In today’s world, where the news travels almost as fast as the speed of light, it is crucial for every business organization to come up with brilliant and compelling ideas every now and then to sustain in this competitive market. Launching a new promising product or service does seem like a brilliant idea, but convincing the prospects and turning them into consumers can be a lot more challenging.
Earlier, it was quite easier to launch a new product in the market. You could avail the help of a PR agency to create several press releases regarding the launch of new product or service and organize a press conference where every significant media houses would cover the news. The reporters might take a few days to verify the facts or to collect other relevant information for the stories. On the launch day, you could relax and let the news articles do their job.
Well, a lot of things have changed since then. The new media landscape has forced a change the way market planning used to work. Even if you are trying to make a headline with the launch of a new product, it may get people’s attention, but that can be forgotten in minutes the unceasing flow of latest news bury your announcement deep in the consumers’ minds.
As a business professional, you must understand the significance of a marketing plan. It not only helps you to outperform your competitors, but it allows you to add more value to your brand image. In fact, statistics reveal that the businesses with concrete marketing plans have been more successful than those with no plans in the recent times. It is evident that you need to adapt new tactics to grab the eyeballs of your prospects, and in this article, we are going to discuss several effective steps that can allow you to construct an impeccable marketing plan for the launch of your new product or service.
1) Give it an early start:
You can’t always expect the reporters to publish an article regarding your new product whenever you desire. It might happen a few decades back, but it’s not that easy in today’s date. So start preparing before you plan the launch. You can start your outreach activities a couple of months before the official launch of the product. In fact, you can adapt the rolling launch approach, where you gradually introduce your new product in the market. In this strategy, you can continue the outreach activity even after the official launch.
2) Develop unique selling proposition (USP):
Consumers usually look for a product that has a unique quality which no other product in the market can exhibit. The uniqueness can appear in various ways. It can be the price of the product/service, the method of the service, its quality, the size and color of the product, or a few other attributes. Coming up with a new product may not be same as introducing something unique. Innovating something new and identifying its distinguishing feature is what needed to identify the USP of the product or service. The USP of the product or service can also be used as a tool to turn quite a few prospects into leads.
3) Place your business features as benefits to the consumer:
To create a successful marketing plan, it is important to understand that whatever the product or service is, it should benefit the consumers. If your customers don’t find anything in your product or service that is beneficial to him/her, then he/she may not be interested in purchasing your product/service. So it is crucial to promote those elements that are beneficial to the customers.
You can boast about several offers regarding your product or service, but until and unless there’s something that appears useful to the customer, it will be hard for you to organize a successful marketing campaign. For instance, imagine you are promoting a cell-phone brand that is going to launch a new mobile phone in the market in five different colors. It may attract a certain amount of crowd, but it doesn’t really benefit the customers in terms of service. Well, if you promote the fact that it can help you make a call faster, or access the internet faster, then that may hit the right set of strings.
4) Determine the target market:
Before making you develop your marketing plan, determine which group of people you want to sell your product or service to. Say, for example, you are making a marketing plan for a new premium class sedan. You cannot just address anyone in the market and expect a positive response from that person. As you may know, premium class sedans are quite expensive, and it is targeted towards the business class people or people from the upper-middle class. So, in that case, your target market would be that.
You need to consider certain characteristics for the group you are targeting. You can segment the market based on age group, gender, or even socioeconomic status. Your product or service may have multiple target groups, and you need to define the factor that convinces them to buy your product or service for each target group. If you are planning the marketing for a two-wheeler, it can be appealing to the middle-aged people because of its pricing and comfort, while for the youngsters its stylish look and performance can be the deciding factors.
5) Identify the media outlets which your target uses regularly:
It is crucial for the marketing personnel to understand the importance of the media. Media such as television, radio and internet (the new media) have a great amount of influence on the market, and it is the easiest way to reach the customers. So if you are willing to make an impact with the launch of your new product, it is wiser to tease your target market with several commercials, or sneak peek through the effective media outlets. And to make that happen, you need to identify which media outlets are used by your target audience frequently.
A group of youngsters are more active on the internet than the tradition forms of media outlets. So if your target group is youngsters, you need to address them through GIF, memes, online clips, and other forms of promotion that is popular on the internet. If your target audience is office going men, it is wiser to put advertisements on television and newspapers, which are used by this group of people on a regular basis. You can poke the interest of your target audiences with certain teaser posts or ads. Like the “coming soon” ads or posting “leaked” photos of your upcoming project on the social media. This creates an aura of intrigue which will later grow into interest.
6) Make the product available to the influencers:
Roping in the influencers on board can be a great move in your marketing plan. Through your ad campaigns you may be able to reach the target market, but in order to make the cut, you need some influencers to speak for you. Influencers are the known faces, who have a certain amount of influence on the public. They can be film stars, television actors, or sports persons whom you can recognize at once. The online bloggers and YouTubers are also considered as influencers in today’s world. So you can ask these influencers to use your product or service and give (or write) a review on their experience.
7) Don’t expect an extravagant release:
You might be heavily inspired by the product launches of top brands such as Apple or Microsoft, but it won’t be a good idea to follow their style if your product or service does not have that kind of reach or impact on the people. You might have seen the recent launch of iPhone X which was live streamed all over the world. It is a big even, and Apple has that kind of presence on the market, so it is ideal for them. But for small or medium businesses (even for large businesses with countrywide reach), it won’t be ideal to have such extravagant launch, unless your product is not revolutionary. To make an impact on the market, you do need to make a certain amount of impact with your launch, but don’t get your hopes high expecting an overwhelming response from the launch.
8) Try the unconventional way:
As the launching date comes close, try something unusual but effective to make an impression on people’s mind. In the recent past, the ice-bucket challenge took the internet by storm. Everywhere in the world, people were taking up the challenge and posting their videos on the internet. That is what a “viral” thing is. In today’s world, going viral is one of the most effective ways to get into people’s mind. But since you are promoting a product or service, you need to be a little careful about the stunts you pull.
Have meetings and brainstorming sessions among yourselves to generate unique ideas which you feel will be able to make a sensation in the market. Releasing a compelling video, or publishing a survey that supports the value of your product or service, or creating an appealing infographic that showcases the need for your service can work in this context.
9) Engage your partners:
When you are running a business, you must have a few partnering entities who have financial stakes in the success of the product/service launch. Since their interest is involved in the success of the launch, you can employ them to speak for your product or service as the releasing date approaches. In the marketing world, it is perceived that the more people are talking about it, the better chances it has of getting people’s attention.
10) Make things easier for the people to understand:
If you want people to learn about your service or product engage them with free trials, downloads, various videos describing the product details and demonstrations. People love free stuff. Once they see the value of your service/product, they will be willing to purchase your product/service.
These aforementioned tips are quite effective in today’s world. In fact, it is designed keeping various contemporary elements in mind that have a certain amount of influence in the present market. So, if you’re planning to launch a new product/service in the market, don’t hesitate to incorporate these ideas into your marketing plan.