Developing a Successful Product Launch Plan

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Developing a Successful Product Launch Plan
Cathy Liggett
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Fighting Fires

• Anticipation Market Problems
• Cultivation New Business Opportunities
• Innovation New Products Services

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Successful Product Launch Plan

• Strategic Product Launch Planning
• Marketing Launch Plan
• Marketing Launch Strategies
• Marketing Launch Programs
• Launch Management

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Strategic Product Launch Planning

• Product Focused
• Strategic Launch Decisions
• Strategic Platform Decisions
• Sets overtone and directions
• Strategic Action Decisions
• Define to whom to sell and how

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Strategic Platform Decisions

• Type of Demand Sought
• Different levels of product newness require
  different kinds of impact the launch activities
  must have on demand
• Primary Demand
• Customer Migration
• Replacement Demand
• Selective Demand Stimulate trial purchases

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Strategic Platform Decisions

• Permanence Three options
• We are in the stay, no thought to getting out
• In to stay if we meet our goals, try to win, but
  be willing to pull out.
• Temporary or Short Term used lots
• Example Baskin-Robbins has a basic cadre of
  flavors but runs others in and out to give
  variety. Snack foods also have short- term
  products

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Strategic Platform Decisions

• Aggressiveness
• Aggressive
• Cautious
• Balanced
• Competitive Advantage
• Will our product lower end user cost by virtue of
  its price?
• Will our product offer new benefits by virtue of
  its differentiation? (Many companies choose both)

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Strategic Platform Decisions

• Product Line Replacement Strategies
• Butt-on Product Replacement
• Dropped when a new one is announced
• Fords Marketing of Mondeo and dropping of Sierra
• Low-Season Switch
• Same a Butt-on, but arranging the switch at a low
  point between seasons
• Tour companies use switch when they develop their
  new catalogs

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Strategic Platform Decisions

• High-Season Switch
• Same a Butt-on, but arranging the new item at a
  top of a season
• Sony, putting new replacements items out during
  the Christmas season.
• Roll-in, Roll-out
• Another version of butt-on, arrange by a sequence
  of market segments
• Mercedes introduced its C series country by
  country

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Strategic Platform Decisions

• Downgrading
• Earlier product alongside the new, but will
  decreased support
• 386 chip stayed alongside the 486, until the
  Pentium was introduced
• Splitting Channels
• New Item in a different channel or diverting
  existing product into another channel
• Old electronic products often end up in
  discounted channels

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Strategic Action Decisions

• Competitive Relationship
• Avoid a Specific Competitor
• The product that will come from this program
  will not be aimed at XYZ Company, nor threaten a
  piece of business that is important to that
  firm.
• Colgate once had such a statement relative to
  Procter Gamble, but abandoned it in the 1980s
• Aim directly at a specific competitor
• Make no reference to a specific competitor
• Caution trying to do two or three of these at
  once can cause a set of conflicts for your
  tactical managers

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Strategic Action Decisions

• Scope of Market Entry Related to Market Testing
• Rollout
• Rollout very rapidly (barely holding up long
  enough to find crisis problems)
• Rollout deliberately, as performance warrants
• Rollout to the total market at the beginning

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Strategic Action Decisions

• Image
• What will the new product need?
• Entirely new image
• Major change in an existing image
• Tweaking of an existing image
• No change in an image

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Strategic Product Launch Planning

• Organizational Focus
• Guideline Decisions or Strategic Givens
• Decisions made early in the new products process
  or product protocol specification that would be
  difficult or costly to change once made
• These are often set in concrete without our
  knowledge
• These can also be corporate policies that cant
  be bent or someone in upper management that whose
  personal opinions that become corporate law
• Example Sybron Corporation, had a division in
  the dental furniture business, the division
  desperately needed new cash flow, and it had a
  new and unique chair ready to go, but the
  corporation had a mandatory 50 gross margin
  requirement that the division product planners
  were sure would be waived when management saw the
  new chair. It wasnt, even when the gross margin
  came in at 47. The division collapsed.

