With the fractured way customers interact with brands these days, packaging plays a bigger role now more than ever. David Edelman of McKinsey & Company says,
"Increasingly, consumers put off a purchase decision until they’re actually in a store—and, as we’ll see, they may be easily dissuaded at that point.
Thus point of purchase—which exploits placement, packaging, availability, pricing, and sales interactions—is an ever more powerful touch point."
Here are ways in which you can ensure success with your packaging
Take a Store Tour
Go the stores that your package will be sold in.
Study the products on the shelves where your product will be displayed.
What are they doing to gain attention. More importantly, what aren't they doing? Exploit that difference!
Do they dominate a particular color? Go for a color that is opposite theirs. Do they use a serif font? Do they use images of their product on the box?
Take phone pictures of all the packages, shelves, the whole aisle. Get to intimately know what their product packages do and don't do. What they say, what colors, what fonts, what images they use.
Maybe they do some things right, but you feel they aren't telling the whole story. Again take that difference and exploit it!
Next - Get Inspiration
Continue that store tour into other aisles, other products. Even other stores your product may not end up in.
Anything catch your eye? What was it? the Color? The size? the shape of the package? Maybe it was store point of purchase signage, or aisle display ?
If you've exhausted the store tours, go online and check out the packaging blogs. Thedieline.com is a great blog that celebrates the art of packaging design and has examples of many different product packages.
Hey, you may not be able to afford all the types of packaging, but it should make your head buzz with ideas.
Take An Out of the Box Look at Your Product
You may be too close to your product, having nurtured it from it's spark of an idea to having the completed product in hand. What is unique about your product that packaging can enhance?
Is it it's look, it's construction? Should that be covered in a box or clearly displayed in a clamshell ? Is the size unique? Can the package enhance the idea of a unique size by using its own unique folds, or special printing techniques.
Many products these days are using a special coating on their package which makes it feel soft. Don't discount all the possibilities, even small unseen additions like the coating.
It's all in the presentation.
Speaking of Presentation - How Will Your Customer Interact With Your Package
Many packages are meant to enhance the value of the product.
Consider this - now that the customer bought your product, what do they do next? Slide the outer box off which displays your product in specially made inserts with branding text that confirms why they bought your product in the first place.
It's not just a slick design on the outside and when they open it - its just an unprinted kraft interior!
No, it continues all the way through to how the product is held in place to the power cords placed just so and the direction brochure tucked underneath but even it has a 'built in place'.
You are not there to thank them for buying, but your package is. Make the most of it and your customers will appreciate it.
Work With A Designer
Just like you are passionate about your product, there are those that have made it their whole life to do packaging design.
Consider using a packaging designer when your are ready to step up to the next level. Bringing their experience with products like yours and many others to bear on your project.
There is no lack of proof about how companies have used packaging design to climb and stay on top of the consumer goods category.
Just look at Proctor & Gamble, an $83 billion company. Yes, I hear you, ...They have a big budget for packaging design! That's right, but you can find quality work for your packaging project too.
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