This is how to define your market and product strategies

It’s another Friday.

I wish you a great weekend.?

But before then…

The last time on Game Plan, I walked you through three of the ten steps involved in the Outcome-Driven Innovation process - conducting a competitive analysis, creating an innovation strategy, target hidden growth opportunities. Today, I will conclude with the last two steps - creating a marketing strategy and formulating a product strategy.?

Again for the sake of emphasis and clarity, the ten steps include 1. Define the customer 2. Define the Jobs to be Done 3. Uncover customer needs 4. Find segments of opportunity 5. Define the value proposition 6. Conduct competitive analysis 7. Formulate innovation strategy 8. Target hidden growth opportunities? 9. Formulate market strategy 10. Formulate product strategy.

To the chase, let us consider the last two:? 9. Formulate market strategy 10. Formulate product strategy.

?9. Formulate marketing strategy?

As you are aware, about 80% of new products fail. This is one of the key problems the outcome-based innovation process attempts to circumvent. And it has done that with impressive results, with a success rate of 86%. Having a product that speaks to the unmet needs of customers is not enough though. You still need to do more. You need to create a rock-solid Go To Market strategy else the product may fail to sell.?

While I would advocate that the best products should win in the market, I would also argue that the best product often doesn’t win. It’s often the best-marketed product that wins. For instance, many years ago, a blind taste comprising two cola drinks - Coke and Pepsi - was conducted to know which is better.

Pepsi beat Cola hands down. Yet Coke is the biggest selling cola drink in the world. It is only in the US market that Pepsi outsells Coke. so, you get my drift: having a product that customers or the market wants does not stop there, you need to know how to sell it - communicate the value propositions that resonate with the customers.

Before I get into the crux of creating a marketing strategy, let me explain the Outcome-Driven Innovation process. I know I have done this even in my previous post but doing the same thing is not tedious (sounding like Paul the Apostle). Reinforcement is part of effective communication.?

Conventionally, your Go To Market would likely detail action steps creation of the Ideal Customer Profile, Buyer Persona, Communication of the Value Proposition, Messaging, etc. But ODI method emphasizes the determination of undeserved outcome statements.?

You would recall that the outcome-driven innovation comprises the combination of the? Job to be Done statements (qualitative process) and the rating of outcome statements (quantitative process) with a view to uncovering and targeting underserved customer segments with existing, improved or new solutions that get the job done better and cheaper.

Determine the underserved outcome-based segment?

This is no rocket science.?

The key to unlocking opportunities for new product development is to uncover the unmet needs of customers. And the most vital step to doing that is to unravel the core functional job - the task the customer is ultimately trying to get done.?

For instance, when I go to events, I normally would take a book along (when I used to be a bookworm). So, if the event didn’t start on time, I would busy myself reading the book. So, the Job I am trying to do is not to “pass the time while waiting for the events to start” but? “read a book ”. That’s the core functional job. Also, I am in the process of moving houses and have been talking to loads of agents. Found one two days ago. But there is a snag, the floor of the bedrooms is not tiled. So, I figured I might have to tile the floor. You might say for example, that the core functional job is “tile the floor” - this is only part of the jobs I want to get done. But the job I am ultimately trying to get done is “Rent a modern apartment”.?

And like I had mentioned before,? the way you ask the customer to discover what job she’s ultimately trying to get done matters. It is the difference between creating effective products that speak to the desired outcomes of customers and ineffective products that do not.?

After you have nailed down the job statement, you need to also create the desired outcome statements. That is, for every job customer wants to get done, for instance, “Rent a modern apartment”, customers do have desired outcomes for it. Experience has shown that there may be as many as 20-30 outcome statements connected to a job.?

Against this backdrop, you create desired outcome statements which are metrics customers use to access the effectiveness of a product whether it gets a job done or speaking more plainly whether it meets the needs of the customer or not.

Outcome-based segmentation

The crux of the ODI is the creation of the outcome-based segments - a process which rides on desired outcome statement of customers to categorize hidden opportunities into underserved, served and overserved. This turns traditional market segmentation on its head. Traditional segmentation categorizes customers based on demographics, psychographics, and geography.?

But experience with clients using the ODI shows that customers with different age bands or social classes, for example, can have similar needs. This is important and alludes to the fact that the product is no longer the basic unit of analysis in the product development process, rather, it is the needs of the customers or the jobs the customer is trying to get done. The corollary is that the outcome statements which are an expression of the unmet needs of the customer are the bases for categorizing customers into groups instead of age, sex, income, location etc.

Leverage product? strengths to mitigate unmet needs of customers

With the above, it is clear you have in your hand, customer-centred and data-driven information which would drive your marketing plan. Your marketing plan gives an overall direction as to how you want to achieve your marketing objectives. It is not specific but gives clear direction. The ODI helps you knead down underserved segment - which contains the unmet needs of customers. In other words, the ODI helps to determine which cluster of customer outcomes you should target.?

Therefore, to create an effective marketing strategy, you should leverage your product strengths to speak to the unmet needs of customers - those segments with underserved customer outcomes.?

Your Go-To-Market strategy speaks specifically to how you want to launch your product into an existing or new market.

Communicating the core value propositions of your offering?

How do you communicate the value proposition??

In other words, how do you tell the customers your product or offering can solve their problems? Said differently, how do you tell her (the customer) your solution can get the problem solved better or cheaper than the competition?

Value proposition canvas

The value proposition canvas comprises two parts - customer profile and value map.?

You can read my previous article on the value proposition.?

