How to find your way around the marketing maze
Posted by marianchapman on October 17, 2010 under Business Planning, Marketing, Strategic Planning | 
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How to find your way around the marketing maze
On an average day we are all bombarded with marketing from all directions. Advertising messages on trucks, vans, cars, roadside hoardings, bus stops, posters in shop windows, radio and TV ads, text messages promoting products, marketing via email and in the post, every item with labeling we pick up is marketing something. Then there are ads on supermarket trolleys even on the floor in the aisles! Look up and you can sometimes see promotions on balloons and blimps, then there are all the ads via search engines and on websites and ads in online and printed directories, magazines and newspapers and even inserts into publications. The humble business card is also a form of marketing.
Just about the only way advertisers cannot get to you is in your sleep it seems. Wonder how long it will be before someone works out a way to sell advertising via our dreams?
All this adds up to a huge amount of opportunity – potentially – but most business owners find it actually adds up to a huge amount of confusion. Often meaning that it is easier to do nothing rather than risk spending money and time doing the wrong thing.
Of course some businesses know exactly where their business comes from but for the rest of us…
Why, who, where and when
So what is the answer? The start point is not where to advertise but why and to whom. First work out:
• What your business needs to achieve, this might be as simple as sell more to existing customers or sell more to new customers. Could be both. That’s the why. Put some numbers in this part of the plan either as percentages, turnover or profit.
• Then determine who your best prospects are, try to develop a feel for them as people (a brief pen portrait can help) including what they might read, look at, listen to. If you have good relationships with existing customers ask them.
• This will help you determine which channel(s) to use for your marketing. At this stage you will have to accept that nothing is guaranteed and a period of test and learn is fine (so long as you set up tracking methods so you do learn).
That brings us to where and when:
• The work you’ve done to determine who to aim your marketing at will give you a good indication of which channels to use and your testing will refine that. Often more than one channel works well for example ads in the local press coupled with a mailing and follow up by phone will get your brand known and the direct mail contact (but only if followed up) will gain you meetings at which to close the sale. Or maybe a PR campaign with regular Tweets will reach your target audience.
• When is relatively Location Premier Bank easy – your business may have in-built seasonality or quiet periods. Plan your marketing activity accordingly or consider fairly continual marketing such as networking or pay per click ads.
We have not covered one of the most important aspects of marketing in this blog – the messages. We will cover that next time.
In the meantime you could start on your plan but bear in mind that marketing is not a tap you turn on and out pours business however if you have a plan – and stick to it – over time (sometimes a short time) it will deliver return on investment and help you meet your business goals.
Free Resources
Marketing-Simply – A Guide to Marketing for SMEs –
Business Plan Template – Cashflow Template – Start Up Guide
Guide To Strategic Planning – Small Business Guide
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