Marketing information that you must have to sell your idea
To sell or license your invention you need to be able to promote it. Promotion is one of the services that ITTr supplies, but to do so we need information about the market that your invention falls into. Often inventors have little idea of the marketability of their idea. They are so pleased at coming up with the invention and making it work that they forget completely why they did so, and more often have little or no idea of what inventions might compete with it.
To sell your idea, however, we need to persuade someone that it is worth their time and money to commercialize your invention. That means that the existence of a market for it is of paramount importance. Also very important is how easily the invention can be manufactured and how well it aligns with the buyers current product line.
I've recently been reading a book that has lots of useful advice on these matters. Its called "One Simple Idea" by Stephen Key. Key points out that it isn't hard to figure out what the market might be for your invention. Particularly if it is a simple idea directed to the mass market. A quick Google search and a few visits to local stores can tell you a great deal.
Recently I was working on finding a market for a company with a new product used in groceries. A quick visit to my local market with a pen and pad allowed to quickly identify the manufacturer of the product that they used in my local store. Then a trip home to check out the company's website showed me their product line which aligned and competed with the invention I was trying to market.
For more complex ideas you may need to visit the library or even purchase market research reports. You should always ask yourself this question "How is the end customer dealing with the problem solved by my invention NOW?". For example, although there were no electric lights in the market when Edison made his invention, he could quickly find out that most people were lighting their houses with gas lights. By studying and sizing the market for gas lighting he could determine the market for electric lights.
The story of Edison is instructive in another way. Edison never sold his invention to the gas companies. Like many entrenched interests they were too wedded to their way of doing things to consider an invention that was fundamentally different and would eventually put them out of business.
That brings up the second issue, the one of alignment. If Edison had invented a new kind of mantle for gas lights, he might have found a more receptive audience in the gas companies.
To learn more about what you need to do to sell your invention, contact us. You can find contact and other helpful information on the ITTr website.
