Lisa Pfister Product Launch Consultant

There are so many things that can go wrong in a product launch so I’m going to briefly go over the areas you need to address well before you hit the launch button.

I’ll be going over everything you need to address in this and subsequent posts so stayed tuned…

The first thing you need to have, of course, is a great product. So what does a great product look like?

1. There’s a proven demand for your product
2. People have gotten strong measurable results from using it
3. It’s easy to get results from using it
4. It’s a high priced high margin product (information products are ideal)
5. It’s a no-brainer tailor-made solution to a problem voiced by your niche

Hopefully you checked off most, if not all of those bullet points. If not, instead of carrying on and hoping for the best see how you can improve your product before you launch.

Let’s take these one at a time. There’s no proven demand. That’s a biggie. If you didn’t create something that your target market told you they wanted (through surveying and conversing via blogs etc) then you may be fighting an uphill battle. If you still want to proceed with this product you can always test it out on a small subset of your list. Give it to them for free, have them try it out and share their results.

If it works for them you get great case studies for your marketing materials (checking item #2 off your list). If it doesn’t work you can find out why – what needs to be added or subtracted from the package to make it something your niche cannot do without? Retest with another subset until you have a killer product.

So we touched briefly on item #2 above. If you don’t already have strong measurable results get  some by having people test out your product, if you do then make sure that people don’t just get results from a big effort – try to see how people can benefit from your product in the easiest simplest way possible. Think of it this way. Most of us want to lose weight. And everybody knows this goal can be accomplished by diet and exercise – but how many of us want to take that route? We want a magic pill or an easy button. If your product looks like too much work it ain’t gunna sell. It’s just that simple.

Now on to #4. You want your product to have a high price and good margins for two reasons. There’s the obvious one – more money. The less obvious one is that it will be extremely difficult to get large numbers of high quality Joint Venture partners on board if your product doesn’t have this make up. So what do you do if this isn’t the case? Here’s one suggestion. Make an information product to accompany it. You can write it yourself if you’re the expert. You can interview experts if you’re not. If you add some powerful special value in this way you can overcome this problem.

Finally let’s cover #5 – a tailor-made solution which makes it a no brainer for your niche. It’s got to be special for a very select group of people. You have to speak to them directly in their language and address their specific problems with your precise solution. How do you do this? The only way to do this is by having a very defined sub sub sub niche. When you try to sell to everybody you end up by selling to nobody. Your only chance of true success is addressing the needs of a minute niche and becoming the “go to guy” for that category. If you can do this you can conquer the market and own the category. Any future competition has to position themselves against you – the one who defines the category. That’s why this is so important.

So those are a few of my thoughts about what constitutes a great product, what you can do to prove it up, what you can do to improve it and what you can do to make it saleable before you push the launch button.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on what else you think is critical in a product. Please comment below.

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