Maximising empathy marketing for entering new markets
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Written By: Tapiwa Mugwagwa
Entering new markets is a daring, daunting and dangerous initiative. The new markets are unknown and unexplored worlds with both blind corners and amazing prospects. What an enterprise needs is to know how to penetrate the new market. With the now advanced and complex markets, empathy marketing is proving useful and resourceful.
With empathy marketing there’s a great opportunity to deliver more value for clients and customers on their own terms. The crucial aspect is to appreciate that business starts and ends with the market. I strongly believe that it’s now a generation of adopting a consumer-centric empathetic mind-set if businesses are contemplating entering new markets and staying relevant.
Business is listenership, businesses need to appreciate that success now does not only depend on talent, skill and education but success depends on satisfying an unquenched need or want of the market. Businesses need to be great and attentive listeners to the market talk in terms of needs and wants.
After determining this, they then go to the drawing board to see if they have the capacity to produce or offer what the new markets want.There’s need to critically weigh options on whether the business can design and tailor a product or service that will be appreciated by the market or else the venture will prove tragic and costly.
Time is one component in empathy marketing that needs serious consideration, you must appreciate the preciousness of time hence the need to vigilantly respect and honour clients’ and customers’ time in order to get favourable results. Whenever you have failed to produce or offer service or product on time be apologetic and react swiftly showing genuine concern. Of course a product or service should exhibit high levels of originality and quality to impress the market. There’s need for uncompromised quality hence stringent monitoring systems should be adopted for continual customer satisfaction and growth opportunities in the new markets.
The story of your product’s success or failure can start or end due to your launching pricing strategy. Due diligence must be given to this component whenever entering a new market. You must thoroughly know the reactional patterns to different prices in different markets. Prices should therefore be tailored according to the new market targeted.
Citizenry responsibility
With the current COVID19 scourge businesses that need to thrive in new markets should opt for unusual, out-of-the-drawer marketing strategies and empathy marketing is proving key in the prevailing environment.
There’s what I want to term ‘citizenry responsibility penetrative strategy’. This is where from the onset business must play a citizenry role in the market they want to operate in. For example, develop some facilities in the area you are entering. By so doing you are putting your business in the limelight. There’s need to maintain visibility and consistency in the market. This will guarantee success.
An organization must create internally a culture of transparency and empathy towards customer needs. An enterprise needs to ensure that their products and services and their citizenry responsibility is the talk of the markets they intend to enter.
Teamwork is also a key component to consider when looking at penetrating new markets. The entire team should put their whole mind into the desire to succeed. There is need to pull in one direction and possess one culture. There is need to ensure that management and the employees are speaking one language in terms of quality and derived value. There is need to develop a “we” bond between consumers and the product.
On the promotional side, with the prevailing economic conditions, there’s need to use unconventional, low-cost tactics. Ensure customer service is unmatched.
Finishing on the customer service note. Customer questions must be answered expertly and timeously. Give clients a memorable experience by treating them as kings and queens.
Promote, promote and promote.
Visibility is everything in entering new markets.
#Go Empathy Marketing.
Tapiwa Mugwagwa is a Marketing Strategist at Armgates Pvt LTD.He is a member of the Marketers Association and writes in his personal capacity.
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