Seven Steps to Marketing Success

Hands up who has written their marketing plan this year? Too hard? Not enough time? You don’t need it?  Well, one day spent planning could be all it takes to significantly increase your bottom line. All you need is 24 hours, a pencil, paper and a desire to succeed.

Step One: Know what people want

If they don’t want it, they won’t buy it. Simple. So, firstly, to understand your market better, ask yourself:

• How much share of the market do I need to break even?
• Are there segments of my market where the customers needs aren’t being met?
• Are they big enough to be profitable?
• Who are, and how big are my market segments competitors?
• Is it too competitive to be profitable?
• What is unique about my product/service and does my chosen market want or value it?
• What weaknesses in the competitions’ offering can I capitalise on?

Step Two: Know thy customer

• Who are they
• What do they want
• What motivates them to buy?

If you don’t know this, you don’t know your customer.

Also, don’t confuse wants with needs.

• How does my potential customer buy similar products eg in store, catalogue, the web, door-to-door?
• Who is the primary purchaser or influencer in the purchase decision?
• What are their habits? For example, how do they research their product purchase?
• What are my target customer’s primary motivations for buying? What to they
• aspire to eg lose weight, get healthy; or
• fear eg avoid pain, slow down the ageing process.

Step Three: Focus on a Niche

No more shotguns. If you target “everyone”, no-one will be your customer.

In today’s competitive environment, you need to focus on a specific target group of customers that you can dominate. And if you can’t – move on.

Step Four: Know What You Do, and How to Sell It

“So What do you do?” Your answer to this question is sometimes referred to as your “audio logo”. It needs to

• tell your customers what you do
• be short and to the point.

The message that you develop for all your marketing and promotional collateral needs to be compelling and persuasive. It needs to:

• Explain your target’s problem
• Prove that the problem needs to be solved, and solved now
• Explain why your product is the solution
• Explain the benefits they will receive and the price and payment terms
• Include examples/testimonials of how you have solved other peoples similar problems
• Include an unconditional guarantee
  
  

Step Five: Determine How to Get Your Message Across

How will you get your message across? And what will it cost. Choose a marketing medium that delivers your message to the most niche prospects, at the lowest cost.

There are many ways to get your message across including Newspapers, TV, Contests, Seminars, Radio, Banners, Trade Shows, Newsletters, Networking, Infomercials, Telemarketing, Email, Brochures, Website, Catalogs and Window Displays. The key to success is to match your message to your market using the right medium.

Step Six: Get SMART: Set Sales and Marketing Goals

Use the SMART formula to set your goals and write them down.

Ensure your goals are:

Sensible Measurable Achievable Realistic Time specific.

Make sure that all staff responsible for sales agree to these goals, and review your performance against them regularly.

Step Seven: Develop a Marketing Budget

You can use this "quick and basic" method as a starting point to determine your “cost to acquire one customer” as follows:

1. Divide your annual sales and marketing costs by the number of units of product/customers sold.
2. Multiply this figure by your unit of sales/number of customers goal figure.
3. This will give you a rough estimate of what you need to invest to meet your sales goals for the next year.

Source:  Based on “Your Seven Step, One-Day Marketing Plan” by David Frey (MarketingBestPractices.)

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