The foundation of all successful marketing is understanding how your product/service fits into your customers’ plans, and how it will enhance their life (or make it easier).
Before spending all of your marketing budget on Facebook ads… before hiring that social media manager… and before planning out a content strategy… You need to be able to clearly answer 5 important questions.
Here are the questions that lie at the root of all successful marketing efforts:
Who is your ideal customer?
Review the customers that have bought in the past. Look for the characteristics that identify a likely prospect. Remember them and make note of them. You should be creating messaging & content that will resonate with that ideal customer.
How can you best reach your ideal customer?
Where is your ideal customer spending their time? Are they on Facebook, Instagram or LinkedIn? Are they on all these channels? Are they attending in-person networking events? You need to reach them where they are. Your marketing budget and efforts should be spent communicating via these specific channels, not erroneous ones.
How can you best add value to that customer’s life?
Learn everything you can about the customer and how your offering gets used in the customer’s environment/life. The best way to do this is to spend some time with a customer who is actually using your offering or an offering similar to your own. Ask them questions. Pick their brain.
How can you articulate that value to the customer in 15 words or less?
Create and document your Unique Value Proposition (UVP). Edit it down to something short and sweet. Your UVP should describe something of value to the customer — it’s not just a description of your products and services.
Why are you better than the competition?
Familiarize yourself with how your competitors (and indirect competitors) are marketing their services/products. Now, how do you do it better? How can you convey that unique value to your ideal customer?
Once you have answered and clearly documented all of these concepts (a.k.a. created a Marketing Strategy), you can use that information to create a well thought out Marketing Plan.
You will have a better understanding of what marketing channels to use and the type of content you need to create in order to reach and engage your ideal customer. You’ll be able to craft successful marketing campaigns and spend your time and money more wisely.