It can be infuriating when your marketing efforts get zero traction. Wouldn't it be great if you could focus on 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 tools from text messages to TikTok.

Would you prefer to learn before launch that your new product idea has flaws that will stop customers from buying? Or wait until it's built and much harder to fix? Validation research through focus groups, surveys and polls can deliver insights important enough to change a product's fortunes—IF you ask the right questions and know what to listen for. Darshan Mehta has written a book about capturing insights, and shares what you need to know to get it right.

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 helps high volume SaaS companies assess pricing practices and optimize pricing and packaging, guiding his clients to make the most impactful pricing decisions and communicate value convincingly to decision makers.

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 own 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, ongoing supply chain issues are making costs and material availability a nightmare. Maureen Mwangi teaches growing product makers to navigate challenges like these profitably, and joins host Laurier Mandin to...

There can be a lot of resistance to the change presented by a new product of any size, but especially for B2B products with long sales cycles and complex adoption curves. Margie Agin, author of “Brand Breakthrough” and chief strategist of Centerboard Marketing, helps product makers to accelerate adoption and achieve breakthroughs by distilling functions down to their core value propositions. If you need an “AHA!” moment for your product, be sure not to miss this episode.

Creating a breakthrough product requires a combination of inventiveness, audacity and smart strategic planning. Michael Sandeen has done it more than once, and he joins Product: Knowledge to talk about his winning ideas, the dark side of Kickstarter, the importance of beautiful product design—and cooking the perfect rib-eye steak in just 4 minutes.

Consumers have had enough of phony product brands. From made-up figureheads like Aunt Jemima and the Marlboro Man to hollow brands that don’t walk their talk, social media and customer reviews have forever changed the landscape. Emily Soccorsy and Justin Foster created Root & River to help product makers brand “from the heart.” And it works. Doing it successfully creates new levels of joy, satisfaction and loyalty, but requires a unique and very deliberate way of thinking.

Ajit Ghuman joins Laurier Mandin to talk about his new book, “Price to Scale,” and how it can help a product team to implement complete, end-to-end product pricing in just 30 days. Ajit has led the development and commercialization of enterprise SaaS products like Medallia, Helpshift, and Feedzai, and helped those brands develop pricing models, differentiate their products and grow their businesses. He's the head of product marketing at Narvar, a customer engagement platform that helps brands...

Étienne Garbugli, author of "Solving Product" and "Lean B2B" shares advice for using customer research to achieve product-market fit and achieve scalable growth.

If you’ve created an innovative product, you're automatically in danger of having your ideas stolen or copied. Patenting the features that make it unique is a common approach, but is getting, maintaining and defending a patent worth the hefty costs? Intellectual Property strategist Trevor Prentice talks about those costs, illuminates several less-known but most valuable benefits—and reveals what most IP lawyers do that inadvertently hurts their product clients.

You can’t scale without getting your product positioning right. But what about new and innovative products, where best-fit customers and user data don't even exist yet? How do you perfect positioning before chancing everything on a massive launch? In this episode, positioning expert and "Obviously Awesome" author April Dunford shares her proven methodology to nail product positioning and explains the challenges she has with product-market fit as perceived by most product businesses. It’s...

Patrick Renvoisé is a brain scientist who helps business leaders pinpoint the secret Buy Button inside their customer's brain. The co-author of "Neuromarketing" and "The Persuasion Code," Patrick shares his simple scientific to create desire and entice people to buy your product.

Taking an innovative product across the commercialization chasm is an immense challenge at the best of times. During a crisis, it becomes harder still. Yet with the proper focus, chaos may even help some products gain traction faster. Michael Eckhardt, Managing Director of the Chasm Institute shares 5 best practices for achieving product success during these challenging times.

Laurier Mandin talks with Ian Chamandy, co-author of "Why Should I choose you: Answering the Most Important Question in Business In Seven Words or Less," about how the principles of the most fundamental question translate to a product.

Andreas bought a new podcast recorder for home, and it's very different from the one in our studio. On this episode, Andreas and Laurier talk with Samuel Greene from ZOOM North America about the ZOOM L-8, and how they went about creating a product for a market segment that didn't really exist until last year.

What are the most important elements of a standout Kickstarter campaign? How many people are involved? Where do you even begin? Jackson Cunningham joined Graphos Product CEO Laurier Mandin to talk about the Cove cat litter box, including how Tuft and Paw engaged the company’s online community to help design it—and rock his Kickstarter. https://www.tuftandpaw.com http://www.graphosproduct.com

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? What are the social mores of that country, and what cultural taboos do we need to avoid, and which buttons are we able to push without offending? It’s like learning a new language. We talk to Jeremy Miller, author of "Brand...

Technology has transformed the product development cycle. Photorealistic 3D rendering makes visualizing new products easy. Your product can be near-perfect, but to be successful, the marketing, packaging, and shipping need to be at the same level. There are a lot of moving parts. Often the biggest barrier is knowing where to start, especially when your manufacturer is producing your product a world away, in a different language and culture. Kyle Handfield knows exactly where to start. His...

If you ask Mom what she thinks about your new product, she’ll lie and tell you it’s fabulous — even if nothing could be farther from the truth. When you’re launching an innovative product, product-market fit is essential. That means knowing a sufficient, reachable customer base will be more excited about the product than you are. Conducting validation research is crucial. But the questions you ask is where things often start to go wrong. People will naturally lie to you, just like Mom — and...

Manufacturing in China is different. How different is hard to describe if you’ve never seen it. It’s not that there are cities with factories. There are cities OF factories. And those cities often specialize in a particular kind of manufacturing. Competition is extreme and cutting corners is common. Having a good idea for a product is one thing, but you can’t exactly open the yellow pages and find which city of factories specializes in laser pointers. Where do you even start? Daniel Sande...

We delve into a sub-topic of Intellectual Property: Licensing. Licensing is Trevor Prentice's specialty. He's an Intellectual Property Strategist. He’s worked with businesses in virtually every industry and circumstance. In this conversation we get a clear definition of licensing. Trevor also explains how a good licensing strategy can benefit virtually every business, and even propel a new product forward. We talk about how to decide what to license, valuation strategies to figure out what...

Part 2 of 2: Justin Jackson thinks about product launches and marketing a lot, because he doesn’t accept conventional wisdom; he’s a keen observer of both brand and consumer behaviours. Justin says rather than trying to get the market to find your product, you need to take your product to a market that’s ready, eager—and sizeable.

Part 1 of 2: Justin Jackson thinks about product launches and marketing a lot, because he doesn’t accept conventional wisdom; he’s a keen observer of both brand and consumer behaviours. Justin says rather than trying to get the market to find your product, you need to take your product to a market that’s ready, eager—and sizeable.