Search Marketing Courses

Let’s face it - marketing doesn’t mean squat if you don’t have anything to market. If your product doesn’t satisfy a want or a need of your (potential) customers, then it doesn’t matter how many people visit your site - you simply will not make money!.

Tim Knox makes this very point in this short, 5 minute video:

Tim Know on Market Research & Validation (04:46)

My favorite line of this video is the one about fishing - if you want to fish in a pond, you better know what those fish want to eat. The same goes for marketing a product - if you want to make money online then you must market products that relate to peoples wants and needs.

On the other hand, my least favorite line of the video was his comment that market research is simple. I don’t like calling anything relating to business (or anything else that requires time, energy and skill) simple. It may not be as hard as other elements of creating a successful business, but like anything else it needs to be done properly. And that, by definition, means that it is not simple.

With that said, I think the suggestions he made on how to perform market research are solid ideas - although they need to be delved into and explained in more details (something I hope to do in future posts).

Also, I’d like to differentiate between finding a profitable market and finding a profitable product within that market. A profitable market means that people spend money on various different products within that market. For instance, the pet market (to use his example). People spend a lot of money on their pets - they buy houses, food, toys, clothes, books, etc. for and about their pets. This means that there is money within the market.

But that does not necessarily mean that you can make money in that market. You still need to offer a product or service which satisfies the needs and desires of that market. If you are unable to come up with such a product or service then it does not matter how much money there is in that market, for you will not see any of it.

What’s more, coming up with such a product or service can often times be extremely difficult - and may require more sophisticated research than he hinted to in his video. It usually requires in-depth understanding of the needs of the people within that market - something which you won’t get just by perusing the magazine stand (but that’s another topic for another day).

P.S. I imagine that Tim would agree with the points I made above. I think his advice is right on. I just think it’s important to have the proper mental attitude before starting a new venture - and understanding that creating a product or service is neither easy or simple is part of that attitude.