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Speaking Question 6

Now listen to part of a lecture in a business class.

(female) If a consumer has to choose between two products, what

determines the choice? Assume that someone, a purchaser, is choosing between two products that cost the same. Ok? If people have a choice between two identically-priced products, which one will they choose? They choose the one they think is of the higher quality, of course. But what does it mean for a product to be a high-quality product? Well, business analysts usually speak of two major factors of quality: one factor is reliability and the other is what we called features.

So reliability. What’s reliability? Well, a product is reliable if it works the way we expect it to work, if it can go a reasonable amount of time without needing repairs. If a product, a car for example, doesn’t work the way it should and needs repairs too soon, we say it’s unreliable. So product reliability means, basically, the absence of defects or problems that you weren’t expecting. It used to be that when people thought about product’s quality, they thought mainly about reliability.

Today, it’s different. People still do care about reliability, don’t get me wrong, it’s just that manufacturing standards are now so high that, we’ll take cars for example today. Today’s cars are very reliable. So reliability is important but it’s not gonna be the deciding factor. So if reliability isn’t the deciding factor anymore, what is?

Features! All those extras! The things a product has that aren’t necessary but that make it easier to use or to make it cool! For example, new cars today are loaded with features like electric windows, sun roofs, air-conditioning, stereos and so forth. When people are comparing products today, they look at features, because reliabilities pretty much equal across the board. And that’s why manufacturers include so many features in their products.”