MaxDiff

Why this matters for your decision

When developing an offer, you often have more possible features, benefit arguments or claims than fit on one page. MaxDiff shows what matters most to people by comparison. This helps reduce a long list to a few candidates, for example for a product page, a tariff bundle or a campaign.

But MaxDiff shows what is important, not what it may cost and not whether an offer is chosen. An attribute can rank first and still not justify a price premium.

How MaxDiff works

Respondents see several rounds, each with four to five items from a longer list. In each round, they choose the most important and the least important. From these choices, a statistical model calculates a value for each item, which can be shown as a share or an index. The standard reference on the method describes theory, experimental design and analysis in detail.

Variants such as anchored MaxDiff add a question on whether the items are relevant at all, so that not only relative but also absolute statements become possible.

Example

A manufacturer has twelve possible features for a cordless kitchen machine. MaxDiff puts these at the top: integrated scale (index 182), cooking function up to 120 degrees (index 164), app recipes (index 71).

Whether the cooking function supports a price premium of €80 is not something MaxDiff answers. For that, two variants run in a Painted Door Test: with cooking function for €399, without for €319. Measured purchase intent shows whether the most important feature is also relevant to payment.

When MaxDiff makes sense

MaxDiff is worthwhile when a long list has to shrink to a few candidates: ten to thirty features, benefit arguments, claims or name ideas. The method is robust against different response styles because it uses no scale, and it delivers results that can be compared well across segments.

It is less suitable when items depend on each other, when price is part of the question or when the decision is between a few finished offers. In those cases, a conjoint or a behavioural test is the sensible next step.

How it differs

Conjoint analysis combines attributes with prices into offers and thus also calculates willingness to pay; MaxDiff ranks individual items without price. Classic importance scales ask about each item separately and differentiate less well. A Painted Door Test does not measure importance, but whether a concrete offer with a price is chosen.

Limitations

MaxDiff is a survey: the ranking describes stated, not observed preference. The values are relative to the tested list; if an important item is missing, this goes unnoticed. And the method says nothing about willingness to pay. For feature and pricing decisions, it is therefore a good first filter, but not the last step.