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Posts Tagged ‘Market’

Marketing Strategy Start Small

Never underestimate the small things included in marketing issues. Every marketing activity although small will have great value if done properly. Even the marketing activities should be started from the little things.Consumers who have yet to get to know the product we tend to still have a look around and get to know details of the prosper before finally deciding to buy. Marketing activities that we do should be focused so that prospective consumers make the decision “Yes” against what we have to offer, though from a small advance.

For example, to boost car sales, we can bring people to the first car show, take a test drive for free.

Then, ask the prospective buyers mention the advantages of car used and if need to request it in the form of writing that later signed it. After that, if you asked him to buy a car, chances are it will happen the transaction will be far greater than the directly asked to buy.

So, the most important thing is to give the consumer the opportunity to feel the candidate in advance what you want to offer – surely give the best quality you have.

Thus, prospective consumers will increasingly steadily in making his decision. Keep the first and provide the information they need and make them feel satisfied with what you have to offer right from the start

When I teach small business classes on marketing strategy, I often ask participants the question, “Who are your customers? Who will buy your product?” I am often surprised that otherwise savvy small business people either have no idea who will buy from them, or they assume that ‘everyone’ will.

Assumptions like this can lead to wrong decisions, wrong pricing, wrong marketing strategy – and ultimately, business failure.

The most successful small businesses understand that only a limited number of people will buy their product or service. The task then becomes determining, as closely as possible, exactly who those people are, and ‘targeting’ the business’s marketing efforts and dollars toward them.

You, too, can build a better, stronger business, by identifying and serving a particular customer group – your target market.

One of the first things you need to do is to refine your product or service so that you are NOT trying to be ‘all things to all people.’ Become a specialist!

For example, in my business, an Eco-tourism company, we made some specific decisions early in our market planning. As a charter boat business, we knew that there were plenty of fishing charter operators in the area, and ‘party boats’ as well. So we decided that we would offer sightseeing or special event charters, and that we would not allow alcohol on board, or fishing rods. Yes, this decision eliminated a percentage of the market – but it also gave us a ‘niche’ that we could capitalize on, and expanded our market in a way that other charter operators could not take advantage of.

Next, you need to understand that people purchase products or services for three basic reasons:

• To satisfy basic needs.

• To solve problems.

• To make themselves feel good.

You’ll need to determine which of those categories your product or service is the solution to, and be prepared to market it accordingly.

Your product or service may fit more than one category, too – our charter business primarily targets folks who just want to feel good – spending a day out on the water, relaxing and being waited on. But it also targets people who have visitors coming from out of town, or even overseas, because we represent a solution to the problem of “What will we do while our company is here? How can we entertain them, or show them our area?”

The next step in creating an effective marketing strategy is to zero in on your target market. Continue on to the next page to learn how to use market segmentation to define your target market.

Small business owners who are concerned about their sales and marketing capabilities could begin to see improvement by breaking down the term “sales and marketing” into discrete, manageable elements. You end up with a checklist that can be reviewed in order to prioritize areas needing improvement – a checklist that will serve as the groundwork for an effective marketing strategy.

In the suggested list below, I will use examples from a retail florist business to make some points clear.

• MARKETS. How much do you really know about your current markets or future market? Why do your customers buy from you? What could you offer that would attract more non-customers? How can you sell to more of the profitable customers? If you add features or services, will people pay more for them or will they attract more customers? Are there bulk, institutional, industrial, or corporate markets beyond normal retail that you are ignoring?

Florist: Have you thought about selling regular weekly arrangements to area businesses, especially car dealers, law firms, real estate firms, etc. at a reduced rate, but with a one year contract for 50 arrangements?

• COMPETITION. Who are they and why are they after you? What is the overall market trend and how are you holding up in terms of market share and profit position? How do you really rank against competitors? What substitutes are there to your products and how much of a threat are they?

Florist: If your funeral business is dwindling, what cultural trends (“no flowers” announcements for example) are important here and how can you counter them (such as sending flowers or a fruit basket to the home of survivors, for example)?

• DISTRIBUTION. How can you get your products/services out to new outlets profitably? Are there unbranded opportunities? Can you bundle in your products with someone Else’s?

Florist: Can you partner with service providers for high school proms in the area (photographers, limo services) and offer a one-stop package for young people? This could become a good new sales channel for you.

A marketing plan outlines the specific actions you intend to carry out to interest potential customers and clients in your product and/or service and persuade them to buy the product and/or services you offer.

The marketing plan implements your marketing strategy. Or, as I put it in my article, “The Key to Marketing: Use a Plan”, “the marketing strategy provides the goals for your marketing plans. It tells you where you want to go from here. The marketing plan is the specific road map that’s going to get you there. “

A marketing plan may be developed as a standalone document or as part of a business plan. Either way, the marketing plan is a blueprint for communicating the value of your products and/or services to your customers.
See Writing the Marketing Plan for detailed instructions on creating a marketing plan for your business, whether as part of a business plan or as a stand-alone.

Link cloaking is a very important part of affiliate marketing. In a nutshell, link cloaking is a way to protect your affiliate commissions from being stolen. It’s not totally foolproof. Smart individuals who are well-educated about the matter can still figure out how to keep you from getting your commission.

Most people won’t go that far, so cloaking your links will prevent most commission loss. How do people steal affiliate commissions? Have you ever hovered over a link and noticed that the link was an obvious affiliate link?

Some people type in the parent domain instead of clicking the link as a way of making sure the owner of the site gets paid 100% for the sale. Some people falsely believe that if they buy from an affiliate link, they’ll have to pay more for a commission mark-up.

Some people actually do it for a different reason. If you’re promoting a ClickBank product, especially to other marketers, many of them know they can insert their own ClickBank ID and get what’s usually a 50% or more discount on the product.

This is a different type of affiliate commission theft, because the person doing it gets the affiliate commission themselves, rather than just making sure you don’t get it. Most people don’t do that, of course.

Most people are pretty honest, and don’t mind giving you a little affiliate commission in exchange for recommending a good product to them. But it’s enough of a concern that you should take steps to prevent it.

You can easily set up your own link cloaking system. What you would do is set up a directory on one of your domains. Most marketers use the domain of their own name, as in bobsmith.com. They typically have a subdirectory called /recommends/.

One way to start selling our products without spending a lot, is hiring and paying salespeople on commission, paying a percentage according to the amount of product that sells to the final consumer, or placed in other businesses or companies.

And later when sales increase and no longer as profitable as we pay for fees, hiring and paying them a fixed salary.

Buy at low prices

We should not hurry and buy the first furniture, equipment or machinery that we find, we must always take our time researching the market well, and look for good prices.

There will always be a place where we find the appliance or equipment you need to start our business at a low cost compared to other places.