To create new offerings that serve unmet or unspoken needs, it is best to actually know what those needs are. To do that requires research into future consumer behavior – which, of course, can’t be measured. But what can be explored is what motivates future behavior. To gain this type of knowledge, it is necessary to engage the community of both current and potential customers.

Community Research and Development (Community R&D) is a knowledge discovery process for understanding how people think and choose. Community R&D uses a method called engagements (in-depth discussions driving at the reasoning behind choice and decision) with a relatively few key individuals to gain an understanding of the different types of potential future customers. Customers don’t all think alike, yet they influence each other, and collectively their behavior determines adoption rates.

The critical aspect of Community R&D is discovering those whose involvement will bring the greatest understanding. In the language of Community R&D, this work is called Community Building – creating a knowledge community of individuals who have the knowledge, both tacit and explicit, that you need to know.

What is a Knowledge Community?

A knowledge community consists of specific individuals who can help you understand the nature of an opportunity. These are individuals with diverse perspectives and who have something to contribute to the many facets of product adoption.

Table 1 below shows the differences between a Market and a Community. This contrast points to the need for different research methods in each domain.

Markets	Communities
Many Customers	No Customers
Clear Solutions	Fuzzy Problems
Specified Products	Proof-of-concept & Prototypes
Competitive Differentiation	Anticipated Performance
Pricing Strategies	Uncertain Competitors
Application Specifics	Application Possibilities
Use Context	Development Context
Defined Buying Process	Uncertain Buying Process
Reference Accounts	Technical Validation
Economic Value Exchange	Mutual Learning