Marketing for New Businesses, Part 1
If you’ve just recently started a new business, you may or may not already have some ideas for marketing your products or services. Regardless, if you’ve searched the Internet for ways to begin your marketing journey, you’ve probably read about a marketing plan — the big, intimidating document that requires a significant amount of research and consumes time that could be spent diving head-first into your work. However, even if you plan to hire a marketing team right away, it will be beneficial for you to begin writing a marketing plan yourself. And don’t worry — it’s not as difficult as you might think. Together we’ll explore the ongoing process of marketing and some key research topics that will give you an excellent start to a marketing plan for your new business.
First of all, your marketing plan does not have to be a heavily detailed formal document, especially not at first. The idea is to add more detailed information as your company grows! Truthfully, your marketing plan doesn’t have to be a text document; it could be a slideshow presentation or a series of screenshots. One caveat: if you plan to present a business plan to investors, I highly recommend following the same format and including your marketing plan in your presentation. Most importantly: A) it needs to serve as the one source of truth for all things marketing-related, and B) it needs to remain easily accessible to you and your marketing team.
So, what kind of information should be contained in this magical document? Overall, it should describe your plan to raise awareness of your business and to convince the public that your company is worthy of trust — that is the overall goal of marketing, after all. Two simple questions will dictate this process: “What do we know?” and “What will we do about it?” The first question should be answered with an analysis of your business, your competitors, and your customers. Many sources refer to this as the Analysis phase. The second question, “What will we do about it?”, will be answered with the Strategy and Tactical phases, which entail planning and executing our public-facing announcements, campaigns, etc. Lastly, the Measurement phase returns us to the first question, “What do we know?”, with the gathering of data and observations based on the efforts of the previous phase, adding this new information to your marketing plan, and altering your strategy accordingly. Thus continues the marketing process.
ANALYSIS PHASE
The Analysis phase is the initial info-dump that starts us asking “What do we know?” about some key aspects of the market. Begin by writing about what your business actually does (or will do), first in a broad one-or-two-sentence summary, and then followed by more specific details that you’ve considered. The introductory sentences should describe your core competency — the main product or service you provide. To think of this more literally, answer the question “What is the main thing that I’m good at?” out of the abilities and/or resources that you’re trying to monetize. Also consider your vision and philosophy behind this business. Why did you start this company? The answers to these questions make a solid foundation for an Executive Summary, which is a section of text (typically one to three paragraphs) at the beginning of most marketing plans.
Now it’s time to get into more detail about your competencies, your products, and your services. List these items out, including any services that you’re unsure of. This will be a great opportunity to evaluate those possibilities! If it helps, remember that big enterprise companies discontinue products and services and add new ones all the time, depending on their performance and the state of the market. If you’re a retailer with a very long and ever-changing list of products, you don’t have to write out an exhaustive list. Instead, write about the general kinds of products you’ll be selling and provide examples. You may even include which products you anticipate being your best sellers. However, whether it’s on your ecommerce website backend or any other inventory system you use, you should have access to a current list of your products.
As you look at each of your products or services, think about what similar items are offered by someone else. You may want to create a new section called Competition Analysis or something similar. Consider these three different categories: Direct competitors are those that offer similar products or services with comparable economic benefits (referring to price range) and functional benefits (referring to which customer needs are met); Indirect competitors are those that offer similar items with different benefits; and Substitute competitors offer something completely different that can meet the same needs in the same price range as your offerings. These are subjective categories, but they can help you think about market competition from different angles.
Now it’s time to research these competing companies. In your Competition Analysis section, list the competitors you’re aware of, and do your best to search for information such as their market share percentage, their general strengths and weaknesses, and how their budget compares to yours (if that information is public). The more detail you can include here, the more you can leverage your differences to your advantage. This section will greatly help you with positioning (which we will talk more about in “Marketing for New Businesses, part 2”).
Now let’s begin a Customer Analysis section. Who is the ideal customer? What kind of potential consumer needs were you thinking of when you devised your services or chose which products to sell? How do you want people in general to react to your brand? It will be helpful here to consider your original motivation for starting your business and the philosophy mentioned in your Executive Summary… and we’ll talk more about the concept of your brand in Part 2. To paint a clearer picture of your ideal customer, and maybe to generate some creative marketing ideas, consider what you want the buying process to look like.
There are four main steps to the buying process: need recognition, information search, purchase decision, and post-purchase behavior. Need recognition is the moment a consumer notices a gap in their day-to-day experience — perhaps one that can be filled by your product or service. Information search is a customer’s shopping around for potential solutions to their need, whether online or in-store. The third step, the purchase decision, is the actual purchase of one of their options. I should add, though, that this step is not over until the actual transaction is complete. Many factors can change a customer’s mind and send them back to their information search. Post-purchase behavior is when the customer leaves a review of your company online, returns an item for store credit, or tells their friends and family about their experience. Do not underestimate the influence a post-purchase review can have upon other potential buyers!
Noting the steps of the buying process is a great way to envision the customer behavior that you’ll be asking for. It is also an excellent way to begin considering promotion ideas — yet another concept I will address in Part 2. Stay tuned for the next section of Marketing for New Businesses, in which I will describe the Strategy and Tactical phases of the marketing process. Accounting Near Me - Accountant Near Me - Accountant Charlotte, NC - Accounting Greater Charlotte Area NC + Beyond