Don’t Sell Ice to Eskimos – Try an Ice Pick!

Jean McIntyre

By Jean McIntyre (Marketing Angels)

I met today with a company that is considering branching its business into new markets that are quite different from their existing markets.  They contacted me because they want to re-brand and develop new products and messages in line with the needs of these new markets.

This is an important strategic step.

Too often I hear of businesses that have a great product from which they decide that people in new markets could benefit.  They might put an ad in a new publication and perhaps get a new list of people for a direct marketing campaign.  The focus though is still on selling the same product – even if the market might be very different.

This is what we call in marketing a ‘sales orientation’.

Marketing expert Jane Summers in the book ‘Essentials of Marketing’ described it this way: 

“Personnel in sales-oriented organisations tend to be ‘inward-looking’, focusing on selling what the organisation makes rather than presenting what the market wants.  Many of the historic sources of competitive advantage – technology, innovation and economies of scale – allowed companies to focus their efforts internally and prosper”. 

Markets (and consumers) are more mature than this now and demand that businesses have a solid understanding of their needs and create products and services that serve their needs rather than those of the company.

“But how do I do this?”  you might ask.

Here are some guidelines on what to do to be successful in a new market:

1. Conduct some research – Find out what makes your new target market tick.  What are their aspirations?  What are they afraid of?  What goes through their head when they are searching for companies to meet their needs?  Where do they shop?  What media do they consume and how do they use the internet.  
2. Review existing products – Examine the effectiveness of your existing products to meet the needs of the new market.  More than likely there will be significant changes in their needs and you will need to make changes to your products to suit these needs. For example if you sell skin care to middle aged women and want to offer it to a young men’s market you may need to change the ingredients to suit them and probably the packaging to appeal to men.
3. Explore new product ideas – Understanding the needs of the market may well highlight new product ideas that your company is well-placed to meet.  Further to the skincare example – you may find in your research that despite understanding the importance of skin care – young men are less knowledgeable about what to do to care for their skin and tend to look to the internet for information.  You may decide to create a video on skin care that they can purchase via download with their package of skincare products. 
4. Create new marketing messages for the new market – Once you understand the needs of your target markets and have refined or designed your products, you need to develop updated or new messages to communicate with those markets that your products will meet their needs and how.

You can then update your website and existing material with new messages or (most likely) create new marketing collateral to appeal to the new market.

Creating new products is something that marketers love to do.  Tell a marketer that you want their help to make the transition from being sales oriented to marketing oriented and you’ll make their day.

I’d love to read your comments about how you have approached re-developing existing products or designing new products for new markets.

 

Jean Mc