How Does Packaging Add Value To A Product?

In a sea full of products, do you ever wonder what makes a customer go for a particular brand or company? Is it the actual product? Yes, a lot of times. But does this stand the same for every product? The answer is a big no. Consumers tend to go for a specific product when there is some value attached to it or because there are no proper substitutes to it.

But in the case of a product that has proper substitutes, the brands have to cover some extra mile in order to win their customers. Every customer operates on the simple psychological law of monotonic preferences, which states that the consumer will always want to derive maximum benefit from an offering.

In order to maximize that offering, there are only limited things that you can do with the actual product, but everything apart from that has no restrictions. You can go all-in with all the other peripherals and make the customer yours by giving them the extra value that they seek.

Importance of Packaging Design

Packaging, which is the first touchpoint between the consumer and the company, is an important intersection where the company can leave the customers spellbound. If they get that first impression correct, they win the customer for life until someone else recreates that aura.

Consumers often tend to form an opinion of a product just after looking at it, and as it is wisely said, there are no two first impressions. Some companies are renowned for their packaging, and their packaging becomes the major driver of their traction and even their market share.

Apart from the aesthetics, packaging also plays the role of educating the customers so that they are aware of making the right choice. The user-friendliness of the packaging conveys a lot of emotions about the brand. Every consumer wants to purchase a product that can resonate with the way they think, and hence the messages conveyed by the brand have to be presented crystally clear.

Improving Packaging Design

To add value to your offering, there are certain improvements that can be made to your current packaging assembly. If some of these suggestions can be incorporated, they can help your brand to amplify its presence amongst all the other brands.

Not so common ideas

In a shelf full of rectangular cartons, if you place something oval, the customers are bound to notice it. This is a very simple trick, but the implementation requires a lot of brainstorming and a lot more drafts before finalizing the design.

There are a lot of brands that entered the market with a decent product but won the market share just because they offered something which nobody had ever seen before.

The only goal of providing an unobvious packaging design is to turn the eyeballs of the consumer to your product before anything else.

Reusability

An offering can also be revamped by using packaging, which can be put to good use later.

For example - Pet bottles of coke are used to fill water, and likewise, a box of biscuits is used to store crayons.

Nobody buys these things with the purpose of using them again, but if the customer is able to find an extra use of the packaging that you have provided, there are high chances that your product will get preference over the other alternatives.

All these small perks often act as major sources of motivation when the customer is confused between two similar products. Of course, the product offers more wins.

Using the seasons to your favor

Everybody likes a little chunk of greetings when the festival seasons are on. Many companies capitalize on these emotional expectations by using a specific type of packaging during these times, and guess what? The customers actually prefer them over the regular ones.

Cadbury used this tactic in India to become the only favored brand when it comes to giving someone chocolates on any occasion. Their packaging assembly, which goes with the name of "celebrations," has turned into a brand itself.

Tweaking the designs here and there, plus adding a few more colors to your palette, might just do the trick.

Convenience

After understanding the functionality of a product, there is one question that comes to the mind of every customer. Is the product easy to store? No matter how amazing the product is, if it cannot find a place in the customer's home, it will remain unsold.

Most customers compromise with luxury if they get a product that is more convenient to use and store. It is always a good idea to provide the customers with this convenience for a better value proposition.

Brand Value and Packaging

There are certain messages which a brand wants to convey at all the junctions of a customer journey. Those messages can be anything in which the brand believes in and feels important to showcase too.

A more intricate version of this happens when brands go forward with conveying messages through particular products. An example of this could be to change the packaging of a product to mark their support for an ongoing cause or to support some traditions or values.

These messages hold a lot of importance for both the brand and the consumer, and hence it is always advised to fully brainstorm such ideas before implementation.

Final words

It is very difficult to create brand loyalty in a fast-paced world like ours, and hence every company has to innovate with how they make their customers feel valued. Customer retention is turning into the most difficult of the tasks because of the extended independence of the customer.

The customer needs to know that his opinions and needs are kept into consideration when the product is getting created. If the customer understands that, the job of winning them over gets simpler. Packaging acts as an embodiment of these value additions, and thus it should be given special attention from the beginning.