Marketing 101 will usually teach you the tools of marketing are the 4 P's,
Product- (Making a product/or service that is appealing and offers value)
Price- (Adjusting price according to how you want to position your product/service in the market)
Promotion- (Creating your message, brand, style and content promoting your product/service)
Place - (Putting your promotion in places where your market will see it)
These are very important tools but they are not exactly a plan of action. After working with others who have a track record of marketing success, studying the topic myself and doing marketing work on teams in several different businesses, I have come to see a general pattern/process that yields success for getting interested people in the front door, calling, or emailing you and it happens step by step.
Step 1: Create your brand: know yourself first.
Usually when we think about marketing we think about going "outward" but the first place to start is to look "inward". Crafting your brand needs to go deeper than just creating some nice looking flyers and business cards with catchy phrases and colors. Its about creating and believing in your UNIQUE identity as a business. Ultimately, a lot of people probably do what you do, so they wont remember what you do, they will remember who you are. You need to understand who you are, what you have to offer and why you are different from the other options out there.
You need to have a COMPELLING STORY to tell that you have ready to go when someone asks you to tell them about your business or asks the proverbial question "so what do you do". You need to be able to tell that story in 1 minute, 3 minutes or 10 minutes and it needs to be a story that sets you apart from others. Think about it, practice it, write it down. Before you begin telling other people about your business you need to deeply understand who you are as a business, what you offer, your mission, your values, your tag line, your look, your logo and you should be consistent across all these things. Usually you want to have a basic website, business cards, flyers, a phone number, a business email, etc as soon as possible and all these things should be consistent with your identity and brand. It starts with having a clear vision of your self before you begin looking to others. Also if you want to be successful in the long run you have to ensure you control who you are and revisit your identity regularly and ensure all aspects of your business are consistent with your mission, values, look and story.
I can't stress enough the importance of being unique in some way. If you are not different in some meaningful/interesting way to your target market, why they use you over the other guy? This is why you have to do all you can to make yourself stand out in some way from others and generate a competitive differential advantage. This is not always easy and sometimes it takes a lot of creativity (work with a mentor if you have trouble coming up with a way to be different). Here is a recent seminar I attended on this topic that was very insightful.
Step 2- Target your market, not everyone.
The next step is figuring out who your product/service is designed for. If you say "everyone" that is generally not a good thing and marketing to "everyone" is usually not a good strategy. You need to try and be more specific if possible. The Marketing guru Seth Godin elaborates on this and many other great marketing principles in his talk below.
In any marketing class you are going to hear a lot about market segmentation. This is where you break up "everyone" who might purchase your product or service into different groups by demographics. Focusing on one or a few particular strategically picked groups is generally considered much more effective than going after everyone. You should try and know how your target market thinks, what they look like, what they do for fun, what they like, what they hate, what they want now, what they will want tomorrow and anything else you can find out. Then you should try to deeply understand why your product or service will matter to them.
Step 3 - Craft your message.
With a clear understanding of 1-3 target groups you then work on creating and continually improving your message to communicate what problem your product or service solves/why its valuable to them. Most people make most purchase decisions to solve either an overt problem (like a broke down car) or an internal problem (like hunger or boredom). Your message should communicate...
1) How you solve that problem better, faster or cheaper than alternatives.
2) Who you are and why you are more competent and trustworthy than other options.
Point #2 is very important and sometimes overlooked. There is a reason people buy from their friends and family and it usually has more to do with #2. However it's important that you "sell the sizzle not the steak". What this means is that you need to focus on BENEFITS not features. Apple understands this. They are arguably the greatest marketing company in the world. Watch the ad below and notice they don't mention anything about processing speed, nothing about HD displays, nothing technical at all. They simply, without a single word, show EACH MARKET SEGMENT the benefit of having their device in an incredibly compelling and simple way.
