Using Market Intelligence For Your Product Launch
This article is called How to Use Market Intelligence for Your Product Launch. It’s not easy to successfully launch a new product in any market. For very highly competitive arenas, like cleaning products or magazines, the success rate can be as low as 15% – and these companies tend to have significant resources behind them. Even then, over half also reported going over their launch budget. New and smaller companies need to be smarter to stand a chance of success and ensure they have the right market intelligence.
Market Intelligence
We offer our thoughts on the topics you may need when researching your market for a product launch. When you launch a product, you would like to achieve the revenue targets you have agreed to, steadily grow your sales while increasing profits, and ensure you are getting a good return on your marketing budgets. The best way to get a return is to make sure you have researched your potential target audience to ensure you make smart marketing decisions. But what sort of Market Intelligence is suitable for your needs?
Know your customers’ problems?
As a product manager, you will have already looked at what potential consumer problems your product features will resolve. But you are only halfway. How will you communicate your solution with the tools you have in your arsenal? Clearly and simply write down how you will improve your potential customers’ lives. You can’t be all things to all men. You are going to turn off many potential customers. But how will you get the others to love you? You can’t be seen to lose sales by causing confusion and not being able to differentiate yourself from a competitor’s alternative.
Could you keep it simple?
Remember to use plain English and cut out the industry jargon. Customers are not usually bothered about the type of steel you have used or the details of the tech inside the box. They only care about what will benefit them if they buy your product.
What else is out there?
Look at the market and determine what similar products to yours are saying to their buyers. Understand the problem the products are solving and determine if your competitors are missing any tricks. Look at the pricing strategies of the alternative products.
Where do they live?
Now, look at where your customers live, their age, their spending habits, and where they shop. If you are not selling directly, use Market Intelligence to find out where your potential customers shop. Are they online? Do they use individual retailers? Are they top-end or low-end? Do they go through sales agents or distributors?
If online, go more in-depth and look at the search terms and keywords people will use to find your product. Can your product be promoted on YouTube? If so, YouTube is comparably cheap, and its popularity is growing significantly.
What do they read and watch?
What media do your potential customers read? Even big companies have to be very careful when it comes to spending on advertising. Isolate the top publications, develop relationships with the editors, and provide industry-related content. It only works if you target your advertising. So, use Market Intelligence to understand where and what your customers read.
- What magazines
- Newspapers do they read
- Industry-specific trade publications
Conclusion
This article was about using market intelligence for your product launch. Many things can impact new product launches, and having the right market intelligence will improve the chances of success. It will allow you to choose the marketing tools needed to support a launch. Market intelligence will also enable you to select targeted media and write great calls to action that encourage the consumer to contact you to ensure you get a return on investment with your marketing efforts.
We are Octopus. The Global People-Powered Competitive Intelligence Agency.
Outsmart your competition. Make the unknown known. Octopus helps you gain clarity in complex markets. With clients and tentacles around the world, we deliver sharp, actionable competitive intelligence through a blend of deep primary (HUMINT) and secondary research. If you’re looking to make smarter decisions, beat the competition, and reduce uncertainty, we’re the partner you want on your side.
