When you first get into business, you certainly have a lot to think about. Aside from planning out your products or services and forecasting the financials, a huge part of what you’ll need to do is pull together your marketing strategy. In the beginning, this can seem like a thing to do – but it doesn’t need to be. You can get started on creating the perfect marketing plan and get incredible results when you look to action it. Here are seven steps to follow to get started.
1. Get to Know Your Audience
The first thing you need to do here is think about who you’re looking to target. Figuring out your target audience can often feel like an overwhelming task to take on, but it gets to be a lot easier when you break it down. So begin by doing some research. When you start to research your market segment, competitors, and what your customers want, you can begin to form a better idea of who your target audience might actually be.
2. Solve a Problem or Meet a Desire
Then, as you’re starting to fine-tune things, you’re going to want to make sure that you know how you are different from what’s already on the market. It’s important to think about what you’re trying to achieve with your product and service and who it might best be suited for. You can then create a profile of the exact kind of customer you’re looking for.
3. Choose the Right Platforms
The next step here is to start thinking about where you want to market. Ideally, you’re going to take an integrated approach here, meaning that you’ll look to include a range of different marketing styles in your strategy so that you can cast a wide net and target as much of your audience as possible. So at this stage, you need to decide what. For many people, choosing the right social media platforms to be on is the first step. But you’ll also need to consider other areas such as SEO, paid media, email marketing, advertising, affiliate marketing, and more.
4. Mix Your Approach
Depending on your budget, you may be looking to do a mix of organic and paid marketing activity from the beginning. Or, you may start off with free methods and build up from there. Either way, it’s always a good idea to mix your approach where you can. This means you’re scooping up as many customers as possible. Here, looking to bring in paid media activity with Google Ads and social media placements can help. Mixed with SEO and organic social media posts, you will create a strong integrated marketing approach.
5. Get Creative With Your Advertising
When it comes to the advertising elements, you’re going to want to make sure that you’re nailing the visual side of things. The creative elements should also look to be, well, creative. Don’t be afraid to have fun with this. Think about ways you can capture your audience's attention, because this is essential in a crowded online space!
6. Use Clever Messaging
Alongside your advertising strategy, you’re then going to want to take a look at your copy. When you’re crafting the words for any parts of your marketing, it’s important to make sure that you’re using them to your advantage. Your messaging strategy needs to feed into your overall marketing goals, meaning that you need to be able to use persuasive copy that gets a response and encourages an action from your audience or customer.
7. Optimize as You Go
Then, you’re going to want to make sure that you’re checking in with everything as you go. You’re going to find that things are going to change as you start to track the results. You may find that certain campaigns perform better than others – but you can then apply those learnings and findings going forward to get better results all around.
Final Thoughts: Making Marketing Work For You!
Ultimately, what you’re trying to achieve here is to reach your goals! And you’re going to want to do that as quickly as possible. So this is why pulling together the right marketing strategy that works for you is essential. It’s not just about following everything that you read online or see others doing, you need to make it personal. It has to work for your style of selling, your products or services, and what you actually enjoy doing. Then, joining everything up with an integrated marketing plan and utilizing experts can help you take it all to the next level!
If you want your business to be successful, you have to lean into every possible avenue to make it so that you can. Networking makes your business as successful as you want it to be but it all depends on the effort you put in. While helping your business, you can also improve your life personally because networking takes a certain level of self-confidence to get it right. Whether you are wanting your brand to grow or you are looking to increase your revenue, networking is going to be your ticket to doing that.
Networking works to create stronger relationships and helps to get your business information out there. When you network, it used to be that you’d hand out stacks of business cards to people you meet but with technology these days, a vCard generator can put a QR code on your card and once popped into your lanyard, it’s a great talking point for those who want to learn more about you! When you attend the right events and conferences, you find the right people and if you can give your information over with ease and without needing to print a stack of business cards, you’re ahead of the game. Are you still on the fence as to why you should network? Great – we’ve got even more reasons for you below.
