First I think it's important for you to know what your true objective is? Of course you might say, "I want to make money." Or, "I want my product to become a household name and I want to sell a million of them!"
Marketing, however, is more than that. It's creating a desire for what you have to sell.
A good marketing campaign has people humming a tune or hearing the words to a company's jingle long after they have seen a product's commercial.
You may not have the advertising budget to hire a large agency so you will need to decide which method of advertising you will use based on a few factors.
One factor is, unfortunately, the amount of money you have to spend. The methods of advertising you choose and whether you will be doing most of the work yourself or hiring it out depends on your budget.
And the type of advertising campaign you decide on might be determined by what you have to advertise.
The type of advertising campaign you use will also be determined by what your objective is.
Some questions you need to have the answers to:
- Do you want to sell products with the advertising?
- Do you want to find a licensee for your product, or do you want to move to the next step in the sales or licensing process with a manufacturer?
- Do you want to attract customers? Or investors? Or partners? Or do you want to generate sales of your services?
After you know what it is you want to accomplish, you must determine how to reach your target market. Find out who would be interested in what you have to sell by doing market research and then focus your efforts on just those people who would be interested in your product or service.
For instance, if you decide a mass mailing is the way you want to handle the first phase of your advertising and you buy mailing lists made up of people who have no interest in what you are selling, you have wasted time and money. Spending some time doing market research and finding just the right mailing lists probably would be more effective.
By the marketing stage in your business you should already know who your competitors are. You have already designed and developed your product or service to fill a void in the marketplace not currently being met by competition.
You should always keep your eyes and ears open as to what the competition is doing so it's wise to tailor your marketing initiatives to meet and even exceed the needs of the marketplace you want to reach.
This is one more area that needs your constant attention. No one said running your own business was easy!
2001 Stanley I. Mason. Syndicated by Paradigm News, Inc.
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