SOHO Start-Up -- How To Find a Product to Market

How To Find A Product To Market
by Jeffrey Dobkin

Any product you bring to market is going to be the direction of your life force for the next four or five years - maybe longer. So the first rule of thumb in the selection of a product is to make sure you love the product, the industry it serves, the prospects, and the purchasers - because you’re going to be immersed in their bathwater for quite a while. Better make sure you like the scent.

If you have no product in particular you’re thinking about bringing to market, how do you select one? Well… do you have a hobby? Do you have a passion? For example, do you love computers? How about plastics? Are you interested in metals? Or in manufacturing? Can you sit and talk about antiques endlessly with your friends? Does the conversation always turn to airplanes? Or to food? All of these passions are great pursuits that become industries you can get involved in. The industries become markets to sell your products.

Or… do you have an industry that you’re familiar with? Have you been on the distribution end of a particular field? Are you in retail (ouch, those long retail hours!) Are you familiar with direct mail? Do you enjoy catalogs?

What are you good at? Are you a good writer? A great chef? Do you enjoy working with your hands? Are you creative? Are you good at design? Are you good at art? Are you skillful at creating mechanical objects? Are you a great negotiator? Are you detail oriented? Do you have a special gift in any one area? These are all considerations in product selection.

Once you figure out some product ideas and the industry you’d like to be involved in, ask yourself if, somewhere down the road, there are other products you can market to the same audience. Keep in mind that some products can’t be marketed profitably by themselves. You may need to have additional depth in your product line and companion sales to make a profit. For example, if you sell a book, can you sell your purchasers additional books by the same author or by other authors in the same field? A person who buys one book on computer programming is likely to purchase a second on the same topic.

Throw the above mix into a hat, swish it around with a few beers, and these are your considerations for product selection. Stay with product fields in which you have a great interest. If you decide that you can stick it out, selling the same products to the same group without getting bored or tired of it, here’s where to find the products.

The U.S. Patent Office holds a wealth of stimulating ideas for products in every field. There are 81 patent depositories, located in libraries around the United States, where you can look up patents to find hundreds of thousands of both great and poor ideas in any particular field. Since patents are only good for 17 years, any patent issued before 1980 is fair game for you to duplicate, improve, or borrow from. Take a look at the product; if you can improve it - all the better! Voilà - your product concept is ready to go.

If you see a product with a patent issued after 1980, call the patent holder and ask if you can license the patent. Don’t offer - or pay - any money up front, and only offer a very small percentage - 2% to 5% of any net income - “if and when” your marketing of the product is successful. Most patent holders never market their inventions and will be happy to grant you permission to sell their products. Most inventors are just that - inventors; they invent a product, then move on to the next invention. Most aren’t marketers, which is a profession far removed from inventing.

By the way, one of the most fun government publications to read is the Patent Gazette. It’s the weekly publication of the Patent Office, and it shows all the patents issued for that particular week - usually 1,500 to 2,000. The booklet shows a line drawing of the invention and a one-paragraph description of the device. A single copy costs $50, but you can find it at the patent depositories.

No luck at the Patent Office? Go to the library and ask to see their copy of the Thomas Register of American Companies. This set of reference books weighs in at an incredible 270 pounds and contains products and their manufacturers in EVERY field. There are about 30 books in the Thomas Register set, each containing well over 1,000 pages. Just imagine all those manufacturers and distributors, all referenced in this one huge directory for only one reason: just to increase their sales. Can you find products and manufacturers to help you? Heck, yes. And in great depth.

So look up the industries you’re interested in, and get a look at all of the manufacturers and the multitude of products in each. Call any of them and see if they have any inventory - or tooling - of products they’ve tried to market and haven’t been successful with. Remember, most manufacturers are good at… well, manufacturing. They may be horrible at marketing, and as a result, they may have had little success in launching new products. These may be great products. Of course, they may be terrible products, too. But you never know until you ask and explore.

One thing is for sure - if you're an OK negotiator, the price will be right. Products sitting in their basements for a couple of years have little value to manufacturers - and have already cost them time, and still cost them space. They may just want to get rid of them. They may take 5¢ on the dollar. Plastics houses, like injection molders, are a good source of overstock and unsold inventory. Toy manufacturers, too!

If a manufacturer already offers a product you’d like to market, the price goes up. Naturally, as a “special marketing licensee” of their products, you’ll want their best pricing structure. But if you have to go through their set of distributors and retailers, there won’t be enough profit for your nontraditional marketing efforts. You may ask to license their products only for select industries, or through special avenues where they have no presence, such as only marketing through the mail or through TV ads. Make an offer.

