Building up a campaign for a new product is always a daunting task. You have to worry about the quality of your product, you need to promote it and generate excitement, and you have to make sure you’re always ahead of your competitors. Assuming you’ve done your research and you’ve been designing and working on a product that suits the market, you’re going to need to plan out a promotional campaign that resonates with investors as well as customers.
Set a deadline and start early
Plan your deadline as accurately as possible, but make sure it gives you enough time to perfect the product. You also need to worry about your competitors and when they plan to release their new products as well. You either want to launch at the same time to compete directly or you want to release yours ahead of theirs so you get an upper hand. Make sure you reach out to the media about your new product as early as you can so you can build up attention as well.
Attend shows and hand out samples
One of the best ways to have a successful product launch is to attend trade shows and generate excitement. Not only do you get to put the product or service into the hands of the consumer, you also get to network with influencers and potentially put your product into their hands first so they can tell their fans and followers what they think of your product. If it goes well, this could have an amazing impact on the success of your product.
Analyse the market
It’s no good planning your product release during a time when no one is interested or when the market is saturated with alternatives. Make sure you start retail competitor analysis early so that you get a good idea of what your competition is doing so that your product has a good chance of launching without a hitch. You want to make sure your product is essential to the audience you’re targeting, so much so that they ignore your competitor and go straight for you.
Feed into curiosity
You will naturally get a lot of questions regarding your product. Whether it’s an amateur journalist contacting you over social media or a well-known influencer that’s genuinely interested in your latest product, feed into their curiosity and show them your latest work, give them demonstrations or even hand them the latest prototype of your product to play with.
Be reasonable
Don’t invest in ridiculous things in order to make your launch stand out. Be reasonable and focus on what’s important. For instance, if your product isn’t being put through a rigorous testing phase, then you’ll end up with an unfinished product that’s full of issues such as the Nintendo Switch. This could tarnish your reputation for a long time and it will be hard trying to convince your loyal fanbase to buy your products again. Unless you’re a globally known company, don’t expect people to be queuing up at your retail store a day early and don’t expect to sell out instantly on the first day—be reasonable with your expectations.
