American Power Conversion (APC) helps homes and corporate environments protect against data loss, hardware damage and downtime. Its products include surge suppressors, uninterruptible power supplies, power conditioning equipment, power management software, DC power systems and precision cooling equipment – all designed with quality, innovation and customer support in mind. To keep ahead of competitors and to ensure the company understands its customers’ needs, APC looks to NPD’s consumer and retail information and insights. APC’s Competitor Analyst, David Wyman, recently shared his perspective on the value of NPD information.

NPD: What have been the greatest benefits of using NPD market information?

David Wyman: NPD information gives us the advantage of real data on our channel share that is timely and leads to actionable recommendations. This means we don’t have to guess where we stand among competitors – we actually know our share and our competitors’. It is critical for us to be able to obtain this kind of detailed information so we can identify where problems may exist and act on them quickly to stay ahead in our market.

NPD: What kinds of business challenges has NPD market information helped American Power Conversion address?

David Wyman: NPD information has been most valuable to us in the product development area. We use the data to determine what products we should develop for our customers.

NPD: How are NPD’s information and insights used across APC?

David Wyman: Use of NPD information varies across APC. Among our executives, some are most concerned with the big picture and use NPD information to analyze long- and short-term share trends. Others look very closely at some of the specific product sub-categories we have developed on our own to see where share defects exist. APC’s product managers are concerned about share in a lot of detail, and often rely on NPD information for answers to questions about specific SKUs to determine where our competitors are doing well. Pricing issues are also very important to our product managers, because they always want to make sure our products are priced appropriately compared to the competition. NPD information is also useful in helping product managers understand how new products are performing in the marketplace. Our marketing group uses the information, in part, as a way to monitor the impact of channel programs, advertising and related marketing activities.

NPD: In what ways has NPD market information been valuable to your business decision-making?

David Wyman: As the leading manufacturer of uninterruptible power supplies in the U.S., competitors are always targeting our position in the various channels. The data we receive from NPD provides us with very specific information on the strengths and weaknesses of the competition. This helps us make important decisions about product design and pricing in order to remain competitive and on top.

NPD: Can you provide a specific example of a challenge that NPD’s market information helped APC resolve?

David Wyman: Using the competitive intelligence from NPD, we were able to identify a very specific gap in our product line. As a result, we developed a new product line that helped us gain share in the channel. We then used NPD’s sales data to monitor our progress.

NPD: What would you say to manufacturers or retailers considering NPD’s market information services?

David Wyman: If you are doing business through the major IT distributors, retailers or catalog houses, there is no better way to obtain primary data on channel size and share than to use NPD information.