Working on social-emotional learning (SEL) for children is a preventative action, you work on SEL so that your child has the emotional intelligence to address life challenges in the future. So, the company is mainly working in a prevention field and it can be hard to get customers to use an app before they feel a pain. This is similar to fitness, it can be hard to get people to work on their fitness until they face a health issue. We need help optimizing the message we should use with our target customers, who tend to be 30 to 45 years old college-educated mothers.

We are in a space where meditation apps such as Calm and Headspace were about 8 years ago. People were skeptical of the needs and benefits of mediation before it became mainstream. Or they were skeptical that an app was the appropriate tool to help them learn to meditate.

Parents agree that SEL is important but it is challenging to get them to realize that the methodologies they are using now at home might not be as effective as they think. Parents tend to use direct instruction and be less intentional in teaching SE skills (this is the definition of listening, so now listen). They don't see teaching SE skills as teaching a child to code or to play an instrument. Today, parents pay for math or coding apps for kids because they think "I don't know how to code" but in the other hand, they might overestimate their ability to teach their kids to have self-control, self-esteem, integrity, etc.

We are looking to gain a better understanding of our target market to ensure we are positioning ourselves in the right segment and creating the best marketing messages.

From our customer interviews, the pains we may touch on our messaging could be:

• I worry about things I could have done better or haven’t done.
• Don’t know if what I am doing is working/am I missing anything.
• It’s hard to talk to my kids/I don’t know how to start some of the harder conversations.
• I don’t have all the answers, I need more help.

To support this project the student team could focus on providing:

• A complete analysis of our target market, and the positioning of our brand.
• Investigate the competitive landscape and identify key messaging for promotion.
• Apply consumer behavior theories and principles to improve the market potential.
• Develop a pricing strategy based on industry research and customer surveys.

We hope to gain a comprehensive understanding of our target market and how we can better satisfy their needs. We would like recommendations on how to improve our positioning, brand, and products to better suit the market.