Keep in mind. You are not apple and you don't have to be. However, focus your messaging to specific target groups and you can craft messages that focus on benefits, on credibility and why you are different than other options in a meaningful way. Is it easy? No. Will it take some time and creativity? yes. This is also an area where mentors can be helpful.
Step 4- Decide how much time and/or money will be invested.
In the end you only have 2 things you can invest into marketing time or money. Early on a business owner has little money so they invest their time into marketing. Small business owners all remember the early days when they were out "hustling up business" by telling everyone they knew about their company. Eventually they got customers and began to get business on the fulfillment side of the business. Suddenly they began to invest less and less time into marketing and many don't really invest money either and so their business flatlines.
Its important for a business owner to have a plan in place for what percentage of total sales will be invested back into marketing. The following are some suggested amounts to invest in marketing depending on an owners level of time investment into marketing activities and how quickly you want to grow.
Financial investment in marketing if owner time investment is HIGH.
0%- Weak growth
3%- Moderate growth
5%- Aggressive Growth.
Financial investment in marketing if owner time investment is MODERATE.
1%- Weak growth
2%- Moderate growth
4%- Aggressive Growth.
Financial investment in marketing if owner time investment is LOW.
3%- Weak growth
5%- Moderate growth
8%- Aggressive Growth.
So how much time should an owner invest into marketing? Its also important for a business owner to know what they prefer doing and what they are good at. Do they enjoy sales and marketing or do they enjoy working on fulfillment for customers that have made a purchase decision? If a business owner sales and marketing they should put a focus outsourcing fulfillment duties and then reinvest their time back into marketing. If they enjoy fulfillment they should do that and outsource marketing to outside vendors. HOWEVER, (and this is a big however) just throwing money at marketing does not mean you will get results. Owners must be monitoring ROI's on a monthly basis, consult with mentors or outside experts and constantly adapt marketing investments to those which produce the best ROI.
Usually when we think about marketing we think about going "outward" but the first place to start is to look "inward". Crafting your brand needs to go deeper than just creating some nice looking flyers and business cards with catchy phrases and colors. Its about creating and believing in your UNIQUE identity as a business. Ultimately, a lot of people probably do what you do, so they wont remember what you do, they will remember who you are. You need to understand who you are, what you have to offer and why you are different from the other options out there.
You need to have a COMPELLING STORY to tell that you have ready to go when someone asks you to tell them about your business or asks the proverbial question "so what do you do". You need to be able to tell that story in 1 minute, 3 minutes or 10 minutes and it needs to be a story that sets you apart from others. Think about it, practice it, write it down. Before you begin telling other people about your business you need to deeply understand who you are as a business, what you offer, your mission, your values, your tag line, your look, your logo and you should be consistent across all these things. Usually you want to have a basic website, business cards, flyers, a phone number, a business email, etc as soon as possible and all these things should be consistent with your identity and brand. It starts with having a clear vision of your self before you begin looking to others. Also if you want to be successful in the long run you have to ensure you control who you are and revisit your identity regularly and ensure all aspects of your business are consistent with your mission, values, look and story.
I can't stress enough the importance of being unique in some way. If you are not different in some meaningful/interesting way to your target market, why they use you over the other guy? This is why you have to do all you can to make yourself stand out in some way from others and generate a competitive differential advantage. This is not always easy and sometimes it takes a lot of creativity (work with a mentor if you have trouble coming up with a way to be different). Here is a recent seminar I attended on this topic that was very insightful.
Step 2- Target your market, not everyone.
The next step is figuring out who your product/service is designed for. If you say "everyone" that is generally not a good thing and marketing to "everyone" is usually not a good strategy. You need to try and be more specific if possible. The Marketing guru Seth Godin elaborates on this and many other great marketing principles in his talk below.
In any marketing class you are going to hear a lot about market segmentation. This is where you break up "everyone" who might purchase your product or service into different groups by demographics. Focusing on one or a few particular strategically picked groups is generally considered much more effective than going after everyone. You should try and know how your target market thinks, what they look like, what they do for fun, what they like, what they hate, what they want now, what they will want tomorrow and anything else you can find out. Then you should try to deeply understand why your product or service will matter to them.
