The primary purpose of starting a business (at least in most cases) is to make money, and lots of it. Entrepreneurs pick a business idea they are sure will be popular, with product and service features they know will be irresistible to consumers. Their thoughts are filled with how many customers they need to meet their projections, how much traffic they need to draw, and how the operations can be streamlined. They are sure that once they have all the details worked out, the customers will show up in droves.
Very often, this confidence in their venture spills over into their marketing materials such that the messages they deliver are misfocused on how great the business, products or services are. Unfortunately, this classic approach is no longer effective. Today’s consumers are more knowledgeable and savvy than ever they are far more concerned with what your product can do for them. The new adage for defining marketing efforts must be Ask not what your customer can do for you, but what your business can do for your customers!
Every bit of your marketing effort, from the website to personal sales to follow-up contact, must be completely customer-centric. Everything you think about your venture needs to start and end with your target market. They don’t care what you need, what you want, or how you feel. They only want to know what your products or services are going to do for them. Just remember, it’s not about you, it’s all about the customer.
Define your venture’s marketing messages by the benefits your customers will receive by doing business with you. Know the features of your products, but reframe those into direct benefits for your customers. People want to know how your product will make them better, happier, more attractive, or solve some other problem in their world. For example, a mobile oil-change service has the feature of “oil changes at your home or office.” Better to focus on the benefit of “saves you time and keeps your car on the road.”
Identify your venture’s USPs (Unique Selling Propositions), or what makes your business stand out over the competition. Three separate USPs are good, especially if each of the three targets the primary needs of different market segments. Of course, to define your USPs as benefits rather than features, you will need to know your target markets inside and out, in order to define the benefit that will draw them in.
One way to improve your marketing messages is to personalize the appeals. Use testimonials from satisfied customers and anecdotes about situations that your products improved. Emotional appeals are much stronger than factual appeal, regardless of the audience. Of course, the facts and statistics about your product should be available, but a laundry list of data isn’t likely to sway too many consumers.
Focus on showing customers what your products will do for them and how it will make their lives better. We are all pummeled by hundreds of marketing messages each day …
Mobile marketing may be important to business planning, but it can be difficult to learn and create a great marketing plan. There is so much to learn both on the marketing side and the technical side. Listed below in this article are some simple steps that will help you have a successful mobile marketing strategy.
Your customers are the reason you are working. Knowing the goals and desire of your buyers is the fundamental principle of mobile marketing. When you are applying your services in a manner that is not in line with the desires of the customer, you are unlikely to see much profit. Find out more about your audience to answer their needs.
QR codes are being used more and more on advertisements to appeal to the smartphone-using audience. That way, people using smart phones will be able to easily visit your web site for access to your special promotions or coupon offers. Put these codes everywhere, including fliers, catalogs, and even your own business card. A person that takes the time to use a QR code is likely interested in your company. Offering these on your printed ads and marketing material makes it easy for them to find out more.
When composing your mobile website copy, be succinct. Make sure your site is filled with good information and not just there for keyword stuff. Mobile marketing is all about concise advertising.
Creating a mission statement will be highly beneficial for staying focused with social mobile marketing. This will make it easier to stay focused.
You need to have a home base if you are developing a mobile platform that will stand alone. Your campaign is about getting people to your home base or bringing them back to it. Avoid developing an entire business around your mobile platform.
Make sure your first campaign is successful before you start a new mobile marketing campaign. Take into account the longevity of the campaign in addition to the sales numbers. Base the creation of your new campaign on the success formula of your old one.
When you are getting started in mobile marketing, you need to learn everything you can regarding how mobile devices work and how they display information so you can tailor your ad material accordingly. View your campaign on as many different mobile and smart phones as possible to test out your ads, links and other interactive materials from the perspecitve of a consumer.
Think about creating a free app for your customers. The process is easy, and customers love receiving free applications. You could create an application specific to your business and up the results of your mobile marketing efforts. There are a lot of services that assist in designing apps, and a lot of features these apps could offer to your customers.
As you can see, mobile marketing is the wave of the future, and you need to know how to use it to generate leads and make sales. It will be easier to understand what …
Article marketing, also known as submitting articles you have written to online directories, effectively promotes services and products, making it very popular among marketing affiliates. If someone goes through a link in your writing to purchase a product, you will earn a commission. Read further to gain valuable information on marketing your articles.
Do not limit your content to the strict AP style and grammar. It is acceptable to be less formal in order to achieve the best search engine optimization. Doing so will make your work fit better with what the search engines are looking for. The AP guidelines will still help you write fluid content, but ease up on the rules to gain improved results from search engines.
When writing articles, try to maintain your own unique voice. When you do, you’ll have an article that is much more appealing to readers. Be honest about things when you write, and allow your style to shine. This engages your readers and it encourages them to come back.
Make certain that you submit high numbers of articles. When posting articles to places such as blog networks, be sure to remain consistent. To promote a specific keyword, post multiple articles based on it. If your particular keyword is in a competitive category, plan on a minimum of five article submissions to directories and double that to blog networks. After you have done that you should make 50 or more posts within private blogs to ensure you obtain the desired ranking.
Do your best to provide original content. Keeping your content interesting and original will keep readers coming back. Search engines are totally hardcore about duplicate content, so ripping off others’ content won’t do you any good long term.
Many sites will pay you for each click on your articles. These can be lucrative, but it largely will depend on how much promotion you do to bring people to your article to bump up the views. If you have a passion for writing, then this can be a very lucrative business for you.
Make your articles short, begin with a good introduction, and keep it under 500 words. Most online users have short attention spans. Get to the point quickly or you will lose them. Explanations are for later. The first couple of sentences need to draw them in quickly.
The content you provide on your website should help your reader resolve a concern. If someone finds practical value in reading one of your pieces, it is likely they will search for more of your work.
Match the content with your topic. If someone is seeking one topic, yet finds information on another while using a particular keyword, s/he is bound to be disappointed. This will not result in a good online reputation for you and your site. In addition to this, search engine crawlers take note of this, which can damage your reputation even more.
If you are a good writer, you can find a market that values your talent. If …