Product Adaptation - Definition, Importance, Factors & Example

Published in Marketing and Strategy Terms by MBA Skool Team

What is Product Adaptation?

Product adaptation is a strategy in which a new product is based on customizations or modifications on existing products. Product adaption looks to modify a product based on customer beliefs, preferences, culture etc. which is more popular in a particular geography or social group.

While the core product benefit remains the same, product adaption makes changes and alterations based on customer requirements.


Importance of Product Adaptation

A product is manufactured to provide a certain benefit. However, across the world, the same product can be perceived as well as consumed differently. While the core product remains the same, slight modifications can help reach out to a wider customer base. This strategy of adapting a product based on customer needs is product adaptation.

These products are sometimes internal products or they can be also competitors' product. These products don’t depend on innovations and are a mixture of previous products. It is sometimes modifying your existing product and re-launching it.

Factors for Product Adaptation

Product adaption is largely driven by the following factors:

Culture

Every society, country, city, state etc. has a specific culture which binds the people.

Certain products need to be modified based on a regions culture, religion, preferences, beliefs etc.

Laws

The laws and policies in a particular country demands some products to be altered, and hence product adaptation needs to be done.

Market Need

Sometimes a product needs to be altered to target a particular market based on demand and how developed the market is.

A highly developed market would need lot of features and differentiation for a product but a new market would require more functional and basic features of a product in a particular category.

Competitors

In certain businesses, product adaptation strategy is implemented because competitors have created a new segment by modifying an existing product demand.


Examples of Product Adaptation

Certain examples of product adaptation strategy are mentioned as below:

1.Car Models: Across the world, car models are modified or altered based on the country they are sold in. Some vehicles are left hand drive in countries like USA, France, Germany etc whereas right hand drive cars are available in India, UK, Australia etc. Hence the same car brand & model is adapted as per the laws.

2.Food products: Consider food brands like McDonald’s, Burger King, Pizza Hut etc. which have their food products sold worldwide. However, they have taken a product adaptation strategy by offering meal options like vegetarian, sea food based on food preferences etc. in the country of operation.

Hence, this concludes the definition of Product Adaptation along with its overview.

This article has been researched & authored by the Business Concepts Team. It has been reviewed & published by the MBA Skool Team. The content on MBA Skool has been created for educational & academic purpose only.

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