It’ll help you to meet people with similar interests. Whether you are attending trade shows or exhibitions in your industry, you can meet others who have a targeted interest in what your business does. At least, they’ll have an interest in what your business does. It can be hard to communicate with others when you don't know them but networking events are designed in a way that works to make you feel confident about it.
You can learn more about your industry yourself. Networking isn't just for people to find you and learn about you. It’s a good way to learn more for yourself. From here, you can expand your business and expand your own knowledge, too. You can then become more involved in what your industry is doing, which helps to further your business message.
You could land a promotion. Did you know that networking is a good place to start when looking to step up in your industry? You might be a business owner, but what if your promotion means collaboration with someone else and partnering up with them. You can find new opportunities, new revenue streams and new ways to diversify by who you partner with in your business.
You’ll find new opportunities to learn. You may be excellent at what you do, but others in your industry know their stuff, too. You never know who you could meet or what lessons they could teach you but a networking event can give you a chance to learn more and do more. You never know who could be willing to give you new opportunities to do better.
You can learn more about the community. As a business leader, it’s always important for you to do what you can for your community. It shows you are willing to learn, willing to give and willing to advertise your business in a way that benefits the local area. Your community is going to be your biggest buyer, and if there’s a position that needs to be filled or an event that can be headed up, you can do that and give back to the community, too!
You could even improve your social life. If you are running your business alone, you could always use new contacts to socialize with and networking events are a great place to start. You can meet new people in the perfect setting for the right introductions. Networking events allow you to rub shoulders with work people, too, but socially, your life is going to improve as a result.
You can build your business. It doesn't matter whether you want to grow your brand or launch a project in the future, building your business is all about improving what you’re doing, what you’re earning and how you’re doing it all. So many people in a networking event could become customers in the future, so you need to shine!
You might find that as the result of a networking event, your productivity improves. It works because you can bet that being around other people will propel your confidence in your business forward. Knowing what you could be? That’s a motivator.
Gone are the days when printed flyers and posters were sufficient to get the attention of potential clients or customers. Nowadays, a strong social media presence is practically a lifesaver for your business, as millions of people log into their social media accounts every single day. Fortunately, platforms like Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram allow enterprises to connect with a global market, use digital tools for advertisement, and interact with consumers. It is important to note that your company will not automatically pull in your target market by simply creating an account. You will need to improve your social media skills and marketing. Here are three tips that will aid in building a better presence on social media platforms.
Understanding your audience is not just a key; it's a powerful tool to wield for a successful social media presence. Merely putting your content out there and hoping for the best is not a smart strategy. By identifying your target market and creating content that resonates with them, you can save time, get results, and avoid wasting money on unnecessary campaigns. Paying close attention to their preferences and behaviors is the first step toward building a better social media presence. Who follows you and engages or shares your content? Look for the common characteristics they share. It could be age, location, or interests. Certain social media platforms provide this information when you have a business account. Consider keeping up with social conversations so you can figure out their desire and pain points. You can also listen to what they are saying about your brand so you can serve them better.
Promote your account
New business accounts pop up daily. To get noticed, you will need to be proactive by sharing your account with potential clients and promoting it on your other platforms. For instance, you can cross-post your IG content to other platforms like Facebook for quick and efficient advertising. Whether you are a big or small business, hashtags in your industry are extremely important. They can be used to encourage your audience to share or promote your posts, and they make your content searchable by tag-followers, which enhances your reach. If you are posting a collaboration with another brand or putting up a video of a happy customer, remember to tag them so their followers can notice you. While these tactics may seem simple, adding social media management to your tasks can be stressful. If this is your dilemma, consider visiting sites like https://tessa.tech/virginia-seo/virginia-seo-services/ to connect with credible SEO specialists.
Content is everything in the social media space. The feeds are filled with creative content every minute, and it is crucial to focus on eye-catching visual content so you can grab the attention of your audience. Ditch the stock photos and opt for powerful images your market can connect with. Double down on client photos and personalize your company by taking your followers behind the scenes. Have fun with the latest trends by incorporating them into your product or service videos.
