Business Startup Key To Success _2- Marketing

							Business Startup Key To Success #2: Marketing
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Business Startup Key To Success #2: Marketing

Marketing is the second of the three keys to business success, along with
planning and financial management. Marketing is critical for obvious
reasons    if nobody knows your product exists, they can?t buy it! It is
common for entrepreneurs to underestimate the importance of putting in
the time and energy to find the best marketing avenues for their
business.

As with everything else in today?s society, marketing is changing
quickly, with new opportunities popping up every day and old standards
falling aside. It is no longer enough for any business to simply hang out
a shingle and place a Yellow Pages ad. Rather, entrepreneurs must be
aware of how and to whom they are targeting the marketing message, create
an online presence of some variety, and find the right mix of the five
classic marketing elements to maximize the return of their marketing
dollar.

Identifying your target market, or the consumers most likely to purchase
your product or service, is often overlooked by first time entrepreneurs.
Many figure that the people who need the product will find it and that
will be enough. In fact, the most important aspect of identifying your
target market is determining how to reach as many of them as possible
within your marketing budget. For example, if you are selling a golf club
cleaner, your market is golfers, right? So, it would probably be
beneficial to advertise in Golf Weekly, alongside all the other golf
gadgets. But what percentage of all golfers read Golf Weekly? Certainly
not all of them, not even ten percent. Your broad market of golfers
includes men, women, juniors, all economic classes, all education levels,
and all areas of the US. In addition, there are different types of
golfers    occasional, recreational, competitive, the golf vacation
crowd, the public course crowd, members of country clubs. Which of those
demographics is really the most likely to buy your product? By
identifying multiple characteristics of the consumers most likely to be
interested in your product, you can select different marketing tools for
reaching each market.

Knowing your target market also helps you create effective marketing
messages. A good message convinces the potential customer that your
product solves a particular problem for them. However, the most important
problem that your product resolves might be different for males and
females, different age ranges, or even Dodgers and Yankees fans. Before
you spend any money on a marketing campaign, you need to understand the
details of your target market so that you can provide messages that are
the most effective for each segment of your market.

Whatever type of business you are starting, posting a website is an
absolute must. Consumers these days are more apt to run a quick internet
search for a local restaurant than check the phone book, and more and
more Americans are sporting smart phones that allow them to find any type
of business on the go. Even businesses serving the smallest of markets
benefit from the reasonable cost of hosting a website. In one west Texas
town of 1200 people, the local motel increased its traffic by more than
30 just by setting up a basic website and adding the link to various
hunting sites for free. The $10 per month hosting fee pays off in spades!

Of course, merely posting your site to the internet is not enough. In
fact, posting a website without marketing it is like creating ad copy and
keeping it in a desk drawer   if nobody knows about it, it might as well
not exist! Search engine optimization methods are not difficult to
implement, but they do take time to pay off. Incorporate SEO into every
marketing plan and be sure to stay on top of the efforts. Also be sure to
include the website address on every piece of marketing material from
business cards to print ads.

In addition to launching a website, your marketing plan must incorporate
methods from each of the five basic elements in classic marketing theory
advertising, promotion, public relations, personal selling, and direct
marketing. Many new entrepreneurs are familiar with one or two of these
elements and so focus all of their marketing efforts there.
Unfortunately, they completely miss out on opportunities to expand the
customer base through the use of other elements. For the most complete
and effective marketing mix, consider how aspects of each element can
contribute to reaching your best targets and help build your brand. Each
of the marketing elements includes a variety of methods for getting your
message out. While not all methods will be right for your business, there
will be some from each element that will be effective and should be
included in your marketing efforts.

Before you can make the best decisions for your marketing efforts, you
need to define the precise objectives you hope to achieve. Once you are
clear on what outcome you expect, it is easier to see how to get it done.
For example, one of your early objectives will be to draw a specific
number of people to your website. To accomplish this objective, you will
likely incorporate a number of marketing tools such as offering a premium
in the form of free, useful information on your website, conducting
online advertising that allows potential customers to click through to
your site, using direct marketing email blasts to your customer contacts,
and employing search engine optimization methods to improve your site?s
representation on the search engines. Establishing a clear objective
allows you to focus your efforts on a specific target and evaluate how
your marketing efforts worked out.

Marketing planning is critical to the success of any business. No matter
how great the product, it won?t actually sell itself. It will take some
time and motivation to consider all the options and monitor the success
of each effort, but the payoff will come with increased sales and rapid
growth. Learn all you can about your target market, set up your business
website, and do your homework to develop the best marketing plan for your
venture. Schedule periodic reviews and updates to your marketing efforts
to ensure your budget is consistently driving the maximum sales possible.

The three keys to success    planning, marketing, and financial
management    are true for any type of business. Begin your business
development with these principles in mind and arm yourself with all the
tools you need to effectively plan, market, and manage the finances of
your startup. Before you know it, your venture will be up, running and
making money!