How Can I Get People To Buy My Product?

[standardengr]

Hi everyone!

Like many others on here I've decided I want to try designing and selling hardware. I already have a few ideas I'm working on but the design and manufacturing isn't my biggest concern. My main concern is how I'll actually get people to buy my products. Can I get some advice from people who've had success marketing and selling their own products?

Thanks for your help!

[@rt]

Option A)
Send one to Dave’s Mailbag. Don’t use black PCB substrate, make a special unit where all wiring is bundled with cable ties.
Sand corrosion off any enclosure edges the moment before packing for shipping. Don’t label the box as time sensitive (even if it is).
Replace any pots with indented types, screen print component designators for PCB overlay, disallow PCB manufacturer markings.
Use Nippon Chemicon capacitors.

Option B)
Pay for a great video, and set up indegogo.

[ataradov]

Put it up on Tindie and post a link here. If the product is good, it will sell though a word of mouth. It may take some time for it to take off, but this approach is cheap.

Pay (or send for free with no guarantees) a bunch of YouTubers to promote your product.

[SG-1]

My two cents from a consumers view: Your marketing has to explain how this product will make my lift better & how I cannot live without it.

There is an old story about the early telephone salesmen.  The company pitch was to explain the technology to the perspective buyer.  One sales salesman was outselling all the others by 10 to 1.  When he returned from the field everyone wanted to know how he was doing this.

He told them that he would sit down with the lady of the house & explain that she could talk (gossip) with the neighbors with out ever getting dressed to go out.

Many products advertised now I cannot even figure out what they are supposed do. I know immediately that I do not need it.

For instance if I need a meter that can measure AC+DC, how do I find it ?  They are out there, but that feature is not advertised.  You have to dig through the specs for it.

[Brumby]

3. Don't infringe Siglent trademarks.

Classic.

[shpxnvz]

I'll share my two cents.  I've launched a moderately popular and profitable software product; hardware is probably not an entirely different ballgame.

Try to think a little bit early on about what sort of business you want to run, as that will guide what kind of products you can create and sell, and where to focus your effort individually.  Are you just looking for a hobby, to sell a few things for extra pocket money?  Or want to develop a small but sustainable lifestyle business?  Or maybe you have some capital to invest and want to build something bigger?

Whatever the answer you ought to think at least a little bit about product/market fit.  No matter how cool your product is you won't sell much without a viable market of willing buyers.  Great product ideas are a dime a dozen but few will find a sustainable market, and since the cost to develop and sell a product is huge a top priority should be finding out quickly and cheaply whether there's a market worth selling to.  Otherwise you can end up spending a ton of time and energy and money trying to sell a doomed product to a market that doesn't exist (been there, done that).

I'd go deeper into that aspect but most of what I've learned about testing product/market fit is more suited to software than hardware.

If you're going to go it alone and try to bootstrap a business by yourself you'll probably have to step outside of your comfort zone and pick up some new skills.  You've got to be minimally competent at product design, product management, marketing, sales, contract negotiation, accounting, etc...  There are a bunch of great books out there that can help you pick up the skills you don't have yet.

The one piece of advice I wish I had back in the beginning would be find a viable market before worrying about building a complete, functional and polished product.  I could have saved the better part of a year on my first attempt if I had done that the other way around.

[ejeffrey]

One more piece of advice to go with shpxnvz: don't ignore early feedback.

Once you get a prototype or even a design concept into some prospective customers, they are going to give you suggestions and make complaints.  Some of them will be contradictory, others will be just crazy, but at least listen to all of them. The people interested here are your "best case", if you can't make them happy, you can't make anyone happy.  You won't be able to do everything they ask for, but if there are a few big things that you hear over and over, you need to *really* try to accommodate, or you are going to hear that x100 when you try to go to a bigger audience.  If you really can't do something everyone seems to want that is a point to seriously consider throwing in the towel.

A specific example of this is to not use the excuse "my beta testers are all techies, they don't understand regular users" to dismiss their complaints.  You might be right, but a lot of people underestimate their users to their own detriment.  Technical users also appreciate products that are simple and do what they need, but if you don't satisfy their needs, you probably aren't going to satisfy anyones needs.  If you really are convinced that a complaint is not relevant because your testers are not your target audience you need to get some of your target audience as testers.

[standardengr]

Thanks for the feedback everyone! It looks like I have a lot to think about. I definitely still need to find a niche market and stick with it.

[calexanian]

Also depends on the type of product and market it would go into. Most markets have their own trends and sales channels.

[ebastler]

It might help if you tell us what type of product you are thinking of. Who are your target customers? Otherwise, all advice here is either just generic, or may be downright misleading.

(Hint: If you are planning a gadget for a non-technical audience, don't send it to Dave for Mailbag.)

[standardengr]

Right now I'm working on a GPS clock and I have another idea for an "engineer's" watch with several features that would be helpful for engineers. I'm not sure if I want to focus on wearables, lab equipment, or other devices. My original idea was that I would just develop whatever ideas I have and focus on what's successful.

[Distelzombie]

You mean like a smartwatch? Or a smartphone?
Smartphones already have oscilloscopes. (At least androids.) It uses the mic or external "microphone", which could be a probe, and it goes up to 40kHz - depending on your smartphone. Did i mention they have GPS?

Thing is... you need something that's really new. Don't just get a volt-meter, throw a clock on it and make a wrist mount. That doesn't work. Also you have to make sure that the GPS function cannot be used with malintent - like logging where you are 24/7 - by third parties, by you - the manufacturer, or by the user.
Losing trust equals no new sales.

Something new like:

[shpxnvz]

Don't take this as a comment on the project ideas you shared at all, but it reminded me of a sort-of truism in the small/bootstrapped software startup community.  For very small companies it's way, way easier to sell products B2B than it is B2C.  If you are able to create a product that scratches an itch for a business (read: lowers pain/cost of doing business in some tangible way) they are much more likely to be willing to pay you for it than consumers are.

This is especially true if the cost is low enough that the person in the company who's job you will be making easier can expense it or buy it with petty cash.  Once you get over the threshold where purchasing departments have to get involved by policy it gets much harder.

Niche products or niche industries can be a good thing too because the market may be small enough that bigger companies can't profitably sell to it.

So, maybe think a little bit about itches that the folks you know at work have; problems they constantly complain about that could be fixed with a particular device.  Sometimes buying an acquaintance a cup of coffee so you can pick their brain for a while can generate ideas for problems to solve, too.

Best of luck!