Myth #5: Good Products Sell Themselves
If a great product sits in the woods and no one knows it’s there, does it make a sound? No matter how good your product or service is, no one will buy if if they don’t know it exists, and if they don’t understand and believe that it can meet their needs. Customers and prospects need to find out about your offerings and they need to learn about them in the right framework. They need to understand that your offerings can meet their needs–when and where they need those needs met.
The type of marketing campaign you need depends on many factors, such as your audience, the market space, and the competitive environment. For example, how familiar is the audience with you, your product and the alternative offerings available? Is this a new market, an established, mature market or one with significant recent growth? Are their comparable offerings available from other suppliers or are you competing with an entrenched way of doing business? Who are the market influencers? Do you have references who can lend credibility to your offering and your business?
Once you’ve addressed these questions, you can build the marketing campaign you need to hit the customers you’ve targeted for your product or service and you can focus your resources on getting the most bang for the marketing buck. After all, the last thing you want to hear from a prospective buyer is this: “Gee, your product sounds like it would have fit our need perfectly! I only wish I’d known about it before we chose something else.”
