Starting your own business, developing a product, and then launching it seems like a daunting list of things to accomplish. But there’s another equally important piece that you can’t forget about if you really want your product—and your business—to be a success. Successfully marketing your product is crucial to your sales and the future of your business. It’s easy to let marketing take a back seat, though, when you’re working as hard as you can to launch your product on time. Still, you don’t want to get caught without a clear and strong marketing strategy. So here are some tips for marketing your product based business, even if you feel like you don’t have the time.
Know Your Customer Base
The more specific you can get here, the better. You’re not just marketing your product to women in general, you’re marketing it to a certain demographic contained within “women.” Maybe it’s women who are married with children, or maybe it’s young professionals living in an urban area. Whatever the case, you need to do some market research and dig down into who exactly will be buying your product. The more specific you can get, the easier it will be to tailor your marketing efforts.
Focus On Benefits
Maybe your product has some features that you’re really excited about. You feel like they’re game changers, and you can’t imagine that people won’t love it. Here’s the thing—not everyone gets excited when they hear about new features. Most of us miss out on things our phones can do every day and it doesn’t really bother us all that much. Focus on what benefits those features will bring to your customers’ lives. Translate your product’s capabilities into tangible benefits for your average customer.
Reach Out
This means getting in touch with thought leaders and influencers in your industry. There are blogs and social media groups for just about every industry and market segment you can imagine. If you don’t already read and interact with leaders in your industry, now’s the time to get started. Let them know what you’re doing, get feedback from them, and even give them an early look at your product. These people can be invaluable when you’re launching a product and need to get noticed. If there isn’t a community around your industry already, then build it. You’re in the perfect position to do so with your new product.
Keep Up With Your Customers
It’s important not to take it for granted that past customers will come back to your business when you launch a new product. The internet provides people with countless options for most products and services. Keep in touch with your customers through social media and email. Personalize your interactions and make them feel like part of a community. Give your best customers early notification and allow them to pre-order if it’s possible.
Don’t let the marketing side of your business overwhelm you. Contact Pivot today to see how we make product development and manufacturing easy.
