Here’s a quick question: have you ever set out to buy a particular product (like a car, or software, or a chocolate bar) but when it came to the point of purchase, you actually paid up for a different version of that product?

Maybe you bought the car with the better specification, or that new chocolate bar caught your eye in the shop?

Sound familiar?

In some cases, your change of mind and change of purchase decision will have been a fluke. You just happened to change your mind because, well, that’s your prerogative.

But in other cases, those clever marketers may have steered your purchasing process down a path that ended in you buying the product they always wanted you too.

Let me explain.

We market product A, to sell product B.

There is an assumption for many businesses that if they want to sell more of a particular product or service, they should therefore market that particular product.  Not always true.

As with all marketing, the focus here is the customer, not the product. In other words, if the same customer could potentially buy product A and product B, then there is the option to market product A to the customer, but actually with the intention of selling them product B.

But why would we do that?

Well, lots of reasons, but it could be that product A is marketed first as a more effective method of gaining customer attention whilst at the same time introducing product B. It could be that product A is a cut-down version to gain a price advantage, but product B is then subsequently offered as a great value upgrade. It could even be that product A is simply a loss leader (a free course, advice guide, or free gift etc) in order to earn the opportunity to sell product B.

Dell and BMW have been doing this for years. They will promote a particular model, but it’s no fluke that many customers will end up paying 25% more for a version of that model (or a totally different model) with a higher specification.

So, if you are having a tough time trying to market your ‘product B’, consider the following:

• Define the typical customer profile for that product.
• Consider whether this customer profile can be attracted by marketing another of your products that is easier to promote, or,
• Consider what complimentary services (such as tutorials, events, research papers etc) you can market to gain the attention of your target customer profile.
• Once you have the customer’s attention, use the opportunity to demonstrate how your product B is the best option for them.

Happy marketing.