Video Transcript

Hi, everyone. My name is Cade Jones. I’m a digital marketing manager here at Element Three. And did you know the biggest problem that companies encounter when taking a new product to market is a lack of planning? Well, today you’re in luck because we’re going to cover the five most important questions that you need to have answers for before you can take your product to market.

First, though, we need to cover a few ground rules and a few caveats before we get into the meat of this conversation. The first thing that you need to be true, before you can answer even the first question, is you have to have a strong understanding for what your product is, the pain points that it essentially solves, and why you’re bringing this product to market.

It’s important to have a really strong line of communication between the engineering team and your product team and you as a marketer so you can get answers to these questions. So let’s dive into it.

The first question is “how does the product fit into the greater portfolio for you as a company?” It’s really important to understand this question and get the answer to this question so that you can understand if this product is essentially a complementary product to an existing one. Is it a net new product? Having an answer to this question will really help you craft your messaging as you begin to take this to the marketplace. And so that customers aren’t confused when they see a product, and see that it matches a little bit to one that you already have existing.

The second is “what is the competitive landscape look like for this product?” Understanding the competitive landscape is extremely important because you want to make sure that you are differentiating your product from a competitor’s product and making sure that essentially the messaging of how you take this to market is really unique and so that your customers are never at a point where they’re getting confused between you and a competitor.

The third question is “what is your audience for this new product?” If it’s a slightly different, but mostly the same, existing audience then maybe some of the same channels and mediums that you’ve used to date may work. If it’s a completely brand new audience or net-new audience to your company, then maybe a little brand work is in line for this type of campaign.

The fourth most important question is the timing for the campaign. You don’t want to generate hype too soon or too late, or you run the risk of essentially flopping on your go-to-market or new product launch.

And then lastly, and probably most importantly, is “what is the ultimate goal you’re hoping to accomplish with a product or this new campaign?” Are you trying to generate new free trials for a SAAS product? Are you trying to generate preorders for a physical good? Understanding that will really help you as a marketer begin to craft the narrative around the campaign and to really choose those channels, those mediums, those mixes to take this to market.

A really good example of someone who does product launches and go-to-market campaigns really well is Apple. I don’t know if any of you saw the September summit, but specifically, with their Apple Watch line, they really targeted and tailored their messaging to this outdoorsy group and brought new product features such as emergency call, and longitude and latitude, and a GPS and to their products. They’re a really good example of someone who does this extremely well and caters to their products and their messaging and how they’re talking about their products to the audience that they’re trying to take it to market towards.

I hope this was really helpful. Thanks.