Modern marketing: think outside the box

Modern Marketing – thinking outside of the box! (Posted by Ian LeBruce of Cappuccino Ads)

So you’ve started your own company? BRILLIANT! First and foremost, good on you, being an entrepreneur is one of the best choices you will ever make in your life.

1. The first step when making a marketing strategy is defining your customers. Create personas of who they are and what their buying habits include. Know the buyer’s journey and the steps they go through before they purchase your product or service. Are they in a particular age group, wealth demographic, or location? Remember, you can waste a lot of time and money if you don’t know who you are selling to; a little bit of market research early on can make a huge difference further down the line.

2. The second key thing is based around your USP (Unique Selling Point). What is it that makes you different from your competitors? If you’re better value or more effective at doing something than everyone else in the marketplace then why wouldn’t you shout about it? Write these points down and be prepared to tell everyone! Hopefully you already have a competitor matrix – use it! It’s definitely a good idea at this point to look at what the competition are doing in some detail. 

3. The third thing I want to talk about is something often overlooked in a strategy, but can tell you a massive amount of detail about the business at a glance. A SWOT analysis goes into four key areas, the Strengths of your business, the Weaknesses, the Opportunities and the Threats. Break these down into bullet points and really be honest about the weaknesses and threats. 

Now, onto the fun part! GET CREATIVE! Think about what advertising you’ve seen over the last week – what jumps out? You won’t remember 98% of what you’ve seen, so as a business, you need to work hard to make sure whatever you do is in the 2% that your clients do remember. We’ve worked with around a dozen clients so far in 2014 and every single one has resulted in a different campaign! ‘Interactivity’ and ‘mobile’ are the big buzzwords in the industry at the moment. If your advert can’t engage with the end user at a time that suits them, then you’re probably wasting money. Push the boundaries and think outside of the box. Throw crazy ideas around but, ultimately, keep the points I made earlier in your head. Remember who your customers are and make them take notice of what you want to say.  I’m more than happy to give advice. Happy marketing!