Rules to Better Marketing

If you were going to build a house, you would hope that the architect and builders were working together using architectural plans and blueprints as their guide. So why would trying to build a solid customer base or market share be any different?

You should know that a marketing plan is of monumental importance. Although we recognize that in many cases marketing plans get filed away in the closet until it's time to get a business loan, they're most effective when they act as a blueprint for all the marketing activities a company undertakes.

It's important to identify the market which will gain you the maximum amount of benefit if captured. It should be the focal point of most of your marketing efforts. The target market needs to be clearly identified with a justification as to why they are your specified target market.

Many organizations rely too heavily on their logo, assuming it defines their brand. But a brand is much more than a visual mark—it's an emotional connection built through every interaction customers have with your business.

Branding encompasses much more than just a logo; it includes the color palette, typography, brand elements, visual language, and the brand's voice. It is the consistent application of these elements that truly defines a brand's identity.

Before you move onto this step, first have your target audience information right next to you. Understanding your prospects most pressing pain points should be huge priority. Start thinking - what do they want? What are their frustrations? What are their aspirations? And finally, what do they fear? Write down all the ideas you might come up with.

In marketing, good timing is the key to a successful campaign. As a smart marketer you need to remember that some campaigns can take weeks or even months to start heating up, whilst others can take just a few days.

When you have a product, you want new sign ups to learn as much as possible about it, so they can find out quickly if it meets their needs, and convert to paid customers. You don't want people losing interest because they simply didn't know your product could help them.

Sending a single email often isn’t enough to convert potential customers, and following up manually can be inconsistent and time consuming. This is where drip campaigns come in.

In today’s overcrowded marketplace there are dozens of businesses offering the same goods and services with little to no variety, and for a consumer, this can result in it being hard to decide which one will provide the best value and service. Which is why Lead Magnets, if used correctly - can be a powerful addition to your overall Marketing Strategy.

There is a great quote by Wyatt Wood small which says:

“When you can articulate another person’s problem better than they can, they automatically and unconsciously credit you with knowing the solution.”

When you are promoting your services to a prospect, the worst thing you can do is to talk about your business or products and services promoting them and not listen to what they actually have to say. People don’t generally care about your business, they care about how you are able to solve their problems. If you can show your prospect how you can help make their lives a little easier, your services will thrive.

Once you discover a pain point that resonates with your perfect prospect, you should use this pain point across all of your marketing campaigns.

Once you have documented your prospect’s pain points, choose the best ones . The greatest way to test if they are good enough is to run a social media ad campaign targeting your most engaged audience with your top 7 pain points. The pain point that gets the most engagement, is the one that people relate to the most. But keep in mind, this is just a indicator - sometimes customers have several pain-points that vary.

Management seems to have a huge focus on facts and figures, and much like most other things in the business arena, it is clear in marketing you need to be able to put numbers to your results.

You'll need to justify why you chose one option over another with a solid figure. As there are a myriad of ways in which you can market your products/services, there's a managerial expectation that you'll be able to reflect on its performance.

One of the most effective ways of launching an effective marketing campaign is to follow a checklist that includes company tried and tested strategies. This checklist should be filled out with the campaign details and then followed to execute the campaign.

Most companies do great work for clients — but fail to share it. Meanwhile, marketing teams struggle to produce content that feels real, useful, or relevant. The problem? They're not close enough to the work.

By running quarterly marketing meetings with your account managers, you create a feedback loop that surfaces the most impressive client stories. Even better, by bringing in the developers who built the solution, you can turn those stories into rich, technical case studies that educate, impress, and convert.

Events are a fantastic marketing tool for increasing your brand recognition and awareness. However, running events takes a lot of time and organization to ensure the best outcome and smooth running on the day. If you use events to your advantage then.

Sponsoring an event can be a good way to get your company’s name and expertise out there to the people who attend, but you can also get extra value by telling people about it who aren’t going, especially if it is an event valued by your industry.

A golden rule of marketing is:

Taking this into consideration: a great and effective way to promote your company is to give people free stuff. A very simple yet effective method. Each month at the Sydney .NET User Group, attendees receive SSW show bags filled with free software and company brochures.

Every target market is different, and each one will respond to different stimuli that tickle their particular fancy. It is a good idea to customize your marketing approach to consider the particular interests and needs of that group, both in terms of the substance of your pitch, and its style.

For example, say you are trying to sell your car. It's a nice new Holden, with a V8 under the hood and shiny new mag's. If an elderly person comes to have a look at your car, how do you sell it to them? You need to emphasise the features that will appeal to them.

It is important to have solid introduction and closing statements. This is specially useful for product demonstrations.

We believe in reinforcing your company profile at every appropriate opportunity.

The appearance of your office is very important because it is often the first impression of your company to any new visitor or client. In this way, its appearance is as important to your company profile as your clothing is to your personal profile. Although it may appear odd to cover yourself with marketing paraphernalia as you walk down the street, it's good business sense to use your office as one of your marketing tools.

The way that marketing communications strategy is planned and measured is through the concepts of frequency and reach. Frequency being how often the message is broadcast, and reach being how many people receive it. We cover the frequency part of the equation by rotating our product advertising on a monthly basis and increasing our reach by applying this rotation to several different points of contact.