Step 3 - Craft your message.
With a clear understanding of 1-3 target groups you then work on creating and continually improving your message to communicate what problem your product or service solves/why its valuable to them. Most people make most purchase decisions to solve either an overt problem (like a broke down car) or an internal problem (like hunger or boredom). Your message should communicate...
1) How you solve that problem better, faster or cheaper than alternatives.
2) Who you are and why you are more competent and trustworthy than other options.
Point #2 is very important and sometimes overlooked. There is a reason people buy from their friends and family and it usually has more to do with #2. However it's important that you "sell the sizzle not the steak". What this means is that you need to focus on BENEFITS not features. Apple understands this. They are arguably the greatest marketing company in the world. Watch the ad below and notice they don't mention anything about processing speed, nothing about HD displays, nothing technical at all. They simply, without a single word, show EACH MARKET SEGMENT the benefit of having their device in an incredibly compelling and simple way.
Keep in mind. You are not apple and you don't have to be. However, focus your messaging to specific target groups and you can craft messages that focus on benefits, on credibility and why you are different than other options in a meaningful way. Is it easy? No. Will it take some time and creativity? yes. This is also an area where mentors can be helpful.
Step 4- Decide how much time and/or money will be invested.
In the end you only have 2 things you can invest into marketing time or money. Early on a business owner has little money so they invest their time into marketing. Small business owners all remember the early days when they were out "hustling up business" by telling everyone they knew about their company. Eventually they got customers and began to get business on the fulfillment side of the business. Suddenly they began to invest less and less time into marketing and many don't really invest money either and so their business flatlines.
Its important for a business owner to have a plan in place for what percentage of total sales will be invested back into marketing. The following are some suggested amounts to invest in marketing depending on an owners level of time investment into marketing activities and how quickly you want to grow.
Financial investment in marketing if owner time investment is HIGH.
0%- Weak growth
3%- Moderate growth
5%- Aggressive Growth.
Financial investment in marketing if owner time investment is MODERATE.
1%- Weak growth
2%- Moderate growth
4%- Aggressive Growth.
Financial investment in marketing if owner time investment is LOW.
3%- Weak growth
5%- Moderate growth
8%- Aggressive Growth.
So how much time should an owner invest into marketing? Its also important for a business owner to know what they prefer doing and what they are good at. Do they enjoy sales and marketing or do they enjoy working on fulfillment for customers that have made a purchase decision? If a business owner sales and marketing they should put a focus outsourcing fulfillment duties and then reinvest their time back into marketing. If they enjoy fulfillment they should do that and outsource marketing to outside vendors. HOWEVER, (and this is a big however) just throwing money at marketing does not mean you will get results. Owners must be monitoring ROI's on a monthly basis, consult with mentors or outside experts and constantly adapt marketing investments to those which produce the best ROI.
Step 5: Identify, list and prioritize your marketing channels
Many rookies jump right to this step without thinking about and executing the previous steps. The problem with this is that choosing the right place to push your message is no good if you don't have a great message and you can't have a great message if you don't understand in detail who you are and who specifically you are trying to reach. Also if you don't have a plan and a system for how much will be invested in time or money into these efforts you also will likely see sub par results.
Marketing channels are all the ways you can get your message in front of people either directly or indirectly. While serving as a missionary for my church we always were looking for people to teach. We would knock doors, we would get referrals from members, we would seek out part member families, we would teach english, we would do service, we would sing carols at Christmas, we would organize soccer matches, we would visit other churches and all sorts of other things. What most experienced missionaries found was that the best way to find people to teach was, all of the above. Sure some things were more effective in general than others but it seemed that by constantly trying various things we would end up finding people to teach and no one method was the silver bullet. Below is a list of the marketing channel categories that usually are available to a business owner. The key is having the right marketing mix (aka marketing portfolio) that uses channels that produce the best results.
