Making marketing work for you.
It is estimated that the average person encounters between 6,000 and 10,000 ads every single day. This varies from social media ads to flyers. Radio adverts to email marketing. There’s just no getting away from them!
So how can you stand out from the crowd by utilising the resources available to you?
Well, the key is in understanding your target audience, and ensuring that your marketing efforts is reflective of this. This can be achieved in 4 simple steps.
1. Know your ideal customer
The more you know about them, the more you can tailor your marketing efforts to attract the right audience. You are also more likely to be able to socially interact with them and build those customer relationships.
With so much “noise” and content to be seen, both on the social media and on the radio/ TV nowadays; tailoring your posts and making it relevant and relatable to your audience is a great place to start.
To identify your target audience, ask yourself:
- Who are they?
- What are their interests?
- What are their wants and needs?
- Why would your product / service appeal to them?
- How are they likely to search / find your product/ business?
- What would they find valuable?
- How/ when are they likely to interact with your business?
2. Identify what makes you unique
This may sound too simple to be effective but identifying your Unique Selling Point (USP) and communicating this to your audience is one way to stand out from the crowd.
For example: The number of home baking businesses have boomed since lockdown, so identifying your USP is key. Do you:
- specialize in vegan or gluten free?
- cater for children’s parties?
- create bespoke wedding cakes?
- use only local / homegrown produce?
- provide kits so your audience can recreate your bakes from home?
To identify your USP think about what makes you different, and what your values are. You can carry out research on your competition to determine how you differ.
Then, think of ways to communicating your USP and values to your target audience.
Fact: Did you know 71% of consumers say they prefer buying from businesses with shared valued to themselves. Therefore, identifying and promoting your values is as important as promoting your USP.
3. Build your presence
To sell you must first be seen. In simple terms, people cannot buy from you if they don’t know you exist. This is where building an online presence comes to play.
You’ve established the best means of reaching your target audience. Maybe it’s through social media, email marketing, content marketing (YouTube / blogs / podcasts), radio advertising, flyers or a mixture of these. But how can you grab the audience’s attention and retain people’s interest?
Sadly, you cannot convey the beautiful aromas of your creations (if you’re a baker) through digital marketing; but you can captivate their minds with plenty of mouth-watering photographs! You can also nurture attention into loyalty by being social and engaging in conversations with your audience online.
To maximise your opportunity to be seen online, utilise the functions available to you on various social media platforms.
- Reels on Instagram and Tik Tok are building momentum, as they enable the content you share to be seen by a greater audience in comparison to carousel posts. They’re also a great way of showcasing your personality.
- Stories are a great way of showcasing new projects you’re working on and encouraging audience feedback.
- Instagram Live / Twitter Spaces are a great way of hosting a “big reveal” and hosting a Q&A session with your audience on items yet to be released.
- Mailchimp has a great variety of templates available if you’re looking to start email marketing. But why not turn your efforts into a social experience and include some relevant news or exciting updates as part of your email promoting what you’re selling.
4. Be more you – personal branding
Building on the above it’s important to remember that people buy into people. Through sharing your achievements, the highs, and the lows; it enables your audience to resonate and buy into you as a person, as well as your business and product. Which will also help you build and strengthen your customer relationships.
By encouraging open discussion; answering your customers questions; showcasing your personality in your marketing effort, and not focusing on “sell-sell-sell”; your audience will value what you have on offer.
One of my favourite sayings when it comes to showing your personality and your business online is: “I thought not fitting in was something I had to fix. Now I see it as my superpower”
Hopefully reading this short blog has given you a better insight into how you can stand out from the crowds when it comes to marketing. If you ever had any questions or queries, you can contact Kerry or Catrin on info@cambrianweb.com, we’re always happy to help where we can.
All the best!