Posts Tagged ‘small business marketing’

Planning Your Marketing in 2009

by admin on Friday, December 19th, 2008

What are your plans for 2009?


2008 has been a challenging year for small businesses - and the economic outlook isn’t looking all that rosy for 2009 either.
Marketing in particular is something that should be high on most startup businesses’ agendas for the coming year.

Getting those first few clients and customers makes all the difference.

So how do you market yourself in a downturn?

Top tips for planning your marketing in 2009


Justify Your Expenditure

Marketing should drive sales. Whether you look at it over the short term or take a longer ‘brand building’ view, every penny of marketing expenditure should help you achieve a clearly defined business goal.

If something is ineffective then you can either choose to cut that activity or to make the changes necessary to ensure that it does work. Often the problem is not with the idea itself but with the execution.

To analyse your marketing effectively you need to be able to measure the response you get. If you don’t currently have a plan to measure your marketing response rates, then that’s our next tip for 2009.

Measure Everything

You wouldn’t put money into a savings account without knowing the interest rate. Marketing is an investment just like any other – the purpose is to use marketing to grow your business. If you invest X you want more than X back.

As a startup with limited resources this is doubly true.

For each marketing activity you undertake (from placing an ad in the paper to buying a new sign for your shop) set down clearly defined goals that you want to achieve. Once you have the goals written down you can start to judge how effective each activity is in achieving those goals. If it doesn’t stack up, you need to change it.

Start with Small Tests

If your budget is tight the worst move you can make is to bet the farm on a single marketing strategy. It is better to test new ideas with small investments of time and resources. If you get the response you want, it’s easy to scale them up.

Don’t Be Afraid to Get Your Hands Dirty

If you are serious about the success of your new business then you need to be prepared to do whatever it takes. Successful entrepreneurs don’t get away with saying, “I don’t like networking so I won’t”.

If knocking on doors is the best way for your to start getting customers then get knocking. Do not allow yourself to avoid the obvious answers just because you don’t like the look of them - especially when money’s tight.

Replace Anything You Stop

As a startup you can’t simply move from one marketing idea to the next - they should all be working together to build your brand and develop new business. So, if you decide to cut a marketing activity don’t leave holes.

Replace cut marketing activities with new ones. Often this will mean replacing marketing that is financially expensive for marketing with little financial outlay.

For example, you may decide that the flyers you tested are not effective. Building an online presence may be more effective but what you save in cash terms you’ll need to make up for in time committed.

2009 will certainly be challenging but the startups and small businesses that emerge as the winners will be the ones who meet the challenge, not simply hide away until the storm passes.

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Most Likely Customers: Two Examples

by admin on Tuesday, December 9th, 2008

Following on from yesterday’s post about finding the right people to market to, today we’re going to take two quick examples of most likely customers.

Example A:

A website providing video training for secondary school students studying for exams. Every secondary student taking exams could use the site but who are the most likely?

First off, the most likely customer is probably Internet savvy and used to using sites like YouTube.

Their problem is that (a) they want to do well in their exams but (b) they’re struggling with a few points. Thos students will get the most benefit from the service on offer – not the highfliers in the class who already know the subject and not the students who don’t care.

With those points in mind, the marketing team can focus their communications on that segment of the student population.

Example B:

A retro / vintage clothing store. Again, anyone could buy vintage clothing but marketing to everyone would be expensive and time consuming.

The most likely customer is probably someone who is fashion conscious but is looking for something more unique than what’s on offer on the high street. Their problem, finding something unique. Your solution, we stock one-off pieces that you’ll not see anywhere else.

But where do you find these people – and, in turn, how do you market to them?

If finding unique style and fashion is their problem, how else might that impact on their lives? Does it suggest the kind of music they will listen to or clubs they will go to? Does it suggest the kinds of jobs they will have or the magazines they will read?

The more you know about your most likely customers, the better and more effectively you can target your marketing.

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Who should you be marketing to?

by admin on Monday, December 8th, 2008


One of the biggest hurdles for new businesses is getting those first few customers. But even before you reach that stage, if you’re looking for investment you’ll need to show that you have a clear idea of who your customers will be and why they will buy from you.

Either way, you need to do some research.

Your ‘most likely customer’


The first instinct for many startup businesses is to think, “I’ll sell to widest possible market”.

Unfortunately, selling average products to the widest possible market is pretty difficult, not to mention expensive. It’s usually a smarter move to highlight a small segment of the market that you can serve better than any other – and who will get the most from your products or services.

We’ll call this your most likely customer.

Your most likely customers are the ones whose need most closely match the solution that you provide. If you do a good job providing the perfect solution for them then you stand a chance of becoming a major player in that segment of the market. Word-of-mouth, referrals and brand awareness are all easier to come by in a tightly defined niche.

Of course that doesn’t mean that customers from outside that niche can’t or won’t buy your products or services – just that you will focus your attention on the areas where your chances of success are greatest.

Finding ‘most likely customers’


Ideally you will start with this market and then create your products or services to meet their needs but if you’ve already got your product or service worked out then the next best thing is to start finding perfect customers for those products and services.

If that’s the case then your first job is to get a realistic assessment of the benefits that you offer. Benefits (rather than features) are the positive outcomes that your product delivers. The fact that your widget lasts 20% longer than competitor products is a feature. The fact that lasting longer saves on maintenance costs is a benefit.

Once you know your benefits then you can start matching them with problems that your potential customers have. Every customer might suffer from the same problem – widgets that wear out quickly – but for some this will be a bigger issue than for others.

The potential customers whose widgets suffer the most wear and tear – and who therefore have to replace them most frequently – have a greater need for longer lasting widgets than the rest of the market.

If long-lasting widgets are your solution then customers who lose money by replacing widgets frequently are your most likely customers.

Tomorrow we’ll look at two examples of ‘most likely customers’.

What do you think? Who are your most likely customers? How do they benefit more than others from your products or services?

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