Product: Knowledge

Episode Summary What does it actually take to sell tons of product … not as a metaphor, but by the truckload? In this episode of Product: Knowledge , Laurier Mandin shares real-world product marketing case studies where slow or stagnant sales turned into explosive growth. In one case, a barbecue product went from zero sales to 180 tons sold in just a few months . These examples reveal a consistent...

Product manager, entrepreneur, and author Ali Rakhimov joins Laurier Mandin to talk about how better communication can make even the most ambitious products take flight. From building payment kiosks for K–12 schools to leading multimillion-dollar initiatives at Macy’s, Ali shares how simplicity, idioms, and “stupid” questions can cut through complexity and bring teams together.  This conversation...

Why do some buyers eagerly drop thousands on a luxury item, then balk at paying a fraction of that for something useful and well-made? In this solo episode of Product: Knowledge , Laurier Mandin unpacks the Premium Buyer Paradox and explores the psychology behind premium pricing. From Dyson’s visible engineering, to Bang & Olufsen’s design-driven luxury, to Montblanc’s identity-making pens, yo...

Building great products is only half the battle—the other half is building them with marketing success baked in from Day One. Too many product teams operate in isolation, creating features customers don't understand or positioning that marketing can't sell. Heather Inocencio has cracked the code on building product teams that inherently understand marketing needs. With over 30 years of product exp...

The path from direct-to-consumer to retail success is something many product makers dream about, but it's also where countless promising products have gone to die. Bad logistics choices, bloated inventory, and unnecessary costs can sink even great products before they ever reach a store shelf. Paul Jarrett, co-founder and CEO of Bulu, has created a unique solution to help brands bridge this critic...

In this special episode, host Laurier Mandin introduces his new book, "I Need That: Creating and Marketing Products People Are Compelled to Buy." Drawing from over 30 years of marketing experience, Laurier shares key insights on how to create products that resonate deeply with consumers. Key points covered: The psychology behind why people buy certain products How to transform a product from a "wa...

It can be infuriating how much time your marketing efforts take—especially when they get zero traction. Wouldn't it be great if you could focus on acing activities you know will generate results? Chris Smith, cofounder of Curaytor and author of the bestselling (and newly revised edition of) “The Conversion Code,” shares data-proven ways to attract and convert buyers by making smarter use of all th...

It's not unusual for product makers to be terrified by the mere notion of product validation work. Often over-invested emotionally and financially in the product, they're afraid of what they might learn. And many don’t have confidence in their approach to conducting validation research. But the learning will come one way or another, Darshan Mehta points out. And far better to get as many insights...

Nearly all product companies grapple with pricing. What model is the best fit? How do you maximize the market value for a novel product without losing customers when it comes time to pay? Dan Balcauski has spent 15 years helping product makers solve exactly these challenges. As founder of Austin, Texas-based Product Tranquility, Dan has guided many products from new concept incubation through succ...

Ever noticed that while most brands battle constantly with competitors for small gains, leaders like Apple, Tesla and Amazon play in an entirely different sphere? Stan Bernard, author of “Brands Don't Win” believes it's because the branding game is a lost cause. In this episode, he tells you how leaders transcend branding by creating a game no one else can win — and how to do it for your product....

R-RRIP! That was the way we've marketed and sold products for ages, being torn apart. Facebook, Google Ads and other digital ad platforms have been hammered by consumer privacy implementations, making it impossible for many advertisers to sell their products online profitably.  Meanwhile, a succession of unbelievable supply chain issues make costs and material availability a nightmare that threate...

Selling an innovative product relies on making change. And there can be a lot of resistance to adopting a new product of any size, but especially for B2B products with long sales cycles and complex onboarding processes. Margie Agin, author of Brand Breakthrough and chief strategist of Centerboard Marketing, helps product makers to accelerate adoption and achieve breakthroughs by distilling functio...

