CATEGORY ASSESSMENT: Gain credibility through context
What is the scope of your expertise?
I’m sure you know a lot about your function (if you are reading this, that is probably in marketing or sales or insight). And you know everything there is to know about your product.
But do you know enough about total category dynamics? About the desires and attitudes of shoppers? Or what the competition is doing?
CONTEXT IS CREDIBILITY
Launching a new product takes so much inward-focused effort that it is common to forget about how important external context is. Building expertise on your product can come at the expense of ignorance in other areas.
And an unfortunate byproduct of this ignorance is a projection of self-centric interest.
It is tough to have unbiased conversations with retailers about how your product helps the entire category or how it fits into the assortment of existing products when you know so little about those other products.
It is hard to connect with shoppers when you don’t understand how they approach the category, how they learn about and evaluate new products or what bigger benefits those products are expected to deliver.
You have to be a category expert before you can be a product expert.
Understanding all category shoppers helps a product target the best segment, with the most value, and highest probability of capturing their purchase.
It is difficult to develop a pricing strategy or optimize your value proposition without an intimate understanding of how existing products attract interest and communicate their own value.
Knowing the strengths and weaknesses of the competition is critically important to finding a position that minimizes competitive threats and allows ownership of a meaningful and distinct equity.
Category knowledge instantly makes a vendor more valuable to retailers and buyers always looking for new and useful information. By definition, their job is to be category experts and they’re looking for anyone that can help.
They like to see information that validates their view of the category (which also gives greater credibility to the messenger).
Even more, they like information about what other retailers are doing right (something they often have limited visibility to).
They LOVE to see new or unusual information that challenges existing perceptions or reveals new opportunities (they know growth rarely comes from doing the same things they’ve always done).
And they recognize that insight can deliver ongoing value worth far more than temporary increases to profit margins (which also gives greater access and influence to the few vendors that bring the insight).
They are not just looking for insight, but how to act on or apply that insight to trigger new sales (after all, insight without action is just more data to them).
They are more likely to engage with selling stories that set up category-level issues or opportunities and present products that are clearly optimized to deliver new sales by addressing those needs (those that help develop the strategy are more likely to own the solution).
TIME TO TAKE A BROADER VIEW
How much do you know about the category shopper? Maybe you know a few demographic skews, but do you understand their shopping habits, product selection process, attitudes, desires, sources of dissatisfaction or confusion, how they learn about new products or how they behave in front of the shelf?
Contact us if you realize your perspective is incomplete or you want to become viewed as more than a salesman selling an item.