Social media has become a potent marketing tool that has helped many companies launch and make huge profits. With these tips, you can also increase your presence and help your business succeed.
Writing and completing a book is no easy feat. Unfortunately, it’s only half the battle. Making your book sell involves knowing how to publish and market it. Ebooks remain the most popular medium because you don’t have to pay for printing or go to the effort of physically shipping books. That said, there is still work to be done once you’ve uploaded your eBook online. This post outlines 7 tips for selling your eBook.
Design a professional book cover
Cover art is still important – even when selling an eBook. Many eBook publishing platforms won’t let you publish your book through them unless you have cover art. Enticing cover art meanwhile will help to attract new readers while scrolling through titles. You can pay designers online to produce a cover for you. Choose a cover that reflects the contents of your book while making sure it stands out from other similar books.
Set up a website
It’s useful to have a website where you can sell your ebook directly to potential readers. Having a website can also help you to build up some search engine presence for your book. You can pay a website developer to create a site for you, or you can build your own site using a custom website builder like WordPress or Wix.
Automate sales with software
By using eBook DRM and sales software such as Edition Guard, you can automate eBook fulfilment and limit who can read it (and on which devices). Such software can be linked up to your website. Make sure that you have such software downloaded.
Use eBook publishing platforms
There are many eBook publishing platforms that you can sell your eBook though. Some of the most popular options include Smashwords, Amazon, Lulu, Barnes and Noble, Kobo, Apple iBooks and Google Play Books. Publishing platforms can help your book to get noticed, however they do take a cut of each sale. This cut depends on the publishing platform, the price of your book and its popularity.
Promote your book on social media
Social media is one of the best places to promote your book. On top of using your personal social media channels, consider creating social media pages for your book. Interact with other social media users and post engaging content that isn’t necessarily promotional (such as tips, news or opinions) to help further generate attention.
Send your book to bloggers/vloggers to review
There are many blogs and vlogs dedicated to reviewing books. Not only can earning reviews help you earn press quotes to use alongside the promotion of your book, but it can help expose your book to new audiences. There are literary PR companies that can help send your book to various bloggers and vloggers to review. Alternatively, you can look for bloggers and vloggers yourself to send your eBook to.
Give your book away for free for a limited time
Giving your book away for free may not seem like a good business strategy, but it can pay off. Reading fanatics love free books and will often go out of their way to search for them. Exposing your book to lots of readers could help you to get your book recognised. Readers may recommend it to people and from there you could start to organically attract readers. At this point, you could consider putting your price on your book and can start making money off the demand.
Want to attract more visitors to your website? By finding new ways to advertise your site, you can encourage more traffic. Search engines ads and display ads are some of the most common ways to advertise a website, but there are many other advertising strategies you can try out. Below are just a few examples of different places to promote your website.
In your email signature
When sending professional emails, it’s worth having your website in your email signature to add a sense of legitimacy – especially when cold emailing potential clients. Your email signature can also contain other useful information such as your phone number and job title (and of course your name). Many email services allow you to set up an email signature that automatically accompanies any email that you send out.
In your social media bios
Your company social media accounts are another important place to promote your website. There is usually a place within the bio of your account page where you can promote your website. If you’re promoting a personal website such as a personal blog you can put this in the bio of your personal social media accounts or create separate social media accounts for your blog.
On your vehicle
Vehicle advertising can make your company vehicle look more professional. You may also pick up some business from people seeing your website printed on your vehicle. Sites like Edmunds can help you choose a suitable business vehicle to advertise your website on. Vinyl wraps are one of the most common ways to print information onto vehicles – these are sheets of vinyl that wrap over the bodywork of your car, allowing easy removal if you ever decide to sell the vehicle. Other information like brand colors, logos, images, contact details and brief company information can be printed on the side of your vehicle.
On a business card
Business cards provide a quick way to exchange information about your business when meeting a potential client in person. On top of your email address and phone number, it can be worth printing your website address onto these cards. You can also print a QR code onto the business card which allows people to easily visit your website by opening up their phone camera rather than having to manually type in the URL. This Hubspot guide explains how to create a QR code.
