Market Research - A Very Basic Free Guide For Leatherworkers Who Want To Sell More Stuff!

[UKRay]

It seems to me that many people who get into leatherwork thoroughly enjoy making a range of small items (often from kits) that they either give away or sell to friends and family. They progress to larger items but there are only so many bags, purses and belts you can make before the demand dries up.

When that market is exhausted they sometimes struggle to justify their hobby. Essentially, they have run out of good reasons to work leather.

What is needed is a way to find out what people around you actually want and will pay money for. You need to carry out some market research.

This can be as simple as asking people at your place of work, sports team, children's school what they want to buy - but maybe a better way is to ask folk a few questions that give you a whole lot more information about their requirements.

This link will lead you to a new free Knol all about basic market research. It isn't written for marketing geniuses, just ordinary leather workers like you and me. I hope you find it useful and thought provoking.

http://knol.google.com/k/ray-hatley/the-barefoot-leather-guide-to-marketing/uhfjt5pdr2mt/11#

Ray

[terrahyd]

HI RAY ,,,MAN THATS A LOT OF INFO' WILL TAKE A WHILE TO DIGEST ,,,THANKS GUY....

[Blender]

Ray,

That is a great guide (in fact, the whole series) to help market your products. Thanks for doing that.

If/as you add more, be sure and let us know, please.

Thanks,

John

[AmandaM]

A fast and easy way to get a survey out is use an online service, such as Surveymonkey.com Offer a leather item drawing (everyone gets automatically entered) as the incentive and send out a request to your database via email with a short ask letter to please take five minutes and take your survey, yadda yadda.

If your target market is say, archers, then ask to rent the membership list from the local clubs, NFAA, etc. If you use a bigger list service, expect to pay .20/name. Keep it to under 10 questions. It's really not difficult and you will learn alot.

Expand your list by asking people to leave their email when they come in to the shop or order something.

A

[UKRay]

A fast and easy way to get a survey out is use an online service, such as Surveymonkey.com Offer a leather item drawing (everyone gets automatically entered) as the incentive and send out a request to your database via email with a short ask letter to please take five minutes and take your survey, yadda yadda.

If your target market is say, archers, then ask to rent the membership list from the local clubs, NFAA, etc. If you use a bigger list service, expect to pay .20/name. Keep it to under 10 questions. It's really not difficult and you will learn alot.

Expand your list by asking people to leave their email when they come in to the shop or order something.

A

A great set of suggestions, Amanda. I have used online surveys successfully a couple of times.

I like the idea of using membership lists but here in the UK organisations are not legally allowed to sell their membership lists (or even rent them out) without the express permission of each and every member. Is this different in the US or wherever you are based?

IMHO, the biggest drawback to on-line questionnaires is the need to have an appropriate target list of email addresses before you start. This is fine if you are an established concern but I suspect many of the people here are either just starting up or don't have a massive client base yet. Money is always tight so we tend to look for ideas that don't cost too much. Can you think of any other ways they might be able to get or build a list of target email addresses?

My own thoughts are to run a locally based raffle or prize draw perhaps in a place that is frequented by your best customers (feed store etc). Entrants just have to provide a working email address to enter. The prize is entirely up to the guy running the show but if it were a fine piece of leatherwork as Amanda suggests, then you will attract potential customers

I have a couple of questions:

What sort of success rate do you expect with online surveys?

Which of the online survey websites offers the best service and why?

Ray

[AmandaM]

Ray, to answer your questions...

In the US, you can legally rent lists, but you must be careful to follow the CAN-Spam laws to protect folks from getting too much junk they don't want. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CAN-SPAM_Act_of_2003 In a nutshell, you must have your business mailing address to prove that it's a real business, give them a way to click and unsubscribe from your lists if they want, since you are sending info they did not request. Some clubs and organizations will let you use their names for free or cheap. Just have to ask. Some will not share.

What you want ideally is a database of people that you have already prequalified as good potiental customers by their interests and if they are previous customers, so much the better. The raffle idea works. We gave away an Ipod. Get one on sale someplace for less. Starbucks cards, or Amazon cards work well as bait. It takes a while to build and keep CLEAN (very important) but is very worthwhile, as you are not shotgunning your message to people who won't care. Confirm (double optin) each person that commits to recieving info.

Post a link on your website asking people to take the survey.

20% open rate of your message is considered very good. Your response rate will be smaller, and depend on your message, and how well you have crafted your survey. There is a lot of baseline info available on marketing sites that specialize in that sort of thing. Plus, the online services will have posted info as well to help you along the way. The last one I did, did not have a high response rate, but it gave enough to make some decisions about where to advertise and that sort of thing. Think about timing as well - don't send it out on a holiday weekend. If you do print advertising, ask your publication if they would send out the survey request to their database. That way, you don't see the list, but you get the info back.

As to which sites, MailChimp (SurveyMonkey) and Constant Contact are both very reputable and have lots of information available to help you. And they are inexpensive. 0.1/0.2 per name.

Hope this helps.

A

A great set of suggestions, Amanda. I have used online surveys successfully a couple of times.

I like the idea of using membership lists but here in the UK organisations are not legally allowed to sell their membership lists (or even rent them out) without the express permission of each and every member. Is this different in the US or wherever you are based?

IMHO, the biggest drawback to on-line questionnaires is the need to have an appropriate target list of email addresses before you start. This is fine if you are an established concern but I suspect many of the people here are either just starting up or don't have a massive client base yet. Money is always tight so we tend to look for ideas that don't cost too much. Can you think of any other ways they might be able to get or build a list of target email addresses?

My own thoughts are to run a locally based raffle or prize draw perhaps in a place that is frequented by your best customers (feed store etc). Entrants just have to provide a working email address to enter. The prize is entirely up to the guy running the show but if it were a fine piece of leatherwork as Amanda suggests, then you will attract potential customers

I have a couple of questions:

What sort of success rate do you expect with online surveys?

Which of the online survey websites offers the best service and why?

Ray

[UKRay]

What you want ideally is a database of people that you have already prequalified as good potiental customers by their interests and if they are previous customers, so much the better. The raffle idea works. We gave away an Ipod. Get one on sale someplace for less. Starbucks cards, or Amazon cards work well as bait. It takes a while to build and keep CLEAN (very important) but is very worthwhile, as you are not shotgunning your message to people who won't care. Confirm (double optin) each person that commits to recieving info.

As to which sites, MailChimp (SurveyMonkey) and Constant Contact are both very reputable and have lots of information available to help you. And they are inexpensive. 0.1/0.2 per name.

Hope this helps.

A

Very helpful, thanks, Amanda!

Have you got any good tips for list cleaning? Mine is about two years old and I KNOW it needs doing...

Also, are there any other on-line marketing resources you would recommend?

Ray

[UKRay]

http://freeonlinesurveys.com appears to do what it says on the tin. Free uncomplicated survey system and no spam according to the blurb. I just completed one of their surveys and it worked really well. Try it.

Ray

[AmandaM]

You should get a bounce report back with the urls that did not go through. Remove them after you use the list each time so you aren't paying to send to bad addresses over and over.

[tinmann8]

I greatly appreciate you sharing your thoughts via the blog Ray. I'm already working on getting a customer survey put together, and I can't wait to put your suggestions to use.

-Nate

Mojo Leather

[King's X]

I've got someone actually asking for my help in setting up a leatherwork business. Thanks for sharing. I will pass it on for them to review.