First, consumers don’t buy products. They buy solutions. Assuming you provide a solution, the next challenge is convincing consumers your product is better at solving their problems than those made by your competition. We call this competitive advantage. So, if you wanna know the secrets to marketing products, that’s it.
I guess I could end the post right now since I already gave you the biggest secret to marketing products. But, I think you probably need a little more specific information as you try to implement my secret, which, by the way, isn’t that big a secret. So, let’s jump into today’s discussion.
Secrets to marketing products
Know your customer
This isn’t really a secret either and I mention how important it is to know your customer in many posts. That’s because knowing your customer is integral to success on so many levels. In marketing products, you must understand what customers need, their problems, and how they’ll use your products to help craft products they’ll want in the first place.
Next, you need to understand which features likely customers find most desirable so you can highlight the benefits provided that closely match what customers want. Let’s take a concrete example to help understand what I mean by matching features to customers.
Let’s say you have a product with a number of features and associated benefits (BTW, consumers want benefits, not features). A complex product like a smartphone has a number of features with associated benefits. If you try to build certain benefits into your brand, you actually find consumers less inclined to buy your brand than a brand that focuses on the way they use a smartphone. Maybe someone uses their phone for selfies posted on Instagram and makes a living as an influencer. They want a great camera and, likely, lots of storage. Me, I just want an acceptable camera but my new phone, with its multiple lenses, means my phone no longer supports my heart rate and oxygen level assessments available on my older device.
You’ll also use this understanding of your customer to create advertising that lets them clearly understand that your brand is just what they need. Trying to focus on building and promoting products with broad appeal in some markets, is a recipe for disaster versus focusing on products and promotions designed to meet the demands of certain customers.
Keep it simple
You’re trying to write a short and snappy description, right? Well, that means you need to keep it simple! No filler content, and no more than 5 bullet points about your product’s best features; again matching them to your target market. People don’t have the time or the patience to read a whole page about your product’s strengths, and you don’t want to turn people away with large blocks of text.
Take the Amazon model as a good example here – the product’s features and benefits are immediately highlighted next to the image of the product itself, and people have the option to scroll down if they want to know more.
Make it look good
Now you’ve got to capture the right visual element that highlights your product to its fullest. Did you know that when a photographer works to capture an image for a food package, s/he might open dozens of packages to find the absolute best example of what consumers might find inside their purchase? Then, the photographer plays with filters and lighting to make the food really shine and so your mouth begins to water just looking at the label.
No matter what kind of marketing campaign you run, you need to present the people with an image or two of what your product looks like. And, legislation commonly requires that the image is a true representation of what you get. Hence, you can’t show a food label with an enormous chicken breast when there’s only a small portion of a breast inside. Similarly, you can’t show someone using your product to do something no one could make it do.
For example, if you’ve got a new book coming out, giving people a look at a cover that’s professional, attractive, and creates some intrigue draws folks in to entice them to buy. This is especially true with books filled with images, often referred to as coffee table books since folks keep them on their table to leaf through at their leisure or to show off to visitors. Refer to coffee table book printing to make this happen, because when you’ve got a product that has the right colors and physical elements to it, it isn’t hard to get the light to hit elements just right.
Lead onto the benefits
Once you’ve got the features you want to talk about, it’s time to turn them into benefits. The corollary to consumers buying solutions is that they buy benefits not features, as mentioned earlier. Thus, lead with the benefits your product provides; benefits highly desired by your target market. That’s one of the secrets of marketing products.
To do this, you need to tell people about your product’s benefits, then show them how these benefits solve their problems. For example, maybe you have a new toaster that heats super fast. The benefit to consumers is that they can have breakfast ready in a flash so they’re ready to leave the house faster.
Highlighting your product’s best features means being clear and concise, and always having a bit of magic to really draw someone in!
However, some products don’t have benefits consumers really want. For instance, manufacturers are making everything smart. Some smart devices have serious benefits, such as a smart thermostat that heats or cools your house while you’re finishing up at work so the house is at the perfect temperature when you get home. Other smart devices are just stupid (IMHO). For instance, who needs a washer or dryer that’s smart. You just stood there and loaded the machine. It’s easy to just start the device. Why would you want or need to start the device remotely? Now, develop a washer that detects how dirty my clothes are or which cycle cleans them best and you provide a huge benefit, especially for folks who spend a lot of money on their clothes.
Competitive advantage
Competitive advantage means you offer something unavailable from your competition either functionally, emotionally, or in terms of intangibles such as peer envy.
In marketing products, ensure you understand how your target market views your brand as well as brands from the competition. Find elements where you excel over your competition then highlight those benefits in your advertising.
Conclusion
I hope you found this piece containing secrets to marketing products valuable. I’d love to hear your thoughts if you care to share them in the comments below.
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