#10things to ensure your new product is a breakthrough brand

The 20 winners among this year’s 2022 Nielsen Breakthrough Innovation winners in South Africa come from a wide range of categories across Food, Personal and Home Care, and Beverages. The award by the NielsenIQ BASES business, recognises successful product launches across all strategies. This ranges from launches that managed to disrupt their categories and grow their brand; to targeted plays that did not intend to appeal to the mass market but were meant to delight a specific segment.

BASES released its 2022 Top Breakthrough Innovation report last week. For over a decade, this list has been the gold standard in recognising innovation and global success within the Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) space. Additionally, the new report recognises winners that transformed their categories by offering innovative benefits before they were mainstream, as well as new brands in the marketplace.

This year’s Breakthrough Innovation process reviewed over 60,000 of product launches, introduced to the European market in the past two years. The brands that made the 2022 list reflect a wide range of products and approaches that succeeded in making meaningful connections with consumers, an impressive feat within an increasingly crowded marketplace. Beyond BASES requirements for products that reflect strong, distinct qualities such as mass potential, longevity, brand incrementality, category distinction or appeal toward a specific consumer target, this year’s list brings the continued evolution of the success criteria, which includes all six of NielsenIQ BASES’ activation profiles. This is what the report reveals – including insights for SA brands:

1. Consumers want innovation: Despite ongoing crisis mode, consumers still show an appetite for innovation, which means opportunities for smaller brands. In the face of inflationary pressures, looming economic crisis, supply chain disruptions and increasing energy and commodities prices many brands may naturally hold back on innovation, often refocusing on their existing portfolio.

2. Consumers are making less shopping trips: In South Africa, the shopper landscape has been changing, where shoppers put more scrutiny in their purchasing choices than ever before. They’re cutting down on the number of times they go to the shops, offering less chances for them to interact with products (and especially innovations) in store, and for those products to make a real impact on shelf.

3. Consumers are buying more each trip: However, when they do go to the shops, consumers make those less frequent trips count, shopping across more categories and buying as much as 17% more units per trip than they used to. Because of that, innovations need to work even harder to grab attention and make an impact in those less frequent trips consumers take.

4. New product development is a viable growth strategy: The BASES Top Breakthrough Innovation Awards prove that new product developments remain a viable growth strategy for manufacturers, particularly as consumers still show a strong appetite for relevant innovations, reports Maria Zaki, NielsenIQ BASES lead in South Africa. “Our latest data show that only a fraction – 6% – of global shoppers are averse to new products right now, and 94% of FMCG consumers today are open to trying new things.”

5. Focus on new product activations: Keen in mind the full picture of new products activation, as social media continues to play a very important role for innovation activations, and packaging as well – 71% of shoppers claim to purchase new products based on the pack.

6. Agility is important, as the experience of pandemic years in general terms did not change the recipe for success. “You still need a good idea, a good product and a good activation strategy in order to succeed. However, the way of stirring the ingredients together has evolved,” comments Zaki.

7. Relevance is essential: To create good innovation, brands need to be relevant to their consumers, making it easy for them to understand what the product is about and why they need it. Brands must ensure their innovation is being perceived as genuine and authentic.

8. Be easily recognisable: Your key to success is being a recognisable brand. In the store, this means being where consumers expect you to be, but also standing out. Consumers often shop on auto-pilot. You have to effectively disrupt this state through placement and packaging so they take note of something new. Point of sale tactics are critical in this regard to convert sales.

9. Search is key to being noticed on the digital shelf: It is critical to link your search terms with consumer expectations to break through the clutter of the online shelf. So, aim for a strong launch for top search placement.

10. Be creative and bold: Brands should be creative in their marketing strategy and bold in experimenting, to continue to delight their customers and become breakthrough brands, concludes Zaki.

THE 2022 NIELSEN BREAKTHROUGH INNOVATION WINNERS IN SOUTH AFRICA:

VISIT NielsenIQ’s Breakthrough Innovation website.

Main image credit: Supplied.

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