📊 Testing the Market to Increase Sales: Tips and Strategies 📈

Business is movement. To be in demand and have a high level of competitiveness, it is necessary to constantly test the market and offer customers new products and services. But this must be done wisely. Thoughtless offering of goods and services always breaks down on the same problem – lack of customers. The trouble is that the problem is often not discovered immediately, but after a week, a month, a quarter or even a year.

During this time, as a rule, huge amounts of money are wasted. Often the losses are so serious and painful that in the best case it comes to huge debts that have to be repaid for a long time, and in the worst case – to bankruptcy and closing the business.. Is it possible to avoid all this? Yes, it is. One of the options is not to change anything, to work with the same goods and services.

The second option is to test the market before offering new products and services, to make sure it exists and to find out its size. The usual cost of this procedure is from 100 to 500 euros, which is much cheaper than getting a huge amount of unsold goods in which huge amounts of money are frozen and incurring huge costs for promotion to the market. that does not exist.

Why Test the Market

Market testing is the only way to find out whether it exists or not, and if so, how many consumers there are. The results of testing, which a good specialist usually conducts in 3-5 days, provide enough information to understand whether these goods or services will sell or not. Testing saves money, sometimes a lot of money, time and nerves.

Testing saves money, sometimes a lot of money, time and nerves. However, not every market testing is really such. The market is a collection of people who are pumped up by a specific idea and want to implement it. The idea itself is the core of the market, and the product is just a way, or rather one of the ways to implement this idea. Therefore, market testing is also determining whether there is an idea for your product and how many people are pumped up by it.

If there is an idea, if many people have been pumped up by it, as many as it takes to sell goods or services, then there is a market and it makes sense to bring the goods or services to it. If there is no idea, or if few people have been pumped up by it, then there is no market and there is simply nowhere to go. When there is no market, it is necessary to launch another procedure – creating a market and only after it is ready – enter it.

How to Conduct Market Testing

One of the most common ways to test the market is to manufacture or purchase a small number of goods and conduct a trial sale, or a trial provision of services. If sales are going well, it is considered that there is a market. If sales are not going well, it is considered that there is no market. In reality, it is not the market that is being tested in this way, but the goods or services.

The most reliable, reliable and effective way of testing is to evaluate the idea of ​​the target market. This method cannot be used to determine for sure whether there is a market or not. A product or service can be purchased accidentally, or to please the seller, or due to a good mood or having extra money. In fact, testing the market with a product or service is simply testing the product or service, but not testing the market.

You should not confuse product or service testing with market testing. It may turn out that market tests using a product will show that it does not exist, but it actually does, or it may turn out that tests will show the presence of a market, but it will not actually exist. The most reliable, trustworthy and effective way of testing is to evaluate the idea of ​​the target market.

Testing the market for an idea

The essence of this method is that first, using the market legram, the idea underlying it is determined. If you do not know the idea of ​​the target market, then you do not know the market and do not understand it. Accordingly, in order to conduct testing, you need a market legram. After the idea underlying the target market is determined, it is assessed. In the process of assessment, it is determined whether this idea has been implemented in potential consumers or not.

Market testing by assessing the target market idea is interesting because it can be done before the goods are manufactured or purchased. If the idea is implemented, it is very important to know how many potential consumers. Then it remains to determine the compliance of the product or service with the market idea and draw final conclusions. There may be a market, but if the product or service does not correspond to it, there will be no sales. In this case, it is necessary to either refine the product or service to bring it into compliance with the target market, or enter a non-target market.

Market testing through the evaluation of the target market idea is interesting because it can be done before the goods are manufactured or purchased, or before money is spent on creating conditions for providing the service. This means that there will be no need to spend money on purchasing goods, equipment, renting premises, hiring employees, and much more.

What will market testing yield?

The amount of testing costs is small, hundreds and thousands of times less than the possible losses in the event of introducing goods and services to a market that does not exist. One of the indications for testing is introducing a new product or service to the market. The second indication is creating a startup.. But there are other situations when it is advisable to conduct it.

It is recommended to conduct scheduled market testing at least once a year. The first situation is poor sales of goods or services. The second situation is advertising shows low efficiency. The third situation is determining opportunities to increase sales. Testing allows you to not only understand whether there is a market or not, but also to predict its development.. You can determine the product's compliance with the market, the market life cycle, and much more.

In order to avoid a sudden and unexpected disappearance of the market and, as a result, a stop in sales, it is recommended to conduct scheduled market testing at least once a year. If you have at least one of the voiced indications for testing, it is recommended to conduct it either independently or with the involvement of competent specialists.