Marketing targets a pool of potential clients, informing them about you, your business and your product and why it meets their needs. When marketing has done its job and has created a lead, then Sales takes over.
In the past, marketing was a costly affair, and you were taking the big boys on at their own game. TV adverts were (and still are expensive) and lets face it, people go to the kitchen or toilet during advert breaks, Radio is more niche as you find the majority of people will listen to radio in traffic. Newspapers and Magazines, whilst still around are not as popular any more.
But the Internet has created a Marketing arena that is both cheap and far reaching and allows small to compete head on with big. Even with little or no budget, your Website can look as good as a Website that was created at a cost of hundreds of thousands and through careful use of Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) can appear in the same search results as your bigger competitor.
So how do you use the Internet to market your business? You need to ask your self, what is your ultimate goal? Next, you need to know our market and where do you find them? How will they find you? Who are you competing against? What is your value - why should they use you and not your competition?
The Internet has no limits, no boundaries, Grandparents may never venture beyond Facebook, What is your target is 16 year old females teens? Your product or service maybe cater to a market that you have no personal experience with, so answering these questions is the difference between success and failure. But they service another purpose, they tell you what channels to use to reach your market.
You will not find Grandparents on Twitter, but you will find young professionals there.
So your next step, once you have the answers to these questions? You start to engage your market on the channels where you are most likely to find them. Each channel needs to be enraged differently, but they all share a common feature, you need to visit and engage your audience frequently. Do not be pushy, answer questions and give advice. Never push a product or service, take your time introducing them and remember the main purpose for any business is to solve a problem that exists.
So how do you use the Internet to market your business? You need to ask your self, what is your ultimate goal? Next, you need to know our market and where do you find them? How will they find you? Who are you competing against? What is your value - why should they use you and not your competition?
The Internet has no limits, no boundaries, Grandparents may never venture beyond Facebook, What is your target is 16 year old females teens? Your product or service maybe cater to a market that you have no personal experience with, so answering these questions is the difference between success and failure. But they service another purpose, they tell you what channels to use to reach your market.
You will not find Grandparents on Twitter, but you will find young professionals there.
So your next step, once you have the answers to these questions? You start to engage your market on the channels where you are most likely to find them. Each channel needs to be enraged differently, but they all share a common feature, you need to visit and engage your audience frequently. Do not be pushy, answer questions and give advice. Never push a product or service, take your time introducing them and remember the main purpose for any business is to solve a problem that exists.
