Potential clients often ask questions like; How often should we post on social media? Which social media platforms should we use? How much money should we spend? And the answer is always the same… it depends!
Know your market
Before you can create a strategy and make decisions about budgets, frequency and marketing channels, it is crucial to identify your target market and understand what makes them tick. Once you have identified their pain, you can offer the solution that will make their life better. Your marketing plan should be built around the preferences, attitudes and actions of your target market, so you can reach them, engage with them and ultimately sell to them.
Match your product to the right people
A rookie error make by some companies is to go global too soon based on the assumption that everyone will buy their product. This type of rash behaviour is ill-advised and can be an extremely costly mistake… surely it would be better to crack your target market first?
Your target market is more likely to feel an affinity to your brand and to love your product, because they are a ‘match’ to the product (solution) you are offering. Once you have captured this market, only then should other markets be considered and explored.
K.I.S.S.
The key is to keep it simple … yes, everyone wants to make a big splash and go large, but there is no point in making life difficult for yourself. Markedsføring your products to your target audience is the easiest and most cost-effective route to success.
Setting your marketing budget
One of the most frequently asked questions concerns the marketing budget. When clients ask how much they should spend on a campaign, the answer is of course… it depends! The budget depends on the company’s profit margin, how much money the company can afford to spend before seeing any returns, how easy it is to reach the target market. We could go on…
Markedsførings strategi
To get definitive answers to these questions and more, the first step is to build a customer profile, identify where they shop, how they communicate, demographics etc. You could commission market research ascertain if they like or dislike your product and branding, and what they really value. The next step is to create a strategy outlining all relevant marketing channels, estimated costs, KPIs and much more.
5 tips for creating a successful marketing strategy
- Define your target market – make a customer profile: Before you ask questions like, ‘how often should I post on social media?’ define your target market. Your target market may not use social media…stay focused and find the relevant channels.
- Define your budget: Budget should be based on where you’ll find your target market and your profit margin. Start by calculating how profit is generated per product and how much funds are available to allocate to your marketing budget. For example, if lead generation costs are higher than your profits, this is clearly unsustainable in the long-term. However, it could be a short-term strategy to raise brand awareness.
- Give your market what they want: All elements of your branding should be based on your target market. It doesn’t matter if you don’t like a particular colour, style or social media platform. For example, if your target market uses Instagram, you need to be there too. Again, it depends – but not on you, on your target market!
- Choose relevant channels: Once you know who your target market is and where they are, you can plan which marketing channels to use. Research the most economical method of reaching them to achieve the most impact….so they will remember your brand and ultimately buy your product.
- Define your campaigns: Unless you have a crystal ball you won’t know what works the best until you try it. The best way to hone your campaigns to deliver optimum results is to split test, test again and then split test some more until you hit the sweet spot. You might think you know your target market, but you may be surprised how a different look or message affect results.
It depends. … two small words that can have huge impact on your business. Contact us today.
