There are many reasons why products fail and even the largest manufacturing companies cannot escape from those mistakes. Watching out some basic pitfalls below can save your company or your business on very low sales or even on the brink of bankruptcy.
1. Setting Aside Quality - since business today are very competitive than an few years back, many companies are skimping on quality in order to be competitive. News about bad quality of a product can spread like a wild fire in the internet and word of mouth as quickly compared when internet was not yet available. Before you know it, even your most loyal client can drop you without notice if the quality of your product does not satisfy their standards.
2. Making Copycat Products – if your product does not have a clear and defined niche market, you are competing against thousands or millions of clones with a very minimal chance of success. Monopolizing on a certain specialized niche will give you a better chance of success. If you want a broader niche market, your product got to have a competitive features not found on your competitors. Innovation is the key on the rapidly changing market fad.
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I was searching of a good advertising medium that is not very expensive and I read in a magazine about a clothes hanger that are used to advertise companies and businesses. I’m not sure if the company producing such clothes hanger is the pioneer and maybe someone have already thought about it. The company was Hanger Network founded by JD Schulman in 2003. The hanger was made entirely from recycled, heavy duty coated paperboard (of course the hook was recycled plastic for durability).
The idea is those hangers are given free to dry cleaners and advertisers shoulders the cost which in turn have their company logos on those hangers. Since seldom will people reject freebies, then it isn’t hard to distribute those hangers. This is a very good idea from an American that we Filipinos can duplicate if we are planning to have other advertising medium we want for our campaign. Since those hangers are for dry cleaners only because it is made from recycled paper, how about making a water proof clothes hanger too? items like soda can could be a good material.
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Have you read or heard of these words: Utube, Yotube, Yutube, Yu tube, Youtude videos? those words at first glance looks like a derivative of the word “Youtube”. If that is what you think, then maybe you are right because when you type these words on Google search, the first website on the search list is Youtube. I don’t want to make my own judgment that those words are misspellings because those words originate in different countries. Who knows, maybe those are correct spellings depending on the country where the search terms originate. Also, these keywords can be a good opportunity for keyword hijacking if you want your site to have many visitors because those keywords have a lot of traffic.
But just beware that keyword hijacking is not a good practice if your intention is just to have all kinds of traffic under the sun but not suited to your site’s theme or niche. It might do you more harm than good. For example, if you have a website about the latest gadgets and most the visitors that came to your site were looking for the latest celebrity gossips, then I think those visitors will be turned off and never visit your site again. Also, you are lucky if the visitor will read even the first paragraph of your post and not leave is a split second.
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Budget is the main concern of businesses for availing advertisements specially in this global financial crisis we were experiencing right now. But adverting is also very important, specially in a period like this. Why? Branding is of utmost importance so people will still have loyalty to a product despite of a weak economy and will appear that the company or business is doing all right. Mainstream media is the most effective way of advertising but if you are looking for an alternative to lower the cost, then below are some options: (I omitted online advertising because I already made a post for it)
Transit Ads
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A common scene at the store: Customer enters. Salesperson approaches with her usual “bili na” (“Buy Now”) or “how may I help you Sir/Ma’m?” welcome. Customer brushes off salesperson and continues browsing alone. The customer’s reaction may seem a bit rude, but reasonable. Unless they have a question or need help, most customers would rather do without the sales routine. They don’t want to listen to another hard-selling pitch or have someone trail them around the store. Whether you’re selling clothes, food or insurance,you and your sales staff must know the low down on clinching a sale. This experience happens to me not usually but on one particular department store it does. On the Philippine souvenir section in Robinson dept store in Cainta. Not only the sales staff follows your trail and watch your every move, some employees are annoying and guarding you like a thief. So what’s a salesperson supposed to do? Well, they can continue their age-old, ineffective, and irritating way of approaching customers, or they can try the following pieces of advice to see to it that the customer is comfortable, interested, and ultimately taking out his wallet to make a purchase:
- Dress the part. Good grooming is important in practically every job-but even more so in sales. Salespeople are at the front line, and give customers their first impressions of the business. So, look your best and put on what’s most appropriate for the job. If you are selling apparel, take special care with your own clothes and appearance.
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