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I saw this awesome quote from Jeff Bezos (founder and CEO Amazon) when he was on the Charlie Rose show (see video).
“Before if you were making a product, the right business strategy was to put 70% of your attention, energy, and dollars into shouting about a product, and 30% into making a great product. So you could win with a mediocre product, if you were a good enough marketer. That is getting harder to do. The balance of power is shifting toward consumers and away from companies…the individual is empowered… The right way to respond to this if you are a company is to put the vast majority of your energy, attention and dollars into building a great product or service and put a smaller amount into shouting about it, marketing it. If I build a great product or service, my customers will tell each other.”
Today we discuss while this is 100% true and how we turn our product or service into our marketing plan.
While brand advocacy is important but should not come in addition to a healthy mix of traditional and nontraditional marketing efforts not in lieu of… There is too much competition to rely on any individual passing along your befits to their networks.
Working at a start-up, we don’t have the budget to really spread the word of our product ourselves. By using a mix of social media and guerrilla marketing tactics, we hope that we find the right amount of consumers and businesses to start the “avalanche” we need to get things going. It would be nice to have the money for advertising, but to be honest, I’m not sure what we would do…. Facebook ads?
@GABIWINKS Everyday I work with Small Businesses and this is their biggest struggle no matter what their “business” actually is. Here’s the good news, you’re already doing something key; consuming information and seeking help. My best advice is 1. get educated on whatever media you considering (social media, blogs, TV, Print, yellow pages, etc) I truly believe all advertising works if done correctly but unfortunately most is not, which is why so many businesses incorrectly look at advertising as an expense instead of investment. Know that if you are in business, you are also in the business of marketing so make it a priority. 2. Get together an annual plan with a realistic budget, realistic for your small business not for Walmart or McDonald’s! John Jantsch’s Duct Tape Marketing is a great resource to start with if you are a reader http://amzn.to/pLlS1U. 3. Also understanding your breakeven and return on investment goals is imperative before you spend a dime, in actual dollars or in time with respect to social media. This is an easy formula I would be happy to share with you. You are welcome to hit me twitter @soicalmolly
Thanks Molly! I always appreciate advice. You made some great points and I just followed you on Twitter
Can’t wait to read what you post!
@GABIWINKS Thanks Gabi. On Twitter I use #smallbizmarketing when I am posting something relevent for any small business marketers save the search and its easy to keep up on that stuff
Glad to connect, please don’t hesitate to ask questions any time!
@socialmolly is spot on. I wouldn’t suggest Facebook ads as a start to get the word out. Mainly because users within Facebook have virtually no intent to purchase your product. Although if your product is BravoBride you might want to try some targeted ads on FB when relationships status changes to engaged… or even married. I’d suggest you create customized landing pages for that effort though, and not lead people directly to your site. You would want to create some kind of special offer and capture their email address.
Outside of that the best thing you can do is have someone who speaks passionately about your product and connect with people who are conduits to your target market.
@ScottScanlon Thanks for the love Scott! I couldn’t agree more with your thoughts also especially about using a special offer to convert to opt in marketing
@ScottScanlon@socialmolly Although I do write for BravoBride, it is not the business I was speaking about, but yet again, great advice! Our product is more of a service… and it’s free for users. It’s a mobile marketing tool for local businesses and it will make its money by having national sponsors – do businesses with this business model succeed? We are trying to have a successful launch in MPLS before launching to more markets… lots of set backs though.. but all we can do is keep going
Thanks so much again for your advice!