Which do you think is the better approach - creating a product or service that you're not sure anyone will want to buy and then trying to sell it, or first finding out what people want to buy and then creating a product or service that responds to that? Here's a hint: If you build a business around a product or service that you're not sure will sell, you're taking a very big risk.

Creating a product or service in a vacuum, without the input of your clients or customers, is a recipe for disaster. You're designing a product or service that your prospects may neither need nor like, which means that you have to market much harder - or offer lots of incentives - to get your clients or customers to buy your products. Even then, they still may not buy.

Finding a need and filling it is one of the most basic marketing strategies. Your first step in marketing, therefore, begins before your product or service is available to the public, when you're designing and creating it. By tapping into your customers' needs early in the process, you not only build a product or service that your prospects truly want and need, but also, your marketing efforts take far less personal energy, time, and money to implement.

The WPWPF principle

Many home-based business owners are in love with the products and services that they sell, as well they should be. They are their own best cheerleaders, creating infectious excitement whenever they have the opportunity to talk to someone about their business or their products or services. The problem is that some home-based business owners fall so deeply in love with their products and services that they fail to notice that their prospective clients and customers aren't equally in love. They may not even be in like. And when this happens, a great idea remains only a great idea - not a great product or service.

There is a test for home-based business owners who love their products and services. It's called the WPWPF (what people will pay for) principle. Your products and services are only as good as what people are willing to pay for them - no matter how beautiful, clever, or well thought out they may be, if your clients and customers don't want them, they aren't worth even a fraction of the time and money that you invested to create them, and you really don't have a business.

So what's the solution? How can you be sure that the products and services that you've been dreaming about delivering to your clients and customers are the ones that they truly want? It's actually quite simple: Ask them. That's all it takes. Here are a few simple steps for defining your target market and then asking the people in that market which products and services they really want and need (and will therefore be willing to buy):

1. Decide which market you're going to target.

Who, potentially, are your best customers - the people in the market you want to target? Do you want to sell your products and services to busy businesspeople, to retirees who spend their winters in Florida or Arizona, to preschool children, or to people who like to go on extended vacations to exotic lands? Whichever product or service you hope to create, first decide who you're going to try to sell it to. All of the steps that follow depend on this one.

2. Ask the members of your target market which products or services they want and need.

You can do this in person, over the telephone, via written surveys sent through the mail, or through your Web site. The key is to collect as much data about the wants and needs of your target market as you can - the more data, the better.

3. Use the results of your survey when designing your products and services.

Using that great data from surveying your potential customers and clients, determine the design of the products and services you offer. Be sure that you address - and at least consider - every feature mentioned as important by the people you surveyed. Some may not make financial sense, but others may be essential to include, whatever the cost. Believe us: Not only do you end up with better products and services, but you also sell a lot more of them, because they match the wants and needs of your customers and clients.

4. Test the market.

After your products and services are available - but before you roll them out to the public at large - test them out on a few selected people, businesses, or not-for-profit entities. What's their reaction? Are they satisfied with the results? Do your selected customers have suggestions for improvements or changes? What about price? Are your products and services priced realistically? Will your potential clients be willing to pay what you ask? Incorporate the feedback you get by tweaking your product or service or the prices you plan to charge.

5. Market, market, market.

By going through the preceding four steps, you can be reasonably assured that you have a product on your hands that you can not only sell, but that you also can sell a lot of. Now get ready for the ride of your life!

Never bring out a product before you find out for sure that your target market really wants it enough to pay for it. Doing so may mean wasting far too much time and money - delaying your ability to create a positive cash flow while creating negative public opinion about your company. Better to wait a few months to fully explore your customer needs and wants than to rush through a great idea that ends up going nowhere.