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Developing The Marketing Plan
Define Marketing Objectives
Situation Size-Up
External
Internal
Market analysis
Marketing audit
Strengths Weaknesses
Macro- environmental analysis
Specify target market
Set product strategy
Set supporting strategy
Distribution Sales Force
Other Services
Advertising Promotion
Pricing
Deployment
Post- Launch Evaluation
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Marketing Launch Plan

• Marketing Launch Plan
• A plan of action for new product introduction or
  launch
• Where does the Marketing Planning activity begin?
  
• Market launch is one of the final stages in
  the new product game plan, but do it
  simultaneously with the strategic product launch
  planning, if you wait until the end you may have
  done too little, too late
• Discussion

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Setting Marketing Objectives

• The Role of Objectives
• A decision criteria
• Creates a sense of purpose
• A standard for measurement
• What makes a good objective, marketing
  objectives must
• Set criteria for making decisions
• Be quantifiable and measurable
• Specify a time frame
• Example To obtain a 20 unit market share in
  the owner operator segment of the class 8 diesel
  truck market by the end of Year 2 in the
  market.

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Setting Marketing Objectives

• Market objectives for a new product should
  include some or all
• Unit or dollar sales of the product by year after
  launch
• Share by year (be sure to specify the whole
  market or segment, and the unit of measurement)
• Product profitability
• percentage margins, annual profits by year
  (dollars or percentages) and payback period
• Discussion

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The Situation Size Up

• The Situation Size Up
• Key facet, size- ups are done often and at every
  phase of marketing planning
• Size-up is a situation analysis the relevant
  information and asks
• So what? most often ignored
• What does all this information mean to the
  development of my plan of action?
• What are the action implications?

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The Situation Size Up

• Market Analysis addresses the following
  questions and issues
• Market Overview
• How large is the market?
• How fast is it growing?
• What are the key market trends both quantitative
  and qualitative?
• What are the market drivers?

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The Situation Size Up

• Market Segments
• What segments exist in this new products
  marketplace?
• How is each segment unique?
• How fast is each growing?
• What are their drivers?
• What other segment trends are evident?

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The Situation Size Up

• Buyer Behavior
• The who, what, when, where, why and how of the
  purchase process within each segment are set out?
• Who buys?
• Who are the purchase influencers?
• What do buyers buy, and when and where?
• Why do they buy what they buy?
• What are their choice criteria and what are their
  preferences, wants and needs?

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The Situation Size Up

• Competition
• Who are the competitors in each segment?
• What are their strengths and weaknesses?
• How good are their products?
• How does the customer rate their products?
• What are the competitors strategies in pricing,
  advertising, and distribution?
• How well are they doing in terms of market share
  and profitability? Why?

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The Situation Size Up

• Macroenvironmental Analysis Trends and Factors
• The economic situation
• Political, legislative and legal situation
• Demographic trends
• Social trends
• Technological development

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The Situation Size Up

• These questions should be asked for each trend
  category
• What is the current situation or trend?
• What is the timing of the situation or trend, and
  how certain is it to occur?
• What are the implications of the situation or
  trend?
• Is it a treat or an opportunity?
• What impact does it have on the design,
  positioning, and pricing of your product?
• What action is called for in light of the
  situation or trend?

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The Situation Size Up

• Internal Assessment
• The companys internal strengths and weaknesses,
  as they pertain to this product launch.
• Perform a Marketing Audit
• Identify marketing assets and liabilities
  and how you can build on them and use them to
  your advantage in the new product

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The Situation Size Up

• Marketing Audit Questions
• Can your relationships with your customers be
  used to advantage with the new product? Or your
  image or brand name?
• Is your Sales Force good, bad or indifferent?
• Will your Sales Force be able to sell your new
  product? If not, what should be done?
• What shape is your customer service or support
  in? Are sufficient changes needed to support the
  new product?
• Assess the status of your distribution or channel
  systems, pricing policies, advertising
  approaches, etc. What needs to be done to bring
  them up to speed for the new product?

