A great idea is only as good as its market; explore how to identify emerging niche and micro-niche markets to create a successful brand. Thoroughly investigate how to determine if an idea can become a viable product and what markets can sustain. Understand the ins and outs of developing an idea without wasting valuable time and energy.

Learn how to identify and explore emerging niche and micro-niche markets to establish brand presence early and create organic engagement. New markets are continually emerging and forecasting what markets will be created and how to capitalize on developing markets. Novel concepts that innovate on existing products or provide entirely new solutions can be harnessed to build a successful brand.

Bring value to your brand by developing a comprehensive profile of who will benefit from, and ultimately buy your product. Without understanding target demographics and consumer spending habits, no entrepreneur can create a successful product or brand. Create organic engagement with your target audience and become a trusted voice within any market.

Whether you have a new idea or are still searching for inspiration DIY Startup will help you identify brand or product viability, establish profitability, and get started on bringing your product or brand to market. I focus on niche and micro-niche markets to develop novel, creative ideas that others have let slip through the cracks. Often emerging markets have not been identified by larger businesses and allow a DIY entrepreneur to establish themselves early and gain crucial market share from day one.

In this chapter, I will explore identifying your brand voice, tone, and image. If the brand doesn’t have an identity, it will never connect with audiences, and connection is vital for a successful brand. Consumers have many choices when they are making buying decisions, and getting them to choose your brand is a subtle blend of form, function, and identification. Cohesive brand imagery needs to be maintained across platforms to establish and grow your brand’s recognition.

You’ve got your product or brand identified; now, it’s time to protect your intellectual property. I will explore the process, costs, and common mistakes that aspiring entrepreneurs will likely encounter throughout the trademarking phase of their early development. This is a critical phase for building a brand that will be protected as competition increases.

My experience in developing new and unique products naturally led to me learning the patent process’s ins and outs, and this chapter will cover this phase of product development. By understanding this process thoroughly, I will illustrate the importance of predicting likely objections or rejections of their patentability before filing their patent to avoid costly delays. With over twenty unique patents, I thoroughly understand this process and will provide valuable tips, insights, and advice.

The methodology and actions for developing a product are, of course, unique to what the product’s end goal is. Designing a clothing line is different from creating a mechanical product. I will show aspiring entrepreneurs how to identify a development process based on their unique idea. This phase is where even the best ideas can be forgotten or left incomplete as it goes into the prototyping phase, with multiple iterations being created and difficult decisions being presented.

We live in a digital era where a brand’s web presence, or lack thereof, can be the single difference between complete success and total failure. This process starts with creating and buying a domain, having a website built, SEO, brand voice, vision, press and marketing. This is considered by some to be the most essential part of brand and product development.

This chapter will explore defining target audiences, connecting with them through organic marketing, identifying key messages, creating what PR tools entrepreneurs will utilize, and finally planning PR tactics, and measuring their success. Because I’ve developed products for multiple industries, I’ve been able to uniquely understand how different markets have different requirements and that there is no one size fits all PR strategy. I will give aspiring entrepreneurs the tools and advice they need to develop their own comprehensive and effective PR strategies.

This phase focuses on building buzz, reaching your target audience, and developing a comprehensive strategy before you launch your product. Identifying trade shows or other events where an entrepreneur can network with other industry leaders can be one of the best ways to debut a new product. I will explore these and other alternatives. Starting strong with an influential pre-launch campaign, entrepreneurs will be successful from day one and build upon this success.

The most exciting and daunting part of the process is when you finally bring your new product to market and see how the public and press responds. This chapter will explore how to gauge product success, target different strategies to utilize what worked well, identify where you may have made a misstep, and what tweaks or changes need to be made moving forward. Once a product is on the market, the work is not over, and I will explore how entrepreneurs will continue to evolve with their product, introduce new lines, and target a broader demographic.