Tuesday, January 17, 2012

You're Ineffective

Everyone wants to know the key to effective marketing techniques.  The truth is that for most business owners, marketing is costing them money rather than making them money.  Today and tomorrow we will be sharing some key principles to implementing effective marketing techniques.

Principle No. 1 Backward Marketing
Every business has tactics.  Few businesses have a brand strategy.

Tactics are the things you put in place, or the actions you take, in order to bring your product or service to market, including: product development and packaging, distribution channels and sales teams, your logo and website design and everything in between.  These are teh tactics of a business.

The problem most businesses have when it comes to effective marketing techniques is that they don't base their decisions about tactics on any underlying strategy.  The practice of implementing tactics before strategy is what we call backward marketing.  It is the primary reason most companies find their marketing efforts costing them money rather than making them money.

Principle No. 2 Being Better Is One Thing, Being Different Is Everything
Most business owners think a successful brand strategy lies in the idea that their product or service is better than the products or services of their competitors.  Nope.  The key to a successful brand strategy lies in creating the perception that your product or service is different from your competition.

Want proof?  Just take a look at the following top brands and the perceptions they've created.  Notice that none have built their brand strategy around the concept of "better".  McDonald's (family/happy); Nike (athletic spirit); Coke (real thing/American)' Levi's (classic/American); Volvo (safety); Apple (innovation)" Subway (fresh/healthy).

What differentiating perception does your product or service hold?  If you want your marketing to make you money rather than cost you money, you must first discover how your competition is perceived, then you can develop a differentiating brand strategy of your own.

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