The value proposition canvas is a visual representation of how your product solves the problem of the customer, how it relieves their pains and the gains that would accrue to them. On the left is the customer profile (see image above) while on the right, you have the value map.

The customer profile has three sections:

Product and services: This is a list of the product/service features

Pain relievers: Any product features that would alleviate the pains of the customers, e.g . one of the features of Adobe PDF reader is that it can help edit a PDF file. That is a pain reliever for anyone that has to work with a PDF file without necessary converting it to a Word document.

Gain creators: Any product features that would make the customer get value for her money, reduce his risk and help her make more money. Swiss gold, for example, has a trading and investment plan that helps customers trade in gold and guarantees monthly returns without the customers lifting a finger.

Value map (right)

Customer jobs: Lists the core functional jobs, and emotional and social jobs the customer is trying to get done.

Gains: These are the benefits that would accrue to the customers as she is trying to get a job done. The core functional job a new homeowner is trying to get done is “own a home”. Some of the gains here are “Stop paying rents”, “Save more money”, “Feel satisfied”, etc.?

Pains: These are constraints in the way of the homeowner as she is trying to “own a home”. This may include “Poor finish”, “Poor design”, “Financial constraints” etc.?

With the value proposition canvas, you can script your value proposition statement(s).

Positioning and Messaging?

Your product messaging describes or articulates the framework for creating messages that resonate with the target audience for your product. Your product messaging gives a sense of how people or customers perceive your product, hence your messaging should communicate your product’s values.?

It is how you “show” and “tell” the benefits of your product to your customers. It gives a strategic framework on which your marketing, PR and brand communications are built. It brings about a reinforcement of your product messages and gives a sense that it is a well-ordered house not one divided.

Positioning is the platform upon which your product messaging is launched. It describes how your product sits with the market and the context with which your product fit into the customer’s lifestyle. Positioning and messaging go hand in hand, you can’t have one without the other.?

Both positioning and messaging requires research - asking customers and getting their responses. Right off the bat, you had a sense of who the customers were, anyway. I mean, from the moment you started the product development process. Recall, that you needed to conduct interviews with potential customers before you created the job statements and the desired customer outcome statements. So, you can rely on the data generated from that process to create a buyer persona.?

The persona will help in humanising the communication since you know the drive/motivation, goal, desired outcomes etc of the underserved customers. In order words, you have a sense of what their unmet needs are. Therefore, you can use this information to communicate how your product will solve their problems better than those on the market.

Be guided, messaging involves speaking to the customers in their own language. Requires huge authenticity. This is why testimonials and product reviews are good resources you can latch onto to communicate the value of your product.

Channels:

The channels are the mediums through which you want to reach your customers. Depending on who they are and their preferred communication channels - SEO, email, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, direct mail, TV, radio etc.?

SEO

The customer outcome statements can help create “long tail” and "short tail” keywords which can be used to drive awareness for your product online. This is especially good for reaching potential customers who have not heard about your product. Hence, they are at the mouth of the sales funnel.

Social media marketing

This is a strategic communication of your product values in the preferred social networks of your target audience. About 90% of top brands say social media is a key part of their sales strategy. Social media marketing should be part of yours too.

Content marketing?

Content is king. Customers have become content-savvy, so the competition is really intense. To cut through the clutter, you need to research your audience to know what they value and how they want to be served. You can use tools like Hootsuite to help research customer preferences. You can ride on content marketing to inform, educate and communicate the values of your product to your target audience.?

Influencer marketing?

Influencer marketing is a big deal these days. Top brands now use influencers from top-rated celebrities to ordinary fellas with decent social followership. 93% of brands say they would pitch their tents with Instagram as their preferred influencer marketing platform.?

PR campaigns

This is an intuitive way to get the attention of the media to write about your product. You can send copies of the product to an editor, or reporter in your industry or sector. You can also write to the editor of your local newspaper or magazine informing her of your revolutionary product and how it is making a huge impact in the lives of customers. Tools include videos, articles, product samples, etc.

10. Formulate product strategy.

The product strategy is a plan of a company to introduce a new product leveraging on existing technology or improved technology or creating new technology from the scratch.

There are a number of ways a company can do this:

1. Leverage existing solutions or technology?
2. Speed up the product development pipeline
3. Acquire a company that has the solution

a. Leverage existing solutions or technologies?

This involves introducing a new product using existing technologies within the organization. For example, when Microsoft discovered the opportunities to firm up its assurance offering, it leveraged the tools that were already in use within the organization. Why reinvent the wheel?

b. Speed up the product development pipeline

Companies oftentimes need to step up their product development activities especially if the competition is out with a similar product that is getting the job done better and attacking their profit sanctuaries. The result is the launch of a new product which would have been launched perhaps 10 years from now.

c. Acquire a company that has the solution

It’s totally fine to acquire other companies either in a bid to expand into a new market, expand the scope of the company, or “compete for the future”.? Whichever. For instance, Microsoft acquired Skype in 2011 while Facebook bought Instagram. Several reasons have been proposed to explain why Microsoft bought Skype, one crucial reason was to help Bing. At the time, Skype had 660 million users worldwide with 170 million active users monthly.?

To wrap up, the outcome-driven innovation, ODI, is a tested and trusted means of creating products that would win in the market. Because it is based on the desired outcome statements of customers - metrics used in measuring whether a product gets a job done or not. I have detailedly explained the 10 steps involved in this and previous articles. Now, it is up to you to use the information here including previous posts, make them yours and turn them to cash.?

I look forward to receiving your product success stories.

My name is Oyeniyi Faleye.