Free Advice

Who’s listening

I had the fortunate experience to spend the two weeks before, and including the day of, the Superbowl in Europe (or unfortunate experience if football is your life). This means I missed ALL of the pre-game hype.

In Prague there was nary a mention of the game. In London there were brief mentions and the highlights made the Monday morning news. Hockey and soccer filled the sports pages.

All the hype, advertising or money available wouldn’t do any good trying to reach me where I was. Often we do the same in our businesses. We throw money and effort at the wrong audience. Doing that is worse than doing nothing as we:

• Incur an unnecessary cost

• Waste time

• Build expectations that will be unfulfilled

Some of the basics of any marketing plan include:

•   Send the right message

• Send it to the right audience

• Know what to expect

• Be able to measure the results

• To be successful with all the above, and more, means do your research 

Today it is easier than ever, thanks to computers, to target your customers and potential customers. For some businesses, everyone is their customer. This requires a different strategy compared to the company who knows exactly who their customer is or their geographic area for “everyone” is tight.

Given the focus of the vast majority of the readers of this newsletter, let’s concentrate on the scenario where you know who or where your customer is. Start by taking the time to create this definition. This will allow you to customize a marketing plan. Then customize your message to various segments of your customer base. This is important because it’s from six to ten times more expensive to find a new customer than to do more business with an existing customer.

With a decent database, e-mail, websites and the ability to customize, there is no reason not to make your customers feel special. Here’s an example. Let’s say you sell widgets (or the servicing of widgets) to 10 different industries.

• Use a database to sort your prospects and customers into 10 groups.

• Then design industry specific messages for each industry (this could mean that 90% of the message is the same but the other 10% is something specific).

• Whether you use the mail, the telephone, fax, e-mail or your website (or all of these), send customers a consistent message and emphasize the value you provide to their set of circumstances.

• Do this regularly.

• Hone in on their problem and your solution.

Keep excellent records and statistics. This will allow you to make your future marketing even more effective. If you have salespeople who supplement your marketing, make sure they know what’s going on, what message is being sent and to whom.

Above all, know who’s listening.

© Copyright John Martinka 2002. All rights reserved.