So now you’ve got an exceptional idea that you think could help you make that great breakthrough. The one that you’ve always dreamed of. Ever since the day you first stepped into the world of Entrepreneurship.
There are methods that you should use to explore your Market. This is not a time for guess work.
But, let’s all remember that there is no certainty in the entrepreneurial world. Your brilliant idea could be brilliant to only you & your team but not the consumers. The ones whose opinions matter the most in the survival of a business.
So how can you be sure that you’ve got the right idea? Here are 5 methods you can utilise to discover more about your market & understand potential customers’ demands a little better:
1) Blog publicly about what your business is doing
By blogging about what the business is doing, you can get qualitative & personal feedback from consumers, which you will need to add to the quantitative feedback that you will gather later.
To get the most feedback and opinions on your feedback, and also to get to know your targets better, incorporate research methods such as focus groups (group discussions), individual interviews, etc.
2) Ask open questions on Quora & other online discussion tools
An excellent entrepreneur knows that he or she needs to listen to what people have to say.
Many consumers would love to provide feedback – all they need is to be asked.
Q&A sites like Quora or forums like Reddit are platforms that you can ask for their opinions & feedback on what your business intends to do.
You can go to either of those sites or jump on one that is specific to your industry & start asking questions. A broad inquiry like “How do people solve this problem…” can attract & lure out both potential competitors & customers.
3) Create surveys & experiment with incentives
It’s a waste if you have a customer base that you don’t make use of in some way. A great way to elicit feedback & discover needs is sending a questionnaire to your customer base, and give them some incentives in return for their effort.
The incentives can be monetary, like a $100 discount off your product when it first hits the market, or non-monetary, like a movie ticket or a ticket to the latest theatre show.
In the case of this particular monetary incentive, if people are eager to apply for that discount on a product that doesn’t even exist yet, it’s further validation of customer demand.
4) Collect pre-orders
Crowdfunding sites such as Gofundme & Kickstarter have made it much easier for businesses to measure market demand for a product or service. By describing the product’s features and offering it to the masses, entrepreneurs can get an idea of how the market would respond when the product actually goes live.
Also, the instant feedback & questions from the backers on these sites can help the business to uncover potential issues with their ideas and allow them to correct those before scaling.
5) Run test ads
Use Google Adwords and other platforms to create ads that take viewers to a page on your website that will solicit email signups & possibly pre-orders. Make sure to collect metrics on each ad you put out to find out which ads are the most effective. Also, make sure that your landing pages are not terrible.
It doesn’t matter how brilliant your advertisements are – if your landing pages are awful, you will fail – simple as that.
Also, don’t collect only emails; try to also collect the customer’s data in the form of a mini survey.
Want to know more about Entrepreneurship? Need help with your business strategies? Get in touch with Maverick Mentoring now for a FREE, 1-on-1 business consultation tailored specifically for you & your business.
