An Alternative Approach to the Predictive Validation of Conjoint Models

We propose an approach to the predictive validation of conjoint models that overcomes several limitations of current approaches. There are situations in which a company, after completing a conjoint study, can compare the actual sales of two (or more) of its products in the same product-market, in approximately the same timeframe, and with approximately the same level of marketing support. We assess predictive validity by comparing the ratio of the actual sales of product A vs. product B with the corresponding ratio of choice shares predicted by the conjoint study. The results from four empirical tests confirm the predictive validity of the self-explicated approach to conjoint modeling.