Best Practices

Learn how to be more efficient in your testing, bolster innovation and design good tests that follow sensory best practices.

Design Good Tests
Ensure your tests are designed to provide reliable and robust outcomes.
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Establish a Brand Standard
Learn how to elevate your brand standards by defining your product.
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Be More Efficient
Reduce your project’s time and cost using Compusense Cloud.
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Design Good Tests

Sensory testing is a valuable risk management tool that can prevent companies from experiencing product disasters and help inform new product development. There are three things that sensory science can accomplish:

  • Determine if a product has changed (discrimination)
  • Measure the sensory properties of products (descriptive analysis)
  • Determine consumer responses to products (consumer research)

Since getting the test right is of paramount importance, that means we have to design the test properly to assure a reliable and robust outcome.

The Importance of Experimental Design

In sensory testing, the most common source of bias is the effect of order of sample evaluation. The first sample we see or taste is perceived differently because it’s a fresh experience. When we get the second sample, we have the first sample’s impact influencing our response.

The experimental design, that is the order of sample presentation, can be rotated and balanced to ensure that all samples are treated in the same manner and that the test is fair. If we insert a warm-up sample at the start of each sample set that is neither evaluated nor measured, then the effect is equal for all samples in the test.

Complete Block Designs

If we have too many samples to evaluate in one sitting, we can use sessions to manage our study. The large complete block design (CBD) can be sliced into columns and a limited number of columns may be presented in each sitting. This way the whole block can be evaluated over several days, or even weeks if the samples are sufficiently stable to permit doing so.
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Balanced Incomplete Block Designs

We can also opt for balanced incomplete block (BIB) designs that ensure that all samples are seen equally, but no one sees all the samples. The size of the block is based upon what an assessor can manage to evaluate in one session without compromising data quality by fatigue or carry-over. It is possible to balance blocks over sessions to have all samples seen by each assessor.
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Sensory Informed Designs (SID)

This BIB technique begins with determining the sensory profiles of the products through descriptive analysis. We ensure that the products chosen cover the sensory space, the range of attributes and their intensities, of the product category. The incomplete blocks are made using products that have a sensory contrast and can be used to cluster our consumers on their liking response.

SID category appraisals have been conducted with consumers only testing 6 out of 16 possible products. This approach cuts the cost of these studies in half and delivers excellent products development guidance.
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Establish a Brand Standard

The Challenge

When a loyal consumer experiences your product, they consider it to be their own product. Iconic brands must deliver with consumer expectations in mind, or risk breaking faith with their core customers.

In the 1980’s Marks & Spencer introduced sensory specification into their private label purchasing process. To this day, leading retailers rely on their private label suppliers to establish sensory specifications that move beyond consumer liking to a standard of brand identity that defines the product.

The Solution

The main sensory analysis tool that helps us define sensory properties objectively is descriptive analysis. The proprietary Compusense Feedback Calibration, also referred to as FCM, was introduced in 2003 and has become the most efficient and effective method for training and maintaining proficient descriptive analysis panels.

Results

By using immediate feedback to train panelists, it takes as little as two sessions to train panelists with individual onscreen guidance.

Panelists input their response to specific attributes using a series of line scales. The screen displays their response in comparison to an established range. The feedback is immediate and accurate in identifying how close their response was to the target.

The immediacy and accuracy of the feedback acts as reinforcement, subsequently expediting panelists’ learning curve and calibrating their responses to the target range. The collected data is consistently precise and repeatable and will not only deliver your sensory gold standard profile, but will allow you to track any changes over time, including ingredient substitution and manufacturing location. These definitive profiles will help you guide all new development and future expansions objectively.

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Be More Efficient

The Challenge

Consumer testing provides confidence in your product and the quality of data from testing is dependent on getting the recruit right in the first place. A well-recruited database of 5000+ consumers provides a solid base for selection of panelists. Typically consumer panels are comprised of 100 category or brand consumers. Using antiquated methods, 100 panelists would require up to 60 hours of recruitment, interviewing, selecting and scheduling.

The Solution

Online screening, using Compusense Cloud, is the first step in qualifying respondents that meet the test’s demographic quotas. By using quotas, only as many consumers as necessary will complete the test, keeping costs and the number of required samples down. Qualified consumers are then able to immediately book their own time slot to participate in the product test using the scheduling tool. If for some reason a panelist can no longer make their original appointment, individuals can return and reschedule themselves in a new time slot.

Results

Using Compusense Cloud, recruitment, screening and scheduling of 100 panelists can be completed in less than two hours, translating into a 97 per cent reduction in labour. This approach results in saving the equivalent of about two weeks of work and knocks a week off the project timeline. The Compusense Cloud approach to recruiting and scheduling can save thousands of dollars and deliver results in half the time.

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Test Better with Compusense Cloud

We recognize the important role that best practices play in driving positive outcomes within sensory testing and evaluation. Discover how you can integrate consumer testing with Compusense Cloud’s recruitment and scheduling.
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