Instead of trying to make someone else's marketing system work for your business, you'll likely be much more satisfied with the results if you use customized marketing solutions as part of your business strategy.
Market Your Business Effectively
It's a fact that marketing plays a key role in the success of any business. The best products and services won't sell if they aren't marketed effectively. If you are an entrepreneur or you are an employee who is responsible for your company's marketing, it's important to develop customized marketing solutions if you want to achieve the greatest possible sales success.
Creating Customized Marketing Solutions
The best starting point for developing a customized marketing solution for your business is to spend some time thinking about what truly makes your business unique. It's a good idea to come up with answers to some very specific questions that can help you create an accurate profile of your company.
Questions to Ask
- What is your company's unique selling proposition?
- What factors distinguish you from your competitors?
- What do you offer that your competitors do not or cannot provide?
- Who are your primary customers?
- Where do your primary customers live?
- How do your customers find out about you?
- What portion of your business is repeat business?
- How do your customers feel about doing business with your company?
Using the Information
The information you get from answering these questions can form the basis of your marketing plan. Once you have clearly defined the important facts about what differentiates your products and services from others and you have honed in on who your customer needs, you can begin to create a customized marketing plan.
Your marketing plan should include the unique mix of marketing activities that will be used to position your company as the vendor of choice in its particular niche. The combination of techniques that you choose to utilize will form the basis of your company's marketing strategy.
Examples of Marketing Activities
A few of the most popular marketing activities are detailed below. Keep in mind that the techniques that you choose to utilize should be ones that make sense as part of your overall marketing strategy.
- Affiliate Marketing - An affiliate marketing program involves paying commissions to third parties who resell your products and services.
- Cause Marketing - Aligning with a charitable organization can be a great way to increase exposure, improve the company's image, and help out a charitable organization in your community.
- Coupons - If price is an important factor for your clientele and you're marketing to savings oriented consumers, coupons can be an effective marketing tool.
- Direct Mail - Many companies find that mailing marketing messages to the homes or offices of potential consumers is an effective way to promote their products and services.
- Ecommerce - If your company sells products directly from its website, it's important to have a secure and effective ecommerce system.
- Email Marketing -- Sending out advertisements or a newsletter via email can be an excellent way to market your products and services.
- Media Advertising - If you are marketing a consumer oriented product, it may be advisable to utilize newspaper, magazine, television, or radio advertising.
- Internet Advertising - If you're marketing products and services to web-savvy consumers, advertising online can be very beneficial.
- Promotional Items - Many companies find that promotional products are effective marketing tools.
- Publicity - Writing and distributing press releases to the news media and through online press release services can be a great way to promote your business.
- Telemarketing - If you are selling a product to a business oriented market, telemarketing can be an effective way to generate leads and make sales.
- Viral Marketing --- Create email and online marketing messages that consumers are likely to forward to their contacts, thus increasing your reach through viral marketing.
Tracking Results
No matter what types of marketing techniques you decide to use, it's important to pay attention to the results. Monitor which marketing activities are working best and which are not delivering results. Make changes in what you are doing based on the results you see. This will allow you to be proactive in ensuring that your marketing dollars are being spent wisely.
Importance of Customized Marketing
When you're looking for ways to increase sales and attract customers, it's important to develop a plan of attack that is specific to your particular organization. No two businesses are identical. What has worked for another business, even one that is similar to yours, might not be the best way to market your company.
