1. Product Strategy
by Akin Babatunde, CEO, AK Globaltech Concepts
The first P in the 4 Ps of Marketing is product.
Except for manufacturers, perhaps, for many businesses the product strategy part of marketing is really about marketing the company, often not the individual goods or services that the company offers. So as we discuss product marketing strategy, begin to think of your business as the product you are marketing, and you'll gain some new insights.
Various Product Factors
Of course, there is much overlap in aspects of an Internet Marketing Plan. Various sections look at some of the same realities in different ways. In the article on "Positioning Your Online Business as Part of Your Internet Marketing Plan" (http://www.wilsonweb.com/wmt5/plan-position.htm), for example, we discussed points of difference and positioning. These relate both to your business and to your line of products or services. Branding also concerns product strategies, though we won't discuss it in this article. More info at http://wilsonweb.com/webmarket/branding.htm and in Rob Frankel's off-the-wall book on branding, The Revenge of Brand X. http://www.ifulfill.com/frankel.asp?referer=167.100264
Other product strategy items include your guarantee and customer service policies to support the product, as well as instructions on how to install and use the product or service, and product accessories. Troubleshooting trees, knowledge bases, and FAQs that support the product or service are also part of your product marketing strategy.
Packaging
On grocery store shelves, packaging has a lot to do with which box of cereal you select. On the Web, however, packaging doesn't work the same way, since site selection is often made on the basis of search engines or traditional advertising. On the Internet the "packaging" comes after the initial advertisement. The packaging consists of website design elements that create a stimulating selling environment using color and graphics. (See "Techniques to Increase Store Sales," Web Commerce Today, Issue 31, February 15, 2000, http://www.wilsonweb.com/wct3/issue31.htm ) Of course, website "packaging" can be projected to your customers via HTML e-mail in order to draw your previous customer back into your store.
The "Product" You Market Is Often the Website
As I mentioned, for many companies, the product you are marketing IS the company itself, the business. Yes, you may be talking about individual products among your products or services, but your overall message is, "Buy it at our site for these reasons.... Let us serve you because ...." As we discuss various kinds of Web businesses, you can see this interplay of marketing the website "product" as well your goods or services products.
Kinds of Internet "Products" or Companies
Manufactured goods. If you're a manufacturer, then your products are self-evident. Your business probably isn't General Motors, but you may be among the many small manufacturers on the Web. Perhaps you're an artist or woodworker selling your creations. You may have a tool and die shop that produces custom parts according to specific customer needs (so you're probably marketing more of a service than goods). You may have a single product or a product line you are producing or importing. But usually you're advertising your company on the Web, not an individual product by itself. You want the online community to know and visit your website. Getting your business known is the major goal of your marketing for now. (Of course, there are exceptions to this.)
Online Catalogs. Web catalog sites are essentially wholesale or retail order-taking terminals. They may carry products from dozens or thousands of manufacturers. But what is the product? Their own "store" is the product here. They are building an online "brand" that they hope will represent to you the kind of store where you can find and purchase just what you want. Yes, they market their product lines through HTML e-mail fliers (see http://www.wilsonweb.com/wmt5/html-email-multi.htm), but they're essentially saying, "Come here, come to our store out of all the other choices on the Web. We have what you're looking for." One way to look at an online catalog site is as a shopping service that helps you find what you want among their carefully selected collection of best-of-class products.
Amazon.com is an example you may be familiar with, but how about free catalogs? One early software download site is http://tucows.com What is their service? Storage and download of thousands of shareware software programs. Tucows.com offers a vast product line, though none of their products are unique to tucows.com. But the site itself is unique in the way it is arranged, in its breadth of offerings, in the software reviews it carries, in the speed of its download servers, and in the geographic diversity of its server locations. Online catalogs offer a branded shopping service. (Of course, there's more, but I am simplifying.)
Online Services. In a similar way, many online services can be thought of and marketed as products, too. http://HitBox.com, for example, offers a suite of services for the webmaster to check your spelling, analyze the accuracy of your HTML code, score your META tags, track visitors to your pages, and generally massage and clean up your website. You can find service sites that will calculate your taxes; and others to predict your success, personal characteristics, and love prospects based on your birthdate and relative planetary positions in the heavens. Websites compare prices of computer monitors available at other online businesses. Search engines are really an online service, and the list goes on. Think of your site's collection of services as the product you are marketing.
Custom Services. Custom services, too, can be viewed as products. In the mid-90s I pioneered marketing website and e-commerce design services as product "packages." One of the keys to success was to define the "standard" product carefully, clarifying what was included in the standard website, and what items were considered add-ons. I learned to market not just "a website," but a 12-page website that included a single response form, custom graphic header, background, menu system, certain marketing elements, etc. When you package your services into clearly-defined bundles, they become a product that is clear to the customer and therefore saleable. Your service packages constitute your product line.
Information products. One of my favorite sites is http://Britannica.com -- the website that includes the entire Encyclopedia Britannica free to the visitor. What a wealth of material -- a great example of an information product (in this case, a free product). An online newspaper is another example of an information product, as well as our E-Commerce Research Room (http://www.wilsonweb.com/research/). So is Doctor Ebiz (http://doctorebiz.com) -- a question and answer e-mail newsletter designed to help small businesses solve their problems.
Entertainment products. Very close to information products are entertainment sites -- online game sites, music sites, photo essay sites, etc.
Price Tag Is Irrelevant
Often we don't view a site as a product because we are offering something to consumers for free. Don't let the price tag or lack of it fool you. Think of your website as a product, and your content as product lines and you'll know how better to market.
The exception, of course, is if you have no product at all. I've seen a lot of product-less sites on Yahoo! GeoCities. Here's a typical site: me, my pet, a photo of my apartment, a picture my girlfriend with me at the beach last year, my pet peeves, my favorite hobbies. Oh, and a few affiliate program banners I wish you would click on in order to make me wealthy without working.
If you want a business that earns money, if you want to attract significant traffic, then you must offer a website product that customers want. As you see your website as a product in and of itself, you'll be able to market it more effectively.
Exercise: Define the overall "product" that your website offers. The richer the product-set the more attractive your business. Now describe your product strategy, that is, they way you are planning for your products or services to complement each other and stimulate sales.
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