How to sell something that's really new.
It’s well known that people often don’t respond as well to new things as they do to familiar things. We dealt with this all the time in copy testing. New, innovative ideas would often ‘fail’ while more common cliched ideas would test well.
The same is often true of new products and services. There’s typically a long build up period for new things while people get accustomed to them and then the real sales often come down the road. Witness the slow sales climb of the iPod, chart above from the Guardian blog.
I wonder whether it was this slow build that made Apple think about pre-launching the iPhone. If pressed for an answer to the best marketing of this year, I’d have to say it was the Macworld speech Steve Jobs gave.
To me it was a masterful display of drama and pacing. From a content standpoint, I was riveted from the start and, even though expectations were set very high – “this is a day I’ve waited for for two years…” he still managed to shatter my expectations with the reveal.
However, perhaps the smartest thing about it was that it came a full six months before the actual release of the product. At the time, I remember thinking this was odd, but in hindsight I now realize it gave people – not just bloggers – six months to get used to the idea.
Expanding upon this idea, the web is a fantastic medium to help build familiarity with a product or service that doesn’t yet exist. Pre-launching can happen here in many different ways whether it’s a slideshare or video of your concept, an “invite-only” beta release or even a flashy animated demo. The key is to let people kick the tires on a new concept without asking them to make a purchase decision. To let people get familiar with it so that when it is actually available it feels like it’s been there for a while.