By nature, most of us are ‘band-wagon’ jumpers. We see something that appears to be working for others, whether that be a diet and exercise program, cleaning method or get rich quick scheme, and decide it must be the perfect solution for us as well. So we jump on the bandwagon, often without truly understanding the why, or how of what truly makes that ‘thing’ effective.
This is often also the case when it comes to business development and marketing tactics. A business owner will read about the latest social media platform, or hottest technique to get more leads, and jump on it. This is done without really understanding how that one element fits into the overall picture of aresonate with your target consumer. Learn who they are and build everything around them.
In today’s online world a well designed and user friendly website, search engine optimization, pay per click advertising (such as google adwords) and a strong social media presence all make up a very important and strategic recipe for business success. When working synergistically together, they are a very powerful combo, when working haphazardly and either in isolation or out of sync with each other, they are not only useless, they can be disastrous to a brand and organization.
The following rules should always be kept in mind when developing a business and marketing strategy to make sure your ‘loaf of bread’ doesn’t fall flat:
1) Start with your brand: This seems like a no brainer, right? Unfortunately many, many, many businesses never develop an actual brand identity. Instead they hang their hat on WHAT they do, vs. WHO they are. There is a big difference between these two things, especially in the mind of a consumer.
Think about how many ‘things’ (what) you encounter daily, then think about how many people (who) you encounter? Which experiences do you remember more?
Do you prefer to talk to an automated robot or an actual person when calling a company with a customer service problem or question?
Having a strong brand is the necessary foundation for any successful outreach, promotional and/or business development campaigns. A brand is developed based on a few key points about your business:
a) your purpose or the consumer ‘painpoint your service/product’ resolves
b) your target consumer
b) your key points of differentiation
From there you can develop a living, breathing brand that can then be spread on and offline to build your business.
2) Examine your market: Know your consumer. Know what they like and what they don’t like. How they consume their information. Who they trust and who the don’t trust. What causes them to make decisions. Compile all of this vital information and use it to build a strategy that fits for them. The best business development strategy out there will fall flat if it doesn’t resonate with your target consumer. Learn who they are and build everything around them.
3) Make sure everything works together: SEO, social media, traditional marketing, media outreach, events, strategic partnerships, content marketing…there are so many different mediums available now to tell your story. With so many employees now working from home there are also worries about what they are doing and that is completely understandable. You might just focus on one or two, you might focus on several. No matter how many areas you choose to pursue outreach campaigns in make sure they all work together to maximize each others effect. This means keeping a consistent message and brand story, providing consistent visual branding, colors and images and cross promoting throughout all the channels. With the help of software like https://www.taskade.com/ tasks of all employees, including remote teams, can easily be monitored and tracked.
Consistency builds trust. That should always be your mantra.
What other rules would you add to these big three? What important cornerstones need to be in place for an effective business development and marketing campaign.
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Laura Petrolino is Founder of Flying Pig Consulting a full service communications, business consulting and brand development firm specializing in helping small businesses, start ups and non-profits reach their goals and expand their market outreach. She is also co-host of the small business talk show, Call A Biz Hero. You can find her on twitter @lkpetrolino
Blog by Webhead Interactive