Marketing
and Sales strategies seem to be one of the areas that for some reason are one
of the weaker areas of a number of early stage businesses that I see (or it may
be that having spent a chunk of my career in that space, I’m looking at it more
closely and critically). I've also had some requests for more on Digital and
Social media marketing in our hub’s pages, so here’s proof that we’re
listening..☺
For
those reasons, I wanted to cover some key areas that we look at as potential
investors; both when assessing the (sales) potential of businesses in their
chosen markets and that can help any business benchmark themselves against.
There
are very many contributors on Social media platforms and the Web supplying great
detail on the ever-evolving tactical side of digital marketing generally;
content marketing, use of video, on Facebook advertising, on Twitter, Instagram
and so on.
But
before you flex those creative or presentational muscles, there’s essential groundwork
to do; even where there is no digital side at all, these elements really matter.
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A comprehensive marketing and sales strategy combines at least these 7 areas
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We’ll
look again in future at my take on those tactical digital parts within what
should be a comprehensive and consultative approach, but for now I want to
concentrate on giving you some of the key nuggets behind an overall strategy, despite
the difficulty in doing justice to the detail needed. I'll call this the
"Seven Stages to the Holy Grail of Marketing"; in other words a
congruent, fluent and integrated approach to your sales and marketing from
customer outreach to accounts payable.
Let's get started on our seven:
1) Have
you exactly and precisely defined the problem you solve for your demographic;
in other words, your niche? Can you precisely
describe an avatar for your model customer(s) or your ideal customer?
2) How
do you reach them? What has to happen for them to get into your customer
relationship system, list, to see your advert or for you to achieve their awareness
as a named entity or associated with a solution to their problem? In other
words, where are they present, physically or online, and how do you get to
them?
3) When
you reach them, how do you engage with them? This relates to 1): What exactly
is their problem? How well do you understand that, in all its practical
consequences and myriad detail for them? In other words, you need to be able to
precisely define them and describe them to reach them, and that's key,
particularly when you want to use very segmented advertising. The tone of the
campaign and individual ads have to account for the traffic types you interact
with, their current awareness level of the issue and business targeting them,
from no clue about the issue and company through to existing customer, fully
engaged and aware
4) Is
the product/service you offer something they truly want – you may think you know what they need, but if it’s not bridged from what they want or combined with it, they may not bother to explore further. Some
call this the value of benefits or results versus product or service
features, followed by ‘social proof’, and testimonials. Are you even selling to
the people who own that problem or
who care enough to pay money to fix it?
5) This
will sound obvious, but how exactly does your product or business solve that
problem for them, or the product ‘fit’ part to the issue and how do you show
them that you are solving, or capable of solving, that problem? This is the
product architecture part - Is the product or service appropriately structured
to address that problem; how and what do you offer them to show that you can
help? In other words, how do you monetize the relationship you have built by
finding, reaching and engaging?
6) Do
you have a clear value ladder into which that product fits that's suitable for
that customer? If you're looking at, primarily, a high-ticket product, how do
you build them into that high-ticket sale – is there a progression of trust
through multiple levels before they’re prepared to pay that much and have
achieved familiarity with your offering and vision where appropriate? It may
not be a digitally- fulfilled product by that point.
7) Last
and definitely not least, and perhaps
the one with the most potential detail, what kind of a sales ‘funnel’ precisely
do you have or need? How do customers
move through it and what is their total experience through it with your company?
You may have established a value ladder of products and pricing points, but how
do people move up and down that? How are they sold up to that level? How are
they caught on a down sell when they refuse at a level?
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You need
chapter and verse on this last item. Whether you are selling a
digitally-fulfilled product online, whether you are backing it with a sales
force, whether you're using direct marketing, or whether you're perhaps selling
off a presentational stage at trade shows with an appointment close, all of
those previous seven have to be absolutely defined for a successful strategy.
© Ask An Angel Ltd
2017 All Rights Reserved
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