7 Ways To Stretch Your Marketing Dollar
If you’re anything like me, your budget for your business is carefully calculated, and every dollar is spent to the very exact penny, and most of the time, you’re lucky if you have any money left over! I’ve come across some ways to stretch your marketing dollar, and make it as effective as possible!
If you purchase advertising space, use your ads for more than just advertising, take them to the next level! When first starting out, I thought I had a sure fire way to get clients and blow ALL of my money on one marketing tactic…WRONG…my lesson form that is to NOT spend all your money on one marketing task, and if you in fact have already done so, make sure you get ”reprints” on all graphic artwork that is done when in respect to your business. If you have someone create a logo for you, go that extra mile and ask for an electronic copy…this way you can put your logo, on your website, your blog, and even when making your own business cards, this way your BRAND is starting to become noticeable, and people will identify you with your logo.
Secondly, I’d like to point out, if something WORKS, stick with it; there’s no sure fire way than to keep using a strategy that works, and making it even more successful. If 98% of your business comes from TWITTER, then why STOP, keep doing what works already, but just make sure to still experiment…three ways is better than one.
Most companies when starting out, try to maintain the image of FORTUNE 500 companies, when in fact, all they need is a simple business card with any and all contact information on it; there’s simply NO NEED to purchase some fancy glossed and embossed brochures or business cards, and blow all of your money just on that…leave money for other marketing techniques that your company can benefit from.
ALWAYS use modular literature for your company service or product. The solution is modular literature; this means creating a basic brochure layout that has sections capable of being tailored to meet specific market needs. After all, most sections of the brochure–technical specifications, service, company background, product operation, product features–will be the same regardless of the audience. Only a few sections, such as benefits of the product to the user and typical applications, need to be tailored to specific readers. In a modular layout, standard sections remain the same, but new copy can be typeset and stripped in for each market-specific section of the brochure. This way, you can create different market specific pieces of literature on the same product using the same basic layout, mechanicals, artwork and plates. Significant savings in time and money will result.
Explore inexpensive alternatives for lead generation, such as banner advertising, organic search and PR. Many smaller firms judge marketing effectiveness solely by the number of leads generated. They are not concerned with building image or recognition; they simply count bingo-card inquiries. New-product press releases lead the list as the most economical method of generating leads. Once, for less than $100, I wrote, printed and distributed a new-product release to 100 trade journals. Within six months, the release had been picked up by 35 magazines and generated 2,500 bingo-card inquiries. Post all your press releases in a media or press section of your website. Optimize your press releases with key word phrases to draw more organic search traffic.
Do not overpay for outside creative talent; hire freelancers and consultants whose credentials–and fees–fit the job and the budget. Top advertising photographers, for example, get $1,000 a day or more. This may be worth the fee for a corporate ad running in Forbes or Business Week. But it’s overkill for the employee newsletter or a publicity shot. Many competent photographers can shoot a good black-and-white publicity photo for $200 to $250. When you hire consultants, writers, artists, or photographers, you should look for someone whose level of expertise and cost fits the task at hand.
Do it yourself; tasks such as distributing press releases or creating simple squeeze pages can usually be done cheaper in-house than outside. Save the expensive agency or consultant for tasks that really require their expertise. If you do not have a marketing manager or assistant, consider hiring a full-time or part-time administrative assistant to handle the detail work involved in managing your company’s marketing. This is a more economical solution than farming administrative work out to the agency or doing it yourself.
Set Goals; Not Resolutions
I sit here before you today thinking of new ways to improve my business…now of course there’s no set format on how to do so, but I can certainly tell you that improving your business is a daily task. It MUST be treated like a business and not a hobby, and one of the most important lessons I’ve learned this past year is that: if there’s no way to serve others within your business, people WILL go elsewhere to seek help…
I’ve learned throughout starting any business that I’ve had to SET GOALS…there’s really no other way to give your self a format and a vision of how you want your business to operate if you don’t have goals in place and written down.
RESOLUTIONS are just temporary plans and thoughts of how you would like for things to turn out…but everybody knows that once you make a resolution, it generally sticks for about a month or so, then it just becomes another “I should have...” idea.