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The Situation Size Up

• Attack from the position of strength
• Review your companys marketing performance
  overtime
• Discussion
• D

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Marketing Launch Strategies

• Marketing Strategies
• Define the Target Market
• Key element of the product definition
• The manager needs to know the object of your
  affection

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Marketing Strategies

• Segmenting the Market
• Delineation of groups or clusters of people
  within a market such that there is relative
  homogeneity within each group and heterogeneity
  between groups.
• Bases for Segmenting the Market
• State of Being
• State of Mind
• Product Usage
• Volume Segmentation
• Loyalty
• Market Factor
• Benefit Segmentation

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Marketing Strategies

• Selecting the Right Target Market
• Criteria for Market Selection
• Segment Attractiveness
• Competitive Situation
• Fit
• Ease of Use
• Relative Advantage
• Profitability
• Discussion

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Marketing Strategies

• Product Strategy
• Product Positioning
• Product Benefits and Value Proposition
• Features Attributes
• Supporting Elements of Market Plan
• Channel and E-Channels
• Pricing Strategy
• Overall Business Strategy

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Marketing Launch Programs

• Advertising and Marketing Communications
• Steps in developing your communications plan for
  launch
• Specify the communications objectives
• Specify the target and positioning strategy
• Describe the product to the agency
• Review plan and approve
• Review the media plan
• Access the worth of the objectives

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Marketing Launch Programs

• Sales Force Decisions
• Training the sales force in the selling of the
  new product
• Providing the sales force with the appropriate
  selling aids
• Devoting effort to the new product
• Motivating and incentivizing the sales force
  (internal marketing)
• If changes or additions to your sales force are
  needed
• What is the nature of the selling job for the new
  product?
• Is the nature of the selling job compatible with
  the talents, training and the way the current
  sales force operates?

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Marketing Launch Programs

• Financials
• What will the plan cost to implement (the budget)
  
• What will the plan will achieve (Sales Profit
  Projections)

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Developing The Marketing Plan
Define Marketing Objectives
Situation Size-Up
External
Internal
Market analysis
Marketing audit
Strengths Weaknesses
Macro- environmental analysis
Specify target market
Set product strategy
Set supporting strategy
Distribution Sales Force
Other Services
Advertising Promotion
Pricing
Deployment
Post- Launch Evaluation
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Launch Management

• Follows these six steps to increase new product
  and service revenue and improve ROI on new
  product development costs
• Establish goals
• Create an effective product launch process
• Define appropriate launch team structure and
  roles
• Choose suitable launch managers
• Select the right sponsorship team
• Ensuring continuous improvement

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Launch Management

• Establish Goals
• For an innovation idea to take place, companies
  need first to establish the right suite of
  metrics
• Overall ROI
• Time-to breakeven
• Measure of quality
• Revenue and profit profile

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Launch Management

• Create an effective product launch process
• Tailored to the company its culture, customers,
  its industry, types of solutions it provides

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Launch Management

• Define appropriate launch team structure and
  roles
• Successful launch teams work together to uncover
  problems or risks, and find solutions both inside
  and outside individual team members functional
  roles.

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Launch Management

• Choose suitable launch managers
• An effective launch manger builds a shared
  vision, helping create a team which aggressively
  overcomes hurdles
• Select the right sponsorship team
• The sponsorship team ensures that the launch team
  is both accountable for and empowered to
  effectively execute the launch
• Ensuring continuous improvement
• Implementing continuous improvement requires
  discipline and a true commitment to
  organizational learning

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Case Study

• Case Study of Successful Product Launch Plan
• Need
• The product management team at an international
  company was gearing up to develop a pair of
  cutting-edge, phone-and-data devices in
  partnership with leading technology
  manufacturers.
• Actions
• Strategic Product Launch Plan
• Marketing Plan
• Marketing Strategies
• Marketing Programs
• Followed the six steps of Launch Management

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Case Study Continued

• Results
• Successfully launched two first-of-their-kind
  devices in time for high-sales retail season.
• Exceeded post-launch sales expectations in first
  few months.
• Achieved a positive revenue and
  customer-lifetime-value impact for designated
  sales channels

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Summary

• A well-planned and managed launch plan is
  critical to a new products success in the market
  place and achieving product goals.
• From the customers view point, the launch of a
  new product or service must appear smooth and its
  value proposition compelling

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