competitive executions
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Countermeasure Workshop

What are customers citing as system performance problems? How can we work to resolve these problems?

Organized for development teams to review action plans for resolution of top issues and verify problem count reduction estimates. Helps identify customer-cited issues with regard to performance in order to align root cause to issues and ensure thoroughness of countermeasures

Benefits: 

  • Provide realistic plans for achieving targeted IQS performance
  • Provide opinions on the viability of the fixes and related IQS savings estimation
  • Drive corrective actions that are realistic and appropriate for IQS improvement plans
  • Align product changes and quality improvement initiatives to VoC

Accelerated Quality Study (AQS)

How will our vehicle’s usage fare over a long- term period? What can we do now to improve long-term issues prior to launch?

Simulate effects of long-term vehicle usage in a much  shorter, and therefore actionable, time frame. An accelerated mileage accumulation uses IQS and APEAL framework to provide a Voice of the Customer-centric evaluation of pre-production vehicles (or components) vs. benchmark vehicles (or components) to uncover potential quality and difficult to understand/use issues prior to launch. 

Benefits: 

  • Obtain early visibility of durability issues
  • Validate countermeasure implementation while program is in progress
  • Align future vehicle launches with market expectations
AQS
CPE

Customer Placement Evaluation (CPE)

What will consumers think of our new model? What corrective measures should we implement before the vehicle is mass produced? What can our retailers do to mitigate potential issues during vehicle delivery?

Provides early feedback on new models just prior to launch. Consumers drive the new model for up to 3 weeks,  then provide their perception of the vehicle’s strengths and weaknesses from the IQS and APEAL perspective. Recommendations for problems that can be corrected prior to launch based on findings.

Benefits: 

  • Obtain real-world customer reaction that mirrors market launch
  • Utilize early feedback to correct potential vehicle problems
  • Facilitate ongoing interaction between development team and target customer

Post-Production Quality Validation

Do any issues exist with customer-ready vehicles that could impact satisfaction? How can we identify and prevent systemic issues from reaching the customer? 

Identifies systemic and isolated defects from the customer’s perspective, as customer-ready vehicles/components leave final assembly at the manufacturer or supplier.

Benefits: 

  • Prioritize issues from a customer’s perspective for both resolution and prevention
  • Audit staff to better understand what is expected from a consumer
  • Identify gaps in a plant’s Quality Operating System as well as its Customer Audit process
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IQS/DTU Delivery Assessment

How can we assess how our retailers are performing? How can we address known difficult-to-use issues at the dealership to improve product quality satisfaction?

Provides in-depth, in-store  analysis, consultation, and training of all  elements and aspects related to vehicle management, customer delivery, and Difficult to Use (DTU) training.

Benefits:

  • Improve customer satisfaction, as reflected by IQS and SSI (delivery) purchasing results with related aspects of the vehicle-purchasing experience
  • Identify overarching process gaps and themes with standards/guidelines to inform broader improvement package
  • Assess the vehicle delivery process to determine appropriate use of OE delivery tools and proper explanation of DTUs
  • Review dealer intake process, PDI, vehicle preparation, and vehicle storage to identify conditions not conducive to providing an exceptional vehicle delivery

Vehicle Package Optimization

How can you ensure you are offering consumers the right combination of vehicle feature packages? How do we reduce output variation?

Provides comprehensive intelligence into enhanced content, pricing, residual and profitability strategies to improve model competitiveness. Encompasses a unique blend of quantitative and qualitative research that deliver actionable recommendations focused on strengthening both the vehicle model and overall brand.

Benefits:

  • Clearly identify trim roles
  • Understand unique sales positioning and gauge how competitors are performing
  • Reduce cost by ultimately minimizing the number vehicle model line-up variations
VPO

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