The Product Launching Secret That the Gurus Want You to Ignore

If you have a product that you want to launch on-line, make sure that you read this article before you do anything else. There is a very bad bit of advice that is running rampant around the Internet, regarding product launches and if you read on, you will find out all about it and how to avoid it.

First, let's start with the so-called guru advice that is being spread everywhere. Most people would recommend that you develop a list or prospects, create a lot of buzz about the product for a few weeks or months until launch day and then once you you launch the product, for a limited time you sell the product for a deep discount to your biggest fans.

This is a GREAT way to make a lot of money in a short time, however, this is a really lousy way to develop sales and build a business for the long term. Most gurus out there are just collecting money from one seminar promotion to the next or from one huge course launch to the next, offering steep discounts, but then doubling or tripling the cost after the launch.

What if they had a customer that was about to buy, but still wanted more information? What if they had a customer that did not read their email for awhile, but would have purchased the product? Now you have alienated these people and they will probably never buy, seeing that they will now have to pay much more than everyone else did on launch day.

So, what should you do instead? Offer extra bonuses and add-ons to go with the product on launch day. These items will not be available to anyone else once the launch day is over. However, you shouldn't change the price of your product. This will end up rewarding the people that buy early, but the people that want to think about it longer, or read reviews later down the road, will not feel as if they are being overcharged.

There is a terrible precedent that is being set all over the Internet with product launching and if followed with every product, the business owner will only be able to survive by jumping from one launch to the next, having to create an endless stream of content. All of that can be avoided by taking just a slightly different approach when launch day arrives. Your customers will thank you and so will your business.

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Launching A New Product? 5 Necessary Questions to Ask

The launch of a new product is often the end-result of intensive research, planning, and strategising. While this may not be a problem for large organisations with dedicated marketing teams and generous budgets, it can be quite the challenge for the cash-strapped, overworked small business owner to get the right balance.

But by asking 5 simple questions about your product, you can have the foundation of a product launch strategy within minutes.

1. Is your product tangible or digital/intangible?

Tangible products can be held and felt, intangible products cannot. If your product is tangible, you would need to consider logistics, for example, storage, transport and delivery. Think about how delivering your products to a broader audience will influence your delivery costs. And will you need more storage space to hold higher stock levels?

Intangible and digital products, therefore, may be less complicated to sell via the Internet than their tangible counterparts.

2. Does your product have search or material characteristics?

Search characteristics imply that your potential customers can decide to purchase your product or service purely by viewing information about it. For example, you're able to purchase a holiday simply by viewing pictures of the accommodation and customer reviews. A holiday, therefore. has search characteristics.

Products that need further evaluation through smell, taste, touch or sound have material characteristics. When planning your launch strategy for material products, consider whether potential customers would need to have "testers" before buying. If yes, you may need to support your online launch with traditional methods to allow your customers to experience the product.

3. In which stage of the Product Life Cycle (PLC) is your product?

In the introductory stage of the PLC, the product is introduced to your target market. Your launch strategy should create a need within potential customers and marketing activities may include heavy expenditure in advertising to create an awareness of the brand or product and communicate its benefits

In the growth stage, the brand or product is accepted by a critical mass, and you can concentrate your efforts on maintaining and growing market share as competitors enter the market.

In the maturity stage, competition intensifies. The costs associated with acquiring new customers increase so you should focus on maintaining loyalty. The last stage of the PLC is the decline stage. As sales decline, you can either discontinue the product or reinvent it, thereby restarting a new life cycle.

4. Is your product durable or non-durable?

Durable products are products that are capable of surviving many uses (such as appliances and cars) and non-durables are perishable products that are used up after one or more uses (for example, food). If your product is durable, you may have to focus on customer acquisition strategies instead of retention strategies because repeat purchases are likely to be few and far between.

5. Is your product perceived as a convenience, shopping, or specialty product?

Convenience products are those that the consumer is not willing to spend time, money or effort in locating, evaluating and purchasing, for example, pantyhose and bread. Packaging is important to sell the product.

For shopping products, consumers want to make price, quality and suitability comparisons. They make the time and effort to plan their purchases and the product with the best set of attributes is bought. When product attributes are perceived as similar, price is the deciding factor.

Specialty products are those in which the consumer's buying behaviour is directed at securing a particular good, service or idea without regard to time, effort and expense. Consumers are loyal to their brand, store and person. They will pay a premium price for their products and will not accept a product substitute.

Putting it all together

The next step in planning your product launch is to characterise your product according to these 5 characteristics.

For example, a tangible, non-durable, shopping product with material characteristics in the introductory stage of the PLC will have a totally dofferent strategy to a digital, durable, speciality product with search characteristics in the maturity stage of the PLC.

Once you understand the dynamics of these 5 characteristics and how they can influence your strategy, your product launch will be the easiest part of your overall marketing strategy.

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