On posters/billboards
Posters and billboards could be a great way to attract website visitors. As with a business card, you can print your website address and a QR code onto these. For posters and billboards to be effective, they need to be placed in key locations where your target audience is going to see them. While posters and billboards can offer a lot of space to advertise, it’s important not to put too much information on them, as most people will read them at a glance.
On flyers/physical newsletters
Posting flyers and physical newsletters is still an effective way to advertise. People are spending more time at home due to increased remote work opportunities. A lot of people are also more likely to read a newsletter or pamphlet through their door than they are a promotional email (most of our inboxes are so inundated with promotional emails that few of us open all of them). You can print your website address and a QR code on flyers and newsletters to help convert customers.
On a pen
Next time someone asks if they can borrow a pen, why not hand them a pen with your logo and website printed on it? Such pens can be a unique way to convert potential customers – every time they use that pen in the future, they’ll be reminded of your business, and it may just encourage them to check out your website. There are many other branded accessories that you can use to promote your website in this way.
Marketing is an evolving field, always throwing new challenges at those trying to stay ahead of the game. So, it is not at all surprising that even the most experienced entrepreneurs can slip up from time to time. While mistakes are often the stepping stones to learning, recognizing and avoiding them, when it comes to your business marketing, can save time and money.
That being the case, let’s take a look at some of the most common mistakes, so you can avoid making them and save yourself a whole lot of hassle.
1. Not having a clear marketing strategy
One thing that often happens when someone has been in business for a while is that they get complacent about their marketing and do not put the time or effort into creating a clear vision for it. Sometimes, this can work out almost by chance but more often than not, if you do not have an idea of what you want to achieve or how you plan to do it, things will go wrong.
If you have found a form of marketing that works for you, it is all too tempting to stick with it and ignore the latest social media trends. After all, they are constantly changing and how can you possibly keep up? You need to try because social media is where the people are, so it is where your business needs to be too.
The solution: Regularly research and adapt to the latest social media trends. Don't be afraid to experiment with new platforms and keep an eye on what your target audience is really interested in.
3. Doing it all yourself
If you are doing all of your own marketing without so much as consulting any advertising experts, then you might be saving money, but chances are you are losing a lot more in potential revenue,
The solution: These days, hiring an integrated marketing partner is very affordable. It gets you access to a whole marketing team for the price of an employee, so be sure to consult the professionals before you start any new marketing campaign.
4. Overlookign content quality
High-quality content is paramount. Some businesses focus too much on quantity and end up compromising quality. Content that lacks value can erode trust and damage your brand. Not only that, but the more good quality content you have the easier it will be for people to find you when conducting a search on Google, for example.
The solution: Focus on creating valuable, engaging, and well-researched content. Quality always trumps quantity.
5. Failing to measure ROI
One of the worst things you can do as a business trying to market as effectively as possible is to simply not bother tracking how effective your marketing campaigns are, or to neglect checking out the metrics often enough. If you don’t look at the data, you won’t know what works for your business and what does not, and your return on investment may be dismal.
Customers' opinions can provide a wealth of information on everything from the usability of your website to how well your ads go over, so when it comes to marketing more effectively, it would be extremely foolish to dismiss their concerns because you think you know best. Ignoring feedback or reacting defensively to criticism can hamper growth.
The solution: Encourage and actively listen to customer feedback. Make necessary adjustments and let customers know their voices are heard.
7. Avoiding risk and innovation
Playing it safe might seem sensible if you do not want to alienate customers or blow a lot of money on a failed campaign but it can cause your business to stagnate. Markets change, and a failure to innovate can leave a business behind. You need to always be one step ahead with your advertising and this means watching industry trends very closely ab not being afraid to take a leap and try something new.
The solution: Encourage a culture of innovation within your team. Test new ideas and learn from the results.
If you can avoid these marketing mistakes that even seasoned entrepreneurs make, you should see more sales more consistently over time, Good luck with it all!
