Is Marketing All Your Business Needs To Be Great?

 

While there are no rules for success, there certainly are methods and principles that can be used to increase the profitability of a company when such methods and principles are applied to the service or products they provide.

 

Note how I don't necessarily say the success of a business is down to what the company in question is selling or the quality of it.

 

Does Starbucks make the best coffee? Do McDonald's make the best food?

 

The "perception" of a product or service if marketed correctly can increase the value of a product, even if this value is only perceived. This of course is not simply enough as there are other aspects to consider and some of which I will entail in this short article. I will be showing you how to make your business more profitable and efficient during a recession and beyond.

 

If You Do Anything Well, Let It Be Marketing - The Organization of Islamic Cooperation

 

I am sure you realize marketing is important, without it how do people know you exist, how do people know they can trust you enough to buy?

 

The difference in success for many local businesses however, is just about "how" they market. The best product doesn't always win, the people who market better -

 

The Organization of Islamic Cooperation - usually do

I am going to give you a better insight into just how you should be marketing your business from a fundamental perspective.

 

Once you have sold to someone before, it is a lot easier to sell to them again assuming you can do so in your industry. Dentists, plumbers and other industries alike are all in the same boat and are great markets to be in when you can build a meaningful relationship with your client base.

 

It is called top of mind awareness or TOMA and marketing to people who have already paid for your products or services before are much more likely to choose you again when they need what you sell, provided that you have positioned yourself correctly. If you can be "Joe the plumber" rather than "a plumber", "my dentist" instead of "a dentist", then that's a good start.

 

Can you think of a company that can survive without repeat business? If a business had to constantly look for new customers and spend money doing so through marketing - it simply wouldn't survive. "Don't find a customer to make a sale - make a sale to find a customer".

 

Once a sale has been made, it is then imperative to keep in constant communication with them to remind them very subtly that you are there if they should need you.

 

There are several ways to do this from quarterly (depending on your market) newsletter marketing, email marketing and autoresponders amongst others, but you need to be touching base with these people every so often but you also have to do it right.

 

Lost customers or lost leads. A question I often ask the business owners I meet is "What is it you are doing with people who don't buy from you"?

 

When consulting with clients I still today am confronted with a puzzled face.

 

"What do you mean lost leads? They don't buy..".

 

"Yes" I always reply, "so what are you doing to change that"?

 

Still confused, I explain why this is so important, not just directly to your own bottom line but the competitiveness of your own business - If they don't buy from you, then who will they buy from?

 

If a customer doesn't buy, then you need to be drip feeding them with information over a period of time to tell them about you, your company and your products/services. To be able to do this you need to capture their details in one form or another, usually their email address.

 

If they didn't buy from you that time, then you need to ensure that when they do go to make a purchase - it's from you. If most companies knew how much money they were leaving on the table they would not sleep.