“Marketing is about spreading ideas, and spreading ideas is the single most important output of our civilization.”
– Seth Godin.
What Is Marketing?
Marketing is the process of promoting, selling, and delivering products or services and getting feedback on the process. It is a fundamental function in business, which involves identifying the target market for a product or service and finding the most efficient way to reach consumers. Marketing is essentially about communicating with the customers effectively to maintain and increase the customer base.
Why Marketing Is Important For Beginners
If you’re a small business owner or work in marketing, it’s important to have a solid understanding of the basics of marketing. This will give you a better idea of how to reach your target audience with your message and products.
Marketing is one of the most important parts of a business. Companies that do not market properly with their product or service will lose money and ultimately go out of business
The basics are important, but they’re not everything!
Types Of Marketing
In this blog, I’ll outline the three main types of marketing: Advertising, Public Relations, And Direct Response. I’ll also share what these three types of marketing have in common so that you can better understand how they relate to one another.
Advertising: Advertising is the best way to get your message out to as many people as possible because it has one of the highest advertising return on investment (AROI) ratings. However, advertisements have a limited lifespan in that they need to be continuously updated and revised. If you’re not careful, your advertising could run for too long and become outdated … or even obsolete.
Public relations: Public relations is the use of public relations to communicate with the general public or target audience. It is also known as marketing communications. The goal of these communications is to gather interest for a product, brand, or company and spread awareness of its existence. However, it has a limited lifespan in that it can only last as long as the press attention you enjoy.
Direct response: Direct response marketing is the use of advertising, public relations, and other promotional tools to communicate with its audience. These messages are usually broadcast directly to consumers via the telephone, mail, television, the Internet, and other technologies. This type of marketing has a longer lifespan because it’s versatile and can reach people at different stages in life.
Building Basic Marketing Strategies
The task of marketing has become increasingly complex in the 21st century and now involves delivering a message to customers across a variety of different touchpoints. Here are some basic marketing strategies that every business should be aware of.
Neil Borden popularized the idea of the ‘Marketing Mix’ and that concept was later known, ‘The four Ps’ in the 1950s.
The four Ps of marketing stands for – Product, Price, Place, and Promotion of a good and service that needs to be marketed.
The 4 Ps of marketing Technique
By understanding and evaluating the 4 Ps technique one can easily, successively implement their marketing strategies to sell their across their customers/audiences.
Place – It refers to where the people view your product and how they buy it. For example, nowadays people like to do online shopping through web browsers, smartphone Apps, Thrift stores, showrooms, shows, etc Hence you must know where the engagement of people lies the most and use those platforms/places to the max of your benefits.
Price – IT refers to the amount/price you tag on your products. For example- After you choose your location to sell your product you have to pay attention to the demand for that product, how many people are willing to pay for it. Always make sure to check or get references through other similar companies or competitors to get an idea of their pricing strategies. Sellers also have to pay attention to if a customer is a one-time consumer or based Regular consumers (in case of subscriptions) for pricing purposes.
Product – It refers to the kind of product your company is selling, the reputation of the product depends on the seller since the product will be known under their brand. Making sure the products quality is uncompromised and satisfactory will gather a lot of attention from the public. Also Keep in check with the demand, if the demand is high make sure to have an appropriate quantity available of the product. The Quality and Quantity of the product go hand in hand.
Promotion – It refers to the various types of advertising a company invests in to promote its products. The promotion of the product can be target-based or generalized to all customers. If it is particularly target based one has to find appropriate communities, influencers, bloggers, pages to collaborate or promote their products through social media platforms. Generalized promotions can be done by advertising on TV or using banners, putting up hoarding, handing out pamphlets, door-to-door promotions, etc.
Digital Marketing Technique
The term “Digital Marketing” sounds like something you might see on a home shopping network. But the concept of marketing online today is no longer a niche sector. It has evolved into an entire industry – one that requires just as much planning and strategic thinking as traditional marketing. As digital technology has grown, marketing strategies have also changed, with savvy online marketers now using nearly every tool on the internet to promote their products or services to those who may need them and find them relevant.
According to a study by the Association of National Advertisers, only 29% of brand-dominant marketers use paid search advertising, 23% use online video, 11% use mobile advertisements and just 9% are involved with social media marketing. In fact, many companies fail to see the true value of digital marketing in their marketing efforts – not because they don’t know what it is, but because they haven’t fully grasped how big an impact it can have on their brand.
While digital marketing is still relatively new, it has already been completely transformed from its roots – which were initially limited to online advertising and websites – into a multibillion-dollar industry that includes search engine optimization (SEO), social media marketing, and mobile advertising.
The following is a shortlist of things that every business owner should be doing on a regular basis in order to keep their small business moving :
1. Engage with your target audience online.
2. Attend & moderate webinars
3. Run ads campaigns and other marketing tactics on different channels
4. Use social media like Facebook, Twitter, Linked In, etc.
5. Improve your website content
6. Make sure you have an opt-in email list
7. Attend industry trade shows
8. Start a blog and write frequently
Here are the 10 Ways to Create a Lean Brand Image :
1. Know your brand’s strengths and weaknesses
2. Develop a clear understanding of your brand’s unique selling proposition (USP)
3. Get common language in place
4. Use it consistently across all communications
5. Use social media to engage with customers
6. Be active on social networks
7. Get personal
8. Reduce logo use
9. Don’t try to be everything to everyone
10. Use your brand voice
Overview
For entrepreneurs, marketing is no longer just a trade-off between money and time. In the digital era, marketers can use an array of free or inexpensive tools to reach audiences and find customers. With so many options available, it’s easy for small businesses to spend their entire marketing budget on the latest gadget, or on expensive services they don’t need. This can leave them with no cash left for advertising or other promotional activities that could pay off big returns on investment.
But as the old saying goes: “You have to spend money to make money”. And if you don’t consistently spend money, you won’t make any money.
Here are some affordable marketing strategies that every start-up and small company should know about.
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Conclusion
The secret to marketing success lies in the ability to create a consistent brand image. Whether you’re promoting a business, a product, a service, or an individual, the key is to make your target audience remember you.
Having a proper marketing strategy will help your business flourish. Tools can make your life easier when marketing, and they can also make you earn more money. Understand what kind of tools you should use for your business.
