Feature Analysis of an Information Systems Product Development

Improving the product development processes are gaining importance as the competitive business environment creates this need. "Customer" becomes the main focus in the new product development area and customer desires take the first place in this matter. To coordinate the product development processes, companies increase collaboration, and support decision making between the customers and the firm. This study aims to understand & characterize potential users of a new product through idea sharing of users and create a new product concept through developing the common features that users prefer most. Especially during the product conceptualization stage, the customer ideas are taken through two-phase study. In this paper, we will summarize the first phase of the study; a pretest questionnaire that tries to understand the target users and which functions and features they give priority, compare their preferences and the level of them by using scales. The product is the e-mail systems. The existing e-mail usage characteristics of the current products have been collected from Internet, written resources and catalogs of these products. These existing characteristics are compared with the ideal e-mail system characteristics and scaled in the questionnaire study. The findings of this study become the feedback for the extended interview