Phase 1- Free/Super Low Cost Marketing.
1) Networking / Cold contacting/ Referral Programs.
2) Email blasting (Press Releases, Newsletters, New Features, Education).
3) Basic social media to existing networks.
4) Free services.
Phase 2- Basic marketing. (Total marketing budget $200-500 a month)
4) Listing and Advertising Websites (Google Places, Yelp, Yellow Pages etc).
5) Small Scale Promo Products/ Branding.
Phase 3- Online Marketing (Total marketing budget $500-$3500 a month.)
6) Google Pay Per Click PPC and Online Ads.
7) Getting Ranked on Google. (SEO Search engine optimization).
8) Social Media Advertising and Social Pay Per Click.
Phase 4- Going Beyond Internet. (Total marketing budget $4000+ a month.)
9) Mailers
10) Mass Media
11) Billboards/ Large Scale Promo Products/ Branding.
For more details about marketing channels above see the following blog. Marketing Channels Blog.
Please note that there is no perfect formula for every business on which channels to use or exactly how to use them. It takes time and some trial and error to try and figure out which marketing channels will produce the best bang for the buck. It is recommended that you also put include in your marketing budget (perhaps 10-20% of your marketing budget) funds for experimenting with new marketing ideas. This is also where mentors are VERY valuable. Mentors with industry (or similar industry) experience can help you decide which channels worked best for them. Every industry has its own marketing channels that have been proven successful and often by just learning where others in the industry are doing marketing is a great starting point.
Another thing to remember is the difference between direct marketing activities and brand awareness activities. Direct marketing are things like yellow page ads where a person will see the ad and call because of the ad. Brand awareness is best summed up with an example of from my Dads plumbing company. People often call his company using the number on his yellow page ad or website, but they did not call because of the yellow page ad or website. They called because they saw his trucks around town and recognized his name because he is a political figure in the area. They only used the yellow pages to find his number. His name acted as his brand and his trucks and political work created brand awareness. When people thought about plumbers, his name popped into their head. You do the same thing all the time. You don't look up something on google if you already have a brand in your head for that product or service. Is your brand in anyones head for your product or service category? How did it get there? How can you get into more peoples heads and stay there as long as possible? These are branding/ brand awareness activities. Both direct marketing (like getting listed on google) and brand awareness are important but brand awareness is much harder to measure accurately and usually doesn't produce quick results.
Many rookies jump right to this step without thinking about and executing the previous steps. The problem with this is that choosing the right place to push your message is no good if you don't have a great message and you can't have a great message if you don't understand in detail who you are and who specifically you are trying to reach. Also if you don't have a plan and a system for how much will be invested in time or money into these efforts you also will likely see sub par results.
Marketing channels are all the ways you can get your message in front of people either directly or indirectly. While serving as a missionary for my church we always were looking for people to teach. We would knock doors, we would get referrals from members, we would seek out part member families, we would teach english, we would do service, we would sing carols at Christmas, we would organize soccer matches, we would visit other churches and all sorts of other things. What most experienced missionaries found was that the best way to find people to teach was, all of the above. Sure some things were more effective in general than others but it seemed that by constantly trying various things we would end up finding people to teach and no one method was the silver bullet. Below is a list of the marketing channel categories that usually are available to a business owner. The key is having the right marketing mix (aka marketing portfolio) that uses channels that produce the best results.
Phase 1- Free/Super Low Cost Marketing.
1) Networking / Cold contacting/ Referral Programs.
2) Email blasting (Press Releases, Newsletters, New Features, Education).
3) Basic social media to existing networks.
4) Free services.
Phase 2- Basic marketing. (Total marketing budget $200-500 a month)
4) Listing and Advertising Websites (Google Places, Yelp, Yellow Pages etc).
5) Small Scale Promo Products/ Branding.
Phase 3- Online Marketing (Total marketing budget $500-$3500 a month.)