We talk a lot about the high failure rates of consumer products. It’s a tough road, and launching a hit product is a rare event. Michael Sandeen is an innovator who’s exploded those odds—and he’s now done it twice.  Thirty-five years ago Michael created Spin Jammer, a uniquely spinnable flying disc that sold by the millions in big-box retail stores like Walmart, Toys R Us and K-Mart. Then, in late...

Consumers have had enough of phony product brands. Fabricated figureheads like Betty Crocker and the Marlboro Man ruled the twentieth century, but social media and customer reviews have permanently altered the landscape. Not only can we handle the truth—we demand it. While everyone talks ad nauseam about “authenticity,” it’s still much easier to fall back into the old-world playbook. Emily Soccors...

Pricing can make or break any product. Set it too high, and even best-fit customers will take a pass. Too low and you’re devaluing the product, stunting growth and possibly starving it for cash.  But how do you craft a pricing structure that is just right—and be confident it is? And then how do you package your product offerings to attract specific buyer types, without alienating others?  Pricing...

As a 3-time startup founder and 5-time entrepreneur, Étienne has worked in the trenches of building tech companies and introducing innovative products. In “Solving Product,” he has created a reference book to help product creators through the many complex puzzles from ideation to startup, growth, expansion and retrospective. Feeling stuck with solving product-market fit, evaluating your product's...

If you’ve been involved in creating and marketing a new product, you know all too well the danger of having your ideas stolen or copied. In fact, it probably keeps you up at night—just as it did for innovators like Steve Jobs. Patenting the features that make your product unique is a common approach, but is having a patent worth the hefty initial and ongoing costs? Registering one or more patents...

Product positioning is essential to sales, and you simply can’t scale without getting it right. Yet most marketers and executives can’t even tell you what positioning means , much less how to do it. April Dunford is on a mission to change that. As an internationally recognized product positioning expert, April helps startups get their positioning straight. She has written a bestselling book on the...

What if science could prove that marketers are doing EVERYTHING wrong? Patrick Renvoisé is a brain scientist who has co-authored two books claiming that is exactly the case. At SalesBrain, the consultancy where he is Chief Persuasion Officer, Patrick has helped over 100,000 CEOs identify and target the secret Buy Button inside their customer's brain. The co-author of "Neuromarketing" and "The Pers...

Taking an innovative product across the commercialization chasm from the Innovators and Early Adopters to the much larger Early Majority is an immense challenge at the best of times. During a crisis—or in the days following one—it often becomes even harder. Yet with the proper focus, chaos can even thrust some products across the chasm faster than they could manage in "normal" times. The Chasm Ins...

Marketing is all about differentiation. The leaders behind every product brand have thought about, rehearsed, or delivered an elevator speech about why you should choose their offering—but VERY few have baked in a concise way of articulating it to their customers. If you create physical products, the most important differentiation may not be the products themselves. In fact, focusing too much on s...

Podcasting is just complicated enough to introduce anxiety and resistance for those who might otherwise want to try sharing their voice. A new audio market segment of "podcast mixer-recorders" aims to address the complexity problem. Podcasting is complicated because usually more than one speaker is involved. Getting audio into a computer is easy. Getting broadcast quality from disparate sources, f...

Inspiration for a new product can come from anywhere—even a pet store. Once you’re inspired and you’ve got a fire in your belly, you need to find a way to make your idea real. Having ideas is easy; paying for them, not so much. Some startups use their own money or try to find angel investors. It can be equally challenging and discouraging to find venture capital for modest-scale projects. Crowdfun...

Naming a company is more complicated than naming a baby. It just is. There’s more family involvement. Is the product for men, women, seniors; is it for a particular activity or sport that has its own jargon and vocabulary? What country is the product going to be sold in—now and down the road? What are the social mores of that country, and what cultural taboos do we need to avoid; which buttons are...

For our first episode of 2020, we go to the very heart of product launch: the product development cycle. It used to be that if you had a product idea you had to not only finesse the ideation, but somehow cobble together a development team for each stage of the process. For first-time inventors or even seasoned product brands, it was a journey fraught with pitfalls. Technology has transformed the p...