Strategic Marketing for the Win

New Marketing vs. Old Marketing

We are all starved for time and attention in our everyday lives. Marketing is no different. Because of the proliferation in marketing today it takes between seven to twenty-one individual contacts or touch points to establish sufficient trust, respect and rapport to get a prospect to buy what you sell.

So how can financially strapped small business owners accomplish this seemingly impossible task?

Many  attempt email blasts. That’s a total and complete waste of time. Just look at your own response to emails. Most of you delete them without even opening them.

SO how do reach your prospects?

Know Who Your Ideal Client Is

First, discover your ideal client. This is the client that actually WANTS what you sell versus NEEDS what you sell. I need to have my dentist fill a cavity… but I certainly don’t WANT it. On the other hand, no one NEEDS whiter teeth… but most of us WANT whiter teeth.

Can you see the difference in these two situations? Wants are based on emotion and needs are based on logic. Discovering your ideal client depends on your ability to discover their physical demographic traits as well as their emotional psychographic traits.

Architect The Decision Making Process

Second, you must then map out their decision making process. All human beings WANT the best deal. That doesn’t mean lowest price, but it does mean the most VALUE for the price. Prospects will pay twice the price of your competitors if they see five times the value for the price you charge them. Prospects decide to buy based on value, so map out what your ideal clients consider valuable to them in their specific situation.

A daycare mother with a 6 month old infant will value a daycare that offers sufficient staff trained to show additional love, care and support for the kids they keep. On the other hand, a daycare mom with a 4 year old child will value a daycare that specializes in offering educational program for pre-schoolers. Wouldn’t any daycare mom want her child to be reading at a first grade level prior to kindergarten?

It may be necessary for the business to create new “innovations” to their current business model in order to provide their prospects with value, but for the business owner who accepts that challenge and implements those innovations, they will eventually dominate their market.

Your Compelling Message 

Third step, once the innovations are in place, creating a compelling message. This can be easy to do, since the innovations typically separate the business from all competitors. Most businesses have difficulty doing this until they have an outside expert working with them. Then, writing a compelling message becomes as simple as stating the facts easily showing the differences between you and your competition, or even between you and the alternative choice your prospect have.

OK… you now know your ideal client, you know how they make decisions because you know what they value and you have created the innovations so that value can be placed into your compelling marketing messages. Now use this strategy to get your message out to your ideal clients.