6) Google Pay Per Click PPC and Online Ads.
7) Getting Ranked on Google. (SEO Search engine optimization).
8) Social Media Advertising and Social Pay Per Click.
Phase 4- Going Beyond Internet. (Total marketing budget $4000+ a month.)
9) Mailers
10) Mass Media
11) Billboards/ Large Scale Promo Products/ Branding.
For more details about marketing channels above see the following blog. Marketing Channels Blog.
Please note that there is no perfect formula for every business on which channels to use or exactly how to use them. It takes time and some trial and error to try and figure out which marketing channels will produce the best bang for the buck. It is recommended that you also put include in your marketing budget (perhaps 10-20% of your marketing budget) funds for experimenting with new marketing ideas. This is also where mentors are VERY valuable. Mentors with industry (or similar industry) experience can help you decide which channels worked best for them. Every industry has its own marketing channels that have been proven successful and often by just learning where others in the industry are doing marketing is a great starting point.
Another thing to remember is the difference between direct marketing activities and brand awareness activities. Direct marketing are things like yellow page ads where a person will see the ad and call because of the ad. Brand awareness is best summed up with an example of from my Dads plumbing company. People often call his company using the number on his yellow page ad or website, but they did not call because of the yellow page ad or website. They called because they saw his trucks around town and recognized his name because he is a political figure in the area. They only used the yellow pages to find his number. His name acted as his brand and his trucks and political work created brand awareness. When people thought about plumbers, his name popped into their head. You do the same thing all the time. You don't look up something on google if you already have a brand in your head for that product or service. Is your brand in anyones head for your product or service category? How did it get there? How can you get into more peoples heads and stay there as long as possible? These are branding/ brand awareness activities. Both direct marketing (like getting listed on google) and brand awareness are important but brand awareness is much harder to measure accurately and usually doesn't produce quick results.
Step 4: Execute like a farmer and don't forget to evaluate and adapt.
Diligent and energetic execution of your marketing portfolio is the heart of your business; this is the grind, the battle that you have to fight very hard in the early days of the business to get it off the ground and the ongoing lifeblood of people knocking on your door that will keep your business afloat. Still you need to work smart. You need to evaluate your marketing channels and identify which ones actually produce a return. Measure how much time and money you invest into each channel and the results on at least a monthly basis. Some channels are easier to get clean data on others are a little more challenging. Mentors can sometimes help you find ways to accurately measure your ROI. Over time this data will help you know if your marketing effort is sustainable and/or justifiable.
Marketing is not easy and it can be a emotional roller coaster as you invest your heart and money into these efforts to get people in the door but when they do come in, and keep coming in it becomes so worth it! However, this also is the reason many businesses plateau too early. Though marketing is important it does not press on you and often when things start getting busy many businesses stop doing marketing or stop focusing on it. This not only stunts business growth it leads to a scramble when things slow down and they try to jumpstart their marketing. Unfortunately, good marketing is like farming, you can't really "jumpstart" it. You have to work day in and day out planting seeds, tilling, fertilizing the ground and doing all you can, then slowly sprouts begin to pop up. Some may die but others will grow and over time through that steady diligent effort your field will begin to flourish. Think like a farmer and keep planting.
Questions for reflection
- Do I have a specific target market?
- Have I segmented my market into smaller groups that I understand deeply?
- Does my brand and message speak in terms and emotions that are meaningful to them?
- Does my brand have a real identity, style and value system that sets it apart?
- Is my brand and message remarkable/interesting in some way?
- In what way is my product/service unique when compared to the competition?
- ^ Does my competitor say the same thing about their product or service?
- When people think of my industry, does my brand pop into their head?
- What are the ways I can build brand awareness?
- Have I listed and prioritized all my marketing channels?
- What are the marketing channels others in the industry are using?
- Am I consistent and diligent in my marketing efforts? (think like a farmer)
- Do I have specific time set aside to do marketing tasks?
