August 29, 2012
Buyers don’t necessarily want to see the results of your market research, but rather, they want to know you have validated your decisions and the product itself. Decisions like product name and concept, packaging design, packaging copy, product claims, marketing messages, formulas and flavors/colors. For example, conducting in-use testing (a consumer takes your product home and uses it for a week, then answers questions about their experience) assures that your product delivers to the promises and claims your product makes. This helps reassure retailers that if they put your product on their shelf, customers will enjoy the experience thereby making their experience at that store favorable. No retailer wants to be known as a store that carries products that don’t work.
Market research is not a check box and it does not have to be formal or cost anything. Plus, it is actually helpful to your business! Just getting out there and talking to potential consumers to get feedback is the best kind of market research. Do it early, do it often.
When you can show a retailer you’ve done this kind of homework, whether it is communicated in a slide or bullet point in your presentation deck, it will give a buyer one less reason to say “No.”
Other helpful ways of incorporating market research data into your retail pitch is using it to prove the market opportunity of your product. This is called market sizing. It’s looking at the potential population of consumers out there and determining what percentage of that population will buy your product. This reassures buyers that you chose your target consumer carefully and that enough people out there want your product. Another way to use market research is in building your volume forecasts. By buying market research data, you can learn the market size, how many people typically buy this type of product, and the market share each competitive brand owns, you’ll be able to figure out a good estimate for the potential volume of your brand in total and your brand in each of your retail accounts.
Have you conducted informal or formal market research for your product? Did it pay off? Let us know!
Buyers don’t necessarily want to see the results of your market research, but rather, they want to know you have validated your decisions and the product itself. Decisions like product name and concept, packaging design, packaging copy, product claims, marketing messages, formulas and flavors/colors. For example, conducting in-use testing (a consumer takes your product home and uses it for a week, then answers questions about their experience) assures that your product delivers to the promises and claims your product makes. This helps reassure retailers that if they put your product on their shelf, customers will enjoy the experience thereby making their experience at that store favorable. No retailer wants to be known as a store that carries products that don’t work.
Market research is not a check box and it does not have to be formal or cost anything. Plus, it is actually helpful to your business! Just getting out there and talking to potential consumers to get feedback is the best kind of market research. Do it early, do it often.
When you can show a retailer you’ve done this kind of homework, whether it is communicated in a slide or bullet point in your presentation deck, it will give a buyer one less reason to say “No.”
Other helpful ways of incorporating market research data into your retail pitch is using it to prove the market opportunity of your product. This is called market sizing. It’s looking at the potential population of consumers out there and determining what percentage of that population will buy your product. This reassures buyers that you chose your target consumer carefully and that enough people out there want your product. Another way to use market research is in building your volume forecasts. By buying market research data, you can learn the market size, how many people typically buy this type of product, and the market share each competitive brand owns, you’ll be able to figure out a good estimate for the potential volume of your brand in total and your brand in each of your retail accounts.
Have you conducted informal or formal market research for your product? Did it pay off? Let us know!