Marketing offers, suggestions, deals, promises of increased sales…, probably bombard you daily.

As a business owner, you know how important it is to communicate with your market, both existing and potential customers. But with so many ways to do so, how do you determine the most cost effective way to market your business?

Here are 10 tips to help you.

1. Know your purpose – your ‘Why’ for being, which translates into your customers ‘Why’ for choosing you.

Simon Sinek states ‘people don’t buy WHAT you do, they buy WHY you do it.’.

You need to articulate–

Why did you start or purchase your business?

Why this business rather than any other?

What excites you about it?

Where does your passion lie?

What drives you out of bed in the morning?

Because this forms the basis of everything you do, and every reason your customer has for seeking you out.

This will guide your marketing communications. It will provide your ‘Why do my customers need/want to hear this’.

And this needs to be clearly identifiable in every form of marketing communication you engage in.

When you know exactly what it is you want to say, your marketing has purpose – and purpose provides the guide for marketing your business cost effectively. 

2. Know your Audience – Like you know your takeout menus

If I were to hire a plane and drop 50 000 leaflets over a city advertising my quality, handcrafted violins, sure, these may be picked up and looked at by, optimistically, several thousand people. But how many of those 50 000 would contact my business?

Few.

Because of those, only a few would be violinists and therefore interested in violins.

But, if I were to print out only a couple of hundred flyers and take them to an orchestral concert, a music school, or better yet, get permission to post a small informative piece about why my instruments will make their music sound beautiful, on their social pages, the cost would be much less and the response rate much higher.

This is because I know my audience, where they hang out, what they are interested in, what they would like from me — their ‘Why’.

Know your customers and take the time to document your buyer persona.

When you know who you want to communicate with, you can do it more cost effectively with targeted communications.

3. Know how, where, when and why they Consume Content

(This follows on from point two, but it is so important that we are going to give it its own second point.)

Do they like to read a lot of detail about your service/product, just the basics, or is an image all that is required? What time of the year, month, week, day are they likely to be looking? Where would they like to see your message? Why would your message interest them?

Know these things and more and you can much better align your content/message to your market. And the better the match, the more focused you can be (which equals less waste and greater engagement).

4. Develop a marketing strategy (including a budget) and stick to it. 

When you know your ‘Why’ (your purpose, and what this means for your customer), the ‘How and What’ become the next steps and form your strategy. Strategically determined courses of action are far more likely to succeed, incurring less cost and waste.

Strategy driven by ‘Why’ will determine ‘How’ and ‘What’ and deliver better long-term results.

Let me use this example to illustrate. Say you have a paddock of 1000 sheep, and it is your job to move them to another paddock. Now, if you just go into the paddock without strategy, not knowing anything about sheep and their behaviour you would probably just end up running around, yelling, wasting time, energy, (looking silly) chasing around a bunch of sheep, hoping for the best.

Just like in marketing, if you go out there with no strategy, not really understanding your audience, you will probably fail to get the response you want. You might end up resorting to bribery or fear tactics (like discounts, and ‘don’t miss out’ offers), and they may work this time. But they aren’t successful lifelong strategies and will probably lose effectiveness with overuse.

But, say you studied sheep, and you knew that if you can get one to lead, the others will follow, they prefer to be moved calmly, a dog would help, have the gate open ready, and gumboots would save your shoes, etc. This is strategic and proves more effective.

This also means that you won’t be lured by the latest fad, or tempted by a slick marketing promise, or misled into believing sheep to be docile creatures and will do what you want.  

5. Understand the relevant media and how to maximise its benefits to increase cost effectiveness

All media work differently. There is too much about each one to describe here, but the important thing is you shouldn’t just copy and paste. Message content must be curated differently for each media. It is consumed differently on each media, and we must take this into consideration to ensure its effectiveness.

For example, the beautifully created video you posted on your YouTube channel might be too long for your Instagram feed, which will require different captioning than your Facebook post.

6. Invest in tools to help you automate, plan, create, curate content and measure its effectiveness

Can you imagine life without a dishwasher, washing machine and vacuum? How much time would you spend doing household chores without them?

There are tools out there to help you with your marketing; to simplify it. Some are free and some cost money, and you won’t need all of them. But if they are going to be worth the investment for your needs, as part of your strategy, then they may be your time saving ‘washing machine’.

7. WOM is free, but you must WOW to get it–referrals and testimonials.

Word of mouth is still king. It may now be an electronic word, but it’s still ‘word’ and holds just as much sway.

Sorry to break it to you but people trust other people more than they trust messages from businesses—no matter how good the intention behind the message.

But to get people willing to advocate on your behalf, we must convince them you won’t make a liar of them. And, to motivate them to take the steps to put their word behind your brand they need to believe that they are doing others a service by recommending you.

So, you are going to have to WOW them. If you keep your purpose firmly in your mind, this will be easier to achieve (refer point 1.).

8. Bang for Buck – engaging, relevant and resonating content

All your communications with your audience need to address their why. Why is what you are saying important to them.

In this way it will be relevant and resonate. To cut through the clutter, it will need to be creative. You have one line or ten seconds to catch their attention. Use it wisely.

Content created to meet the needs of your audience, in the voice of your audience, will engage your audience. And increase the effectiveness of your marketing efforts.

9. Don’t succumb to the latest fads or deals by advertising reps.

Your strategy (driven by your purpose and your target market) will decide whether the deal or latest fad is a fit for you.

There may be occasions where a deal may coincidentally fit with your strategy. But it is only warranted if it was previously established as part of your marketing strategy.

10. Get some help – if it is good, the ROI will make it worthwhile.

You probably pay for the professional services of a car mechanic. Although you could attend YouTube school and perhaps figure out how to fix your car yourself, in the long run, it will probably work out better for you if you let a professional do it.

Likewise, you will get far more response from your communications and incur far less waste if you invest in professional help.

If you would like help with any of the above, let us know. That’s what we are here for.

Contact us now for a free chat—we’ll make it easy for you.

Saving you both time and money and ensuring a healthy ROI on your marketing spend.