The Art of the Very Small Start: Part 2

Continuing from our resident contributor, Design Translator’s earlier post on “The Art of the Very Small Start”, he will finally unveil his cards and tell us about the new venture that sprang off from a blog entry. Of course, if you have guessed it right by now, DT is sharing with us his journey in how to make the IPoor t-shirt product, from dream to reality.

So from Part 1 we really get a gist of the direction of where digital businesses are moving.

If we use Crowdsourcing, which is a way to generate ideas and source for labor, and The Long Tail Effect which tells us that people buy niche products almost as much as mainstream, as a basis for our discussion we can now proceed to flesh out a product marketing plan for the new Web 2.0 environment.

To further solidify my discussion, I will also sprinkle this discussion with examples on how I applied this analytical thinking to my small entrepreneurship project the iPoor T-Shirt and iPoor product brand.

It’s amazing but I always find what you learn in school still applies today. I suppose I was awake eh?

If there was any take away from my marketing class, they were the 5 “P”s, People, Product, Price, Promotion, and Place (distribution). Till this day, I still apply such fundamentals to my design work, and I will do it again here.

People

Always know your market. Personally as a designer and entrepreneur, I find this is the most important category. Thus it’s the first order in any marketing plan.

Most people come up with great product ideas but have no idea how or who to sell the product to. Let me put it straight to you, you don’t earn anything if nobody buys your product, period.

Understanding your customer’s view on consuming behavior, product selection, likes and dislikes, needs and wants, spending power and even web surfing habits are powerful indicators on how you can tailor your product to them.

With the internet you can even afford to conduct super focused marketing and creating products that fit 100% of their needs. But do note the more specific a tailored product the smaller the volumes so you will need to balance it some how.

My iPoor T-shirt is targeted at a group of design savvy people that appreciates a clever design and the deeper meaning it entails. When looking at the Cult of the Mac, my target market are often in the peripheral looking in and may or may not own an iPod. They are internet savvy and because of that, they are well aware there is another world out there other than that of Apple’s viewpoint.

Product

So by knowing your market or the people that you want to sell to, you can now comfortably define your product.