Anyone have any creative ideas on how to market a new product?
I invented a soy-based doggie treat that is high in protein and low in fat. I need some creative, low-cost ways to launch the product. I want to market the product in hopes of making this a successful business for myself. However, the budget is limited. I just need to get the word out. Thanks for any ideas.
Public Comments
- 1. Insert a "doggie" fortune, like in a fortune cookie. 2. Insert a single pet health tip. 3. Wrap each treat in a cotton cloth square, like in a simple quilt, for customers to collect. Include a simple booklet for how to assemble the squares to make a doggie quilt. 4. Request that customers send back to you a snapshot of their pet for you to post on a website. People like to look at pet photos in a collection like that. 5. Make sure you have a catchy name. "Earth Muffins"? 6. Check with your Chamber of Commerce for all the trade convention listings. Attend and pass out samples with snail-mail order post cards all wrapped up in bright net and bow. 7. Always send more than ordered. If the order is for twelve, send thirteen. Don't advertise that bonus. Just do it. ALWAYS send a surprise. 8. I had a summer camp once for electronic toys called Furbies. Yup. People actually sent me their Furbies from all over the world for a week of summer camp. Anyway, an idea I got from that might be interesting to you in your marketing plan. Launch a pet "pen-pal" club between customer's pets. It's a novel idea and might make people laugh. People would do it, too, connect through you with other pet owners in a pretend correspondance of post cards between pets. That demographic group that your foo-foo doggie treats should be targeting would be likely to find that amusing.
- What is the platform you are thinking of using to market your product. Any more detail plans you want to specify. Naturally, the lowest cost of marketing your product will be the internet. Create an account with blogger.com if you do not want to spend money on getting a domain, write alot of the useful information to educate a reader, and then you can start writing a report and give it free. Alternatively, goto the article directories like www.ezinearticles.com, keep writing articles about your unique dog treat, leave your website as the reference so that when targeted readers find your articles, they will come to your blog to find out more. Maybe write about 3 or 4 articles a day. The more articles, the more readers will find out about your product. And everytime done is free. Hope it is useful. Andrew www.businesspeanuts.com
- The best route for a new product if you don't have a lot of money to promote yourself or open a storefront is wholesale. The best and quickest way is to send free samples with a fact sheet to privately owned pet boutiques. There are tons of dog boutiques, groomers and kennels that will sell your product for you if they find value in it, because there are only so many unique items that they can put into it to set their product apart from all the other (more corporate) pet stores. There is also going to be a huge selling point to the fact that it is soy based, especially if you can claim you used organic materials? You will need some type of unique packaging concept, but it doesn't have to be expensive, it can be something as simple as a little scotty dog ribbon that you put on each treat or box of treats yourself. Something to make it kitchy and cute for dog owners to want to buy instead of the cheaper box products from the supermarket. Just pick your local boutiques first, call them and ask them if you can come by with a few of your samples, introduce yourself and leave a few goodies with them. If they think they have a market for it, they will buy a few from you to sell. If that works for you locally and you have some testimonials, then call other pet boutiques. As awareness for your product grows, you can begin to contact the larger chains, but you will have to have some money to package the product and market it to them (they can be a real pain to work with), but for starters and to make a successful business that you can run yourself fairly easily, try wholesaling to places that cater to dog lovers. Sounds fun, good luck!
