There are many advantages to creating a new category, but it doesn’t solve all of your marketing problems. In this episode, we look at the issues that a smoking cessation pharmaceutical product encountered — and how they overcame them.

A novel medicine to help smokers kick the habit was unexpectedly struggling despite creating a new category. The company’s marketers were missing a hidden indirect competitor that had the advantage of costing nothing to use!

The team discusses how this formidable competitor was uncovered, and how the pharma company changed strategies to effectively address it. See how new stakeholder approaches and communication strategies were used to enable this innovative company to reap the full rewards of creating a new category.

In this episode you will learn:

• How an unidentified or underrated indirect competitor can kill your product
• When stakeholder maps can be used to help shape a new category
• A three-part checklist for diagnosing disappointing results

Here’s some quotes from the team’s discussion:

“It is too easy to ignore the psychological needs that customers have about a product category.”

“It wasn’t until somebody in the back of the room spoke up that the reason for underperformance emerged.'”

“They found a way to position their product against something that cost nothing to use.”

We hope you learn some valuable strategies from the discussion!