Can’t find a ready-made product? If you need to develop a product, the Thomas Register, again, is the ultimate source for products, component parts, and their manufacturers. The set can be found in most libraries or purchased for $240 + $15.80 Shipping (800-699-9822, ext. 444, 5 Penn Plaza, NY, NY 10001). Although I haven’t read every page, I believe it contains listings of manufacturers of every product ever made. Yep. Every product and every industry are represented. As you get familiar with the Register’s contents, you can learn which players are in any particular field and which manufacturer makes each part of any component. It’s an incredible resource tool for ideas, products, parts, components, and manufacturers.

For example, suppose you invent something electrical, and you need electrical wire and a plug for each device. Thomas Register: hundreds of wire manufacturers, electrical plug makers, specialty distributors of electrical anything. Call, get a price for 1,000 - and 10,000 - units, and ask for a sample. When you get quantity prices, the samples are usually free and are shipped right out. Nice trick.

Still need creative stimulation and more resources? Get the trade magazines for the industries you would like to be involved in. In the reference section of the library, get the names of the various trade magazines from directories such as Burrelle’s Media Directory, Oxbridge Communication’s National Directory of Magazines, or Bacon’s Magazine Directory. These reference books are easy to use from the start, and in a single evening, you can get the names of every magazine serving any industry.

Call the magazine publishers and ask for a media kit. This is what potential advertisers ask for - and you were thinking about running an ad in their magazine, weren’t you? The media kit contains sample magazines with the publisher’s current advertising price schedule; it’s sent right out to you first class. Ask them to include any directory issue they may publish, too. It’ll probably be free if you request it at this time.

When the magazines arrive, look at the ads. Any ideas for better products? Look at the new product sections. Anything you can improve upon? Circle the bingo numbers on the reader service card for free information. If you fall in love with a product, call the manufacturer and ask for special licensing and marketing rights - and special pricing - so you can start marketing their products.

Trade shows are another incredible source of products. There are almost 20,000 trade shows staged annually in the United States. Some shows, like the Premium Incentive Shows held each May in New York and again each October in Chicago, span every conceivable product category and every industry. The gift show and the variety merchandise show are other huge broad-based product shows. The annual New York toy show is also pretty incredible.

Other shows are more industry specific. Some are product oriented - and are hard-selling, order-taking shows. Others only demonstrate products and supply information for further follow-up. But one thing is certain: every company that takes a booth has it for only one reason - to increase sales. You can learn an incredible amount of information about products, product needs, or even an entire industry in a single afternoon at a trade show.

Finally, if you see a product you like on any retailer’s shelf, call the manufacturer and ask about a special licensing arrangement. If the manufacturer is big, they may not allow it - they’ll have distributors and retailers all over the country who would get mad if they sold to you directly. But lots of smaller manufacturers will be eager to talk.

You see, no one knows what you have in mind. What kind of campaign you’re thinking about, or how much money you’re going to invest. You may just be the home run a manufacturer is looking for. You may be the one who takes out an ad on a cable show (ads can cost as little as $20 to place on such prestigious networks as ESPN or USA), and you may sell tons of their products.

Still stuck? There are nonprofit inventors’ groups all over the United States that will help you. No, I’m not talking about the rip-off inventors’ hot lines or invention marketing scam firms that seem to abound in the inventing industry (never pay anyone whom you haven’t checked out first to evaluate your idea, and never, ever pay any invention marketing firm over $300 for any reason!) Most big cities have inventors’ groups. In Philadelphia we have the nonprofit American Society for Inventors, of which I am privileged to serve on the Board of Directors. Inventors’ Digest is a great magazine of help for inventors (800-838-8808, just $22 per year - and worth it!) Now you just have to do the hardest part: start.

Jeffrey Dobkin, author of the incredible 400-page marketing manual, How To Market A Product for Under $500 ($29.95), now has a second book, Uncommon Marketing Techniques ($17.95) - 33 of his latest columns on small business marketing, exactly like the one you just read. Both books are available in finer bookstores nationwide, or directly from the publisher - 800-234-IDEA. These books are completely filled with tips and techniques to make your marketing faster, cheaper, more effective - and fun. You never learned this stuff in college! Mr. Dobkin is also a speaker, a direct mail copywriter, and a marketing consultant. To place an order, or to speak with Mr. Dobkin call 610/642-1000. Fax 610/642-6832. Phone orders welcome - Visa, M/C, AMEX. From The Danielle Adams Publishing Company, Box 100, Merion Station, PA 19066. Or visit him at www.dobkin.com. Satisfaction Always Guaranteed.

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