segmentation

Larger the choices – less is the chance for for success

differentiation, Marketing, messaging, Product Management, segmentation

When you have multiple choices on how your product/service can be used , the lesser the chance of you being able to dominate the market. Its like when my wife went to a food store in Toronto, she was overwhelmed with the number of choices for just cornflakes from just one brand. She couldn’t make a decision and she came back without buying anything. Sometimes less choices help the customer.

When you try to target multiple markets – which is different types of customers – at the same time, your messaging becomes blurred. Its like saying I sell condos, farmhouses and also industrial plots. This way you cannot be considered an expert on anything. If you are not considered an expert or a specialist, you are A Commodity. The only way to differentiate a commodity would be price.

So if you do have multiple choices to target a given market – go after them one by one. Segment the market into as fine a piece as possible. Dominate one segment and move to the other but be seen as an expert in each.

Companies like P&G, Unilever etc do this best. They have soaps which are targeted for white clothes and then they have variants within this. Then they have soaps for specialising in stain removal and they create variants within that.

If these multi-billion dollar organsiations who have so many choices of going to the market, still choose one market at a time, then for small companies its absolutely imperative that you only choose a single market first and then move into other categories.

Till next time.

Carpe Diem!!!

Competition is good – Part II

competition, differentiation, Marketing, Positioning, Product Management, segmentation, value proposition

Yesterday I spoke about why competition is good for you.

Today we will look at what you need to be aware of in your competition.

In the technology space if you’re competing with a big player, you need to first of all be aware that they have a large customer base and they an ecosystem already in place. This could be the software developers, the reseller partners etc.

Due to this you get to know what is the surrounding “infrastructure ” that needs to fall in place, to make your product/service successful.

However going head-on into competition is never a good idea.

Each competitor would also have multiple areas of the market that they neglect because they’re not big enough for them to invest in.

Look at some of those and create segments and value proposition for dominating those before you decide to get into something else. Always get into the niche with an agenda to Dominate.

From a customer perspective also, since customers prefer to avoid taking risks, don’t try to initially target the same type of customers who have made your competitors successful because they will use you to get discounts from the leaders.

Competition is a very good learning experience and gets you prepared to Not do the same mistakes which the competitors have made.

Till next time then.

Carpe Diem!!!

Testing…more testing …and even more testing – Part II

Positioning, Product Management, segmentation, Testing

I wrote a post, a few days back, on this topic for identifying the right message, the correct strategy, the correct segment etc. with respect to marketing.

I was wondering if I was being too headstrong in insisting on this.

I just realised, that the nations who were able to bring Corona / Covid19 under control faster also relied on this. While keeping a safe distance and wearing a mask are the only deterrents to catching the Covid19, for the people who are involved in pandemic control, the only method was to test and see how the rate of growth of the pandemic was taking place.

The faster and higher the number of tests being done, the faster the identification of the possible infections , the quicker the response to isolate the people and quarantine them, thus reducing the opportunity for the virus to spread.

On the manufacturing floor also the higher the tests you do in the process, the lesser is the chance that the final product will have defects and will need to be scrapped.

When I visited Paris recently, I visited one of the perfumery companies and they showed us the process of launching a new perfume and how multiple tests had to be conducted to ensure that it did not react with people’s skin and the kind of audience reactions.

For releasing any vaccine they have to go through multiple rounds of tests.

So my rant that the only way to figure out what would succeed in the market is to test, then do more more tests and then even more tests, is actually a standard practice in all kinds of domains. I therefore don’t understand why people in marketing are averse to the idea of having a very serious process of testing their segmentation, niche, messaging etc.

Till next time then.

Carpe Diem!!!

Product Management in technology markets

differentiation, Marketing, Positioning, Product Management, segmentation

I have written and emphasized so much on segmentation and nicking.  On starting with a single market only.

The very nature of the technology industry is very dynamic.  Which means when you have built a product using some components, you have a use case which you think is where it can be utilized.  However when you take it to your existing customers for their feedback – these are also called beta sites – you realize massive adoption problems.

However the same product in a different segment gets adopted very fast. This is where segmenting by usage becomes very useful.

If you can list the possible usage in different industries then take one, do a survey and then if you find resistance move to the next, till you find the industry where your services can go into production.

Then target to dominate that industry as you continue to  identify the next industry where you can utilize the same service.

For a product management person this is a critical factor in the technology sector.  In the consumer segment adaptation of the same product may or may not happen.  But for the technology segment,  where a lot of investment goes in building new products and the window of opportunity is very small, the product management person has to really push for various use cases fast

With small changes you can make the product or service specific to a given industry and then capture it.

But you always have to start small, fail fast, learn fast, adapt and move to the next segment. 

Since marketing is more applied psychology,  the faster you learn, the higher is the possibility of success in technology marketing.

Till next time.

Carpe Diem!!!