Down Economy? Get Smarter Marketing to Stay Ahead

I always thought I was a good marketer. I used all the tools I had at my disposal and I was always able to make a splash in my market. I recently realized that while I did most of it right, I failed a bit when trying to put it all together in a cohesive fashion to create the biggest return on my investment.

While I am a good planner, I was missing some pieces that I always thought would just magically fall into place. Needless to say, that rarely happened. Some campaigns we ran caught on like wildfire, other languished in obscurity. We also struggled to track the sales that were a direct result of our marketing campaigns as opposed to sales that gradually came about as a result of our branding efforts. Just recently we partnered with a local Sir Speedy—a printing and marketing company—to leverage their ability to create and manage large scale campaigns for small businesses on a budget. Even though I was adept at using technology and web-based media, I was pleased to find out about other comprehensive and systematic approaches to closing deals and growing revenue by harnessing simple but advanced technology.

A few years ago, we ran a campaign for Groundhog Day. It was so well received that the regional newspaper re-ran the postcard we sent out in their business section! Sometimes things resonate with the market and you are not certain why. Even though the campaign worked out well, it would have worked out better if I had all the metrics in before we launched.

Previously I would create a mailing campaign, send it out, and follow up with telemarketing calls and maybe physical stop-ins when appropriate. While this method did show results, they were modest at best. I could not easily track exactly what was going on with the campaign and had trouble determining what portion worked, why it worked and putting it all together to really track my ROI. However, it turns out there are very reasonable programs available to help companies like yours and mine do just that.

So, while I compete with—and most likely you do too—much larger competitors and maybe even public entities, how can you mount marketing campaigns that rival the big guys’ scope but on a small company budget? Here are a few ways you can get there without spending every nickel in the bank. And yes, you do need to spend on marketing in down times to keep moving forward, or you could be left behind when things rebound—they will.

• Pre-plan and be prepared. Don’t just come up with a great creative idea and assume it will work because you “get it” and the buying public will certainly understand your intentions. You need to truly investigate your audience and even do some modest research on what your target wants, why they want it and how they want it delivered or serviced.
• Limit the scope. Don’t go for that entire tremendous list you want to send to right away. Temper your inner need to tell the entire market how incredible this offer is. Select the appropriate amount within your marketing area that you feel your sales or telemarketing team can personally follow up with. A personalized approach to follow up will reap you more rewards than an impersonal and generic touch and feel.
• Select partners. You don’t have to do it alone. You don’t have to be the superhero of marketing.  No matter how good your company is at marketing and follow up, there are firms that can truly help you exceed your own expectations because they are built solely to do that better than you.
• Track everything. Make sure you track where a mailing is going. Drive them to a personal URL and track the interaction. Track the time it takes for your staff to follow up, track the appointment, the sales process and what the prospect bought or didn’t buy and why. Without this full picture, it will be hard to see why or why the program did not succeed. For the next campaign we are launching, I will have custom landing page with a web-based dashboard that provides me with all the information I need to track prospect activity and coordinate appropriate outreach and follow up in real-time. The best part? You can do this without breaking the bank. Now, maybe some of you have used systems like this already but after speaking with my nearly 3,000 small business clients, very few even know what I am talking about.

Especially during theses challenging times, your business depends on concrete information and up-to-the-minute results about your marketing programs. Stay ahead of the pack and differentiate yourself from the competition by being a smarter and savvier marketer.