Knowledgebase: How To Introduce New Products

How To Introduce New Products

Introducing a new product line is not always easy. There is a high chance that your new products may flop. According to a study 80% of new products actually fail. This number is surely something that sellers should worry about. 

There are a lot of factors that can contribute to the success or failure of a product. A couple of which are the budget that is given to back the project, how well you can market the product and if the consumer would actually want to buy the product. 

However, there is one particular factor that often gets overlooked which you need to give more attention to. This is the product’s preliminary introduction to the market. It is crucial to launch your product right.  If your product launch goes sideways then your product will belong to the 80% of failed products and you would have wasted time, effort and money.

Listed below are 5 ways for a successful product introduction.

Know Your Competition

Study your competitors. You can do this by performing SWOT analysis which will help you know your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.

Take a look at your competitors if they are offering products or services similar to yours. Having products and services that are entirely unique and different from your existing competitors, it is of great importance to put yourself in your customers’ shoes and imagine why and why not buy your products. It can be possible that there is a better and cheaper alternative to your product. Review the channels of advertising and distribution of your competitors. Evaluate how your product and services will be able to hold up against what your competitors are currently offering to their customers. 

Know Your Target Audience

For a successful launch of new products to happen, you must know who your target customers are. It is of importance to focus on the needs of the customers you believe are most likely to purchase from you. It is possible that your present customers who are currently buying something similar will appreciate the added features that your product or services offers. Your target audience must be able to recognize the need for what you are offering, can afford to buy your product and is willing to buy the product. Keep in mind that it is always better to fill your customers’ need than to actually create one.

Reaching Your Target Audience

After knowing who you are going to cater to, you must then know how to reach your target audience. Will you be marketing your products via email or social media or will you pay a hefty sum of money to companies and let them advertise for you? 

In the past, a lot of businesses, especially big corporations advertise their brand and product through tv and radio commercials but in recent years that has shifted. Though tv advertisements are still effective, most business owners and marketers nowadays choose to advertise their brand and products through social media platforms. This is proving to be an effective idea too.

With the increasing number of people using social media because of the new normal you can reach lots of audiences in a very short time. Once your target audience sees your advertisement and likes your product they can just click or search your brand name and instantly make an order. To increase anticipation and hype of a product, pre-orders are usually done to be able to assess how many people are willing to purchase your product. An example of this would be Samsung, a few weeks before the official selling of a certain phone Samsung would be accepting pre-orders and to make the customers buy now rather than later they throw in freebies such as speakers, watch or earphones.   

Timing Your Product Launch

Timing for a new product launch can either make or break your product. This may sound silly but proper timing can be the difference on what makes your product successful than others. Think of it this way. Will you launch swimming shorts in the winter? Will you be launching winter coats in the summer? You may wonder why the smartphone industries such as Samsung, Real me, Oppo, Vivo are launching new phones now?

You may say it made no sense on launching new phones when businesses are closing down because of the Covid-19 pandemic. However, these smartphone giants saw an opportunity. With the shift of study from home and work from home people are inclined to buy phones because they need to, if they chose not to buy then chances are that they will not be able to attend school or work. Another question that needs to be asked is is there enough cash to back the product launch?

Also, taking a long time hyping up or creating demand for your product and failing to launch it on time can make potential customers be weary of our product and thus giving the brand a bad reputation.

Understanding Your Product’s Lifecycle

As the owner or manager, it is your responsibility to monitor your product’s maturity. If your product is still selling strongly then let it continue on selling but if you see that your product’s sales are diminishing then this is an indication that it is time to revise the product and do more research; whether it is to improve the product or make a new product line. You may also need to change your message to the consumers when you produce another product. This can be a starting point to find the next great idea. Where the next product that you will produce will have a very strong demand.