Meet customers’ need for your business to succeed

The spread of Covid-19 has left few people unscathed. Last year presented a great learning curve for the global economies. Many entrepreneurial businesses, in an attempt to survive, pivoted to meet new needs for goods or services borne out of the Covid-19 crisis.

New start-ups have been opportunistic during the pandemic, repurposing and redirecting the present knowledge, people, skills and networks to match the new market needs and wants that have emerged.

Many individuals with the entrepreneurial spirit are getting creative in order to introduce a “different” product in the market and establish a market share with a hope of building customer loyalty over time. However, in order to develop the right product for the market, it is most important to understand what the product is perceived as from the eyes of the consumers.

After all, it is the customer who is going to use that product. Are entrepreneurs paying close attention to the evolving needs of the customers, and what role does marketing play here?

A business exists to satisfy its customers in a profitable manner. All business entities attempt to fulfill this twofold objective through their marketing offerings. Marketing plan begins with formulating and offering to meet target customer needs and wants. With changes in consumer preferences and market conditions, a company has to remain alert to respond to such changes and be capable enough to bring improved or new offerings at a regular interval.

 However, increasing global competition and weak economic growth worldwide has made the stakes higher in the business environment. Even outside the pandemic situation, no company can sell the same product forever, they have to keep improving their existing offerings to serve the target customers better. 

More importantly, develop new products to innovate not just imitate. This needs a company to be proactive as opposed to reactive to customers’ requirements. Successful global companies remain immune to external shocks due to their ability to make innovation a continuous process.

Identifiable form

 A product is a set of attributes accumulated in an identifiable form. In marketing, anything that can be offered for use and consumption in exchange for money or some other form of value is a product.

It includes not only physical goods but also services, experiences, events, ideas, information, places and properties. When purchasing a product, customers do not buy just physical attributes but rather benefits that satisfy their needs.

Businesspeople must always keep in mind that a product is anything that is offered to a market as a solution to consumers’ problems. For instance, consumers who purchase disinfectants, actually want hygiene and cleanliness. 

The messaging through marketing also helps here. Marketers are aware of the wise words of economist Theodore Levitt who famously said “Kodak sells film, but they do not advertise film, they advertise memories.”

 What a company thinks about its product or brand is not important. Understanding and evaluating the value propositions offered to the target customers is crucial. The value proposition is the package of the benefits offered to the customers which acts as a convincing reason why they should buy the offering using different combinations of products and services.

Companies design strategies to increase the value offered to the customers. When the customers buy products, they do not buy just the functional aspect of the product, there are many other aspects of the product which influence the buying decision. 

Furthermore, the psychological association, if any, with that brand also attracts them. Businesses also have to remain in touch with the customers to observe the changes that are happening with regard to consumer preferences. It is often found that companies do not spend enough time understanding the specific changing needs of their customers before embarking on product development.

 During the planning and development of products, marketers predominantly focus on five different elements or product levels. These include the core benefit which is the fundamental benefit. It comprises the real service or benefits the customer is really buying.

Peaceful environment

The second is the basic product which delivers the core benefits for which the customer buys a product. For example, a hotel room includes a bed, bathroom, towels. The expected product consists of a set of attributes and conditions customers normally expect when they buy the product for instance hotel guests expect a peaceful environment, a clean bed, fresh towels, working lights, a fan, or air conditioner. In emerging economies, most competition usually takes place at the expected product level.

The augmented product is then created by the market to exceed customer expectations. For instance, a hotel may make guests delighted by offering a free ride to the airport in a special car. The nature and number of such benefits depend upon the creativity of the marketers.

Lastly, the potential product, which comprises all the possible augmentations and transformations the product or offering might have in the future. Here companies search for new ways to satisfy customers. This way they also try to make their offerings distinctive.

Such transformations depend on the innovative capability of the marketers however such augmentation adds costs. With the increased costs, such benefits soon become expected thereby implying that markets must continuously search for new features and benefits which soon become necessary.

 Marketing should be integrated into product development and innovation process and should not be used as a band aid when the product starts crumbling.

Barot is a business and financial analyst, humanitarian, conservationist, occasional artist, recipient of OGW honor. [email protected]