Before bringing any product into the market, you need to take necessary and specific steps to ensure that your product doesn’t fail. Many entrepreneurs have a great product but they don’t market it correctly or they fail to invest sufficient time and money into the final product.
It’s easy to get excited about your new product when all you can see is the possible sales and success but, without very careful planning, you may just be setting yourself up for defeat. Here are five things to think about before bringing your product to the market.
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Validate Your Product
First, you need to establish whether there is a need for your product or if you are just saturating the market too much to be successful. There are only so many types of businesses that can cater to the same market need before they become redundant. You don’t want your product to be left in the dust, or worse, completely forgotten because you didn’t have something unique to offer. Even with a truly great product, if there aren’t enough people interested, your business will fall flat.
Conduct Market Research
This builds on validating your product. Once you have made sure that your product is in demand, you need to understand just how much of a demand that is. You may be able to find sufficient research online that validates your ideas, but you are better off doing a few personalized focus groups or interviews with the people you are trying to sell to. This concept works the same as establishing proof of your idea, by testing the market to see if anyone is interested, and what the general customer feedback is regarding that product.
Manufacturing Processes
Any product can fail because simple overhead costs were overlooked or a subpar manufacturer was used to create the product. Put together a strategic plan of how you are going to secure a production line. Using identification solutions is one way to ensure the quality of your product by using high-speed inkjet coders and automatic labeling software. You can find out more about these solutions from Diagraph at https://www.diagraph.com/.
Create a Brand Personality
Successful brands tend to have a specific personality attached, for example, caring about the environment by making eco-friendly water bottles. Don’t just be another entrepreneur. Rather, think about how you want your product to be seen and whether it will address something specific. Are you fighting a specific cause or are you just trying to sell yet another product everyone has already heard of?
Based on your specific product, there might be a good and a bad time of the year to enter the market. The end of the year around Christmas time is very difficult because most people are on holiday, and even investors won’t be interested in spending their family time working. Your pricing also has to be competitive enough that you aren’t seen as a high-end luxury many can’t afford, but that you can still compete fairly against others in the market. Once you have these basic concepts in mind, you can start to think about marketing and making a name for yourself.
