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Your marketing campaign has to stand out from the pack.
Few things make a marketing strategy stand out like a sense of wonder. Apple, Google and other tech companies rely on this sense of wonder for profits. Observe how Google generated buzz for its social networking service by withholding membership. While this might not be the right track for your company, you still need to create a similar “wow” effect.
Rethink Your Product
What is it you actually provide? Not what do you make, but what do you provide customers. For example, Apple doesn’t make computers. It makes home consumer electronics that do what computers do. The company provides ease of use. Cadillac doesn’t make cars. It sells even people of relatively modest means some top quality comfort. Cigarette companies sell rebellion and maturity -- that’s why people still buy their products even though they deal in well-documented poisons. What do you sell? What are people really buying when they buy your products?
What Do You Have That No One Else Has?
This is really the key to creating the “wow” factor. Your company does something no one else does. The trick is figuring out what that is. A great example of this is Jetstar. They do something a lot of companies do: Get people from one place to another in an airplane. What do they do that other companies don’t? Flights for $29. The company instantly created a brand identity with “wow” factor based around $29 flights. What does your company offer that your competitors don’t -- and never could.
What Can You Offer That Competitors Aren’t?
Small businesses often have trouble creating a “wow” factor. One very easy way to create that factor is to offer something the competitors aren’t. Employee loyalty cards that offer a discount for a certain number of purchases are one way of doing this. Another is to offer standard deals, not too different from what pizza places offer -- three for the price of two on certain days or whatever. You can offer something similar to competitors, but you can’t offer the same thing. An essential part of the “wow” factor is distinguishing yourself.
Cheap and Easy “Wow”: Contests
If, at the end of the day, you find that you can’t find any “wow” with the above, there’s a shortcut to “wow”: Contests and sweepstakes. However, if you want people to remember your company beyond contests and giveaways, you have to find some way to engage potential customers in a way relating to your business. A pizza company could have a pizza contest. A rug cleaning company could have a competition to clean rugs the fastest. You could have an essay writing contest about your industry. Whatever it is, relate it to the company for maximum optimization of “wow” -- and to create a loyal customer base.
Why Wow?
Wowing your customers isn’t necessary. If you can’t find any wow factor, don’t consider shuttering your doors. Not every business has one. If yours does, however, have a potential “wow” factor, utilize it to maximum potential. It is one of the most powerful marketing tools a company can have.