This is just a message that I wanted to get out to everyone, knowing that the day before 2012, most of you will be scattering ideas in your brains on what resolutions to conquer, when in fact you should be SETTING GOALS and write them down; it’s okay if they aren’t accomplished in the time-frame that you want, but at least it would be a work in progress, and that of which can be measured…
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!
6 New Business Trends In 2012
What was trendy in business one year might not be so hot in the next, check out what ideas and trends will be defining the world of business in 2012.
The Beauty Business
Here’s a fun fact. In most recessions, some small luxury items sell unexpectedly well. For example, lipstick sales surged in 2011. Nail polish is this recession’s counter-intuitive retail success, with a sales surge of 65 percent since mid-2008. This is indicative of the health of the beauty business overall, which had a strong 2011, setting the pace for an even better 2012.
There are various ways to make money here. One of the newest is blow-dry bars. REALLY. But leading the way, according to Anything Research, are cosmetology and barber schools, which represented this year’s fastest-growing industry. With the National Association of Barber Boards of America estimating over a 10 percent increase in the number of barber shops in the last two years, apparently someone had to be around to train all those new barbers.
Somewhat surprisingly, men are propelling a big part of beauty industry revenues. MindBranch research shows global sales of male-specific beauty products will grow from $19.7 billion in 2009 to $28 billion by 2014 — and overall male consumption of all beauty products will hit $85 billion by 2014.
Financial Fitness
There are a lot of people driving the positive outlook for financial planners. Each generation faces its own life-changing events, creating the need for sound financial advice. Whether it’s seniors headed toward retirement, young people preparing to buy a house or have a baby, or Gen-Xers saving for their kids’ college education, there’s a demographic looking for financial planning, which leads IBISWorld to forecast 5 percent annual growth in this industry through 2016.
Don’t believe me? Although Alexa von Tobel, 28, launched LearnVest, a website offering financial planning tools targeted to women, only two years ago, it has already raised $25 million in funding.
Mobile Momentum
Having quickly taken to e-commerce, Americans are embracing m-commerce in huge numbers. There are already more than 73 million users of the mobile Web. This means if you sell stuff, whether online or in a physical location, your website must be mobile-ready.You can’t ignore the numbers: 81 percent of smart-phone owners search from their phones at home, 80 percent shop from their phones, 68 percent visited a business in person or went to its website after searching from their phones, and over half actually buy something.
Sizing Up Profits
There’s a silver lining to the black cloud of obesity that’s increasingly affecting Americans. The National Center for Health Statistics (part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) says 68 percent of U.S. adults are overweight, which global researcher Mintel says will likely lead to “a wider array of products” catering to this market. While there’s a lot of opportunity here (last year, sales of women’s plus-size clothing increased, while overall women’s clothing revenues were down), the real growth markets are men and brides. Most American women wear a size 14 or larger, and struggle to find wedding dresses that fit.
Retailers are just waking up to this fact, and as Catherine Moellering, executive vice president of retail trend consultant Tobe told Bloomberg BusinessWeek, “These are underserved consumers who have money to spend. There’s an immense opportunity here to develop brand loyalty because these are marginalized consumers.” NPD Group, a global research group, says that while one-third of American men are obese, the “big-and-tall market” accounts for less than 10 percent of menswear revenues. Retailers are already focusing on this lucrative market, but there’s plenty of time for entrepreneurs to start selling these clothes, either online or in-store.
We’re Not Just Playing Games
Gamification first took off in 2007, and it has proved to be recession-proof. Research firm Gartner predicts 70 percent of leading global companies will have at least one gamified app by 2014. Gartner says gamification’s goals are to increase customer engagement, change behaviors and stimulate innovation by employing game mechanics in non-game environments. In fact Brian Burke, Gartner’s vice president of research, says, “Gamification could become as important as FaceBook, eBay or Amazon.” Gartner forecasts, “the opportunities for businesses are great — from having more engaged customers, to crowd-sourcing innovation or improving employee performance.”
Foodie Fight
There are too many food trends to mention in one article — and several are contradictory. While more and more Americans are becoming vegans, and even carnivores are demanding more vegetarian meals, meat is hot. Hamburger joints are re-branding themselves as burger bars and charging more, hot-dog-only eateries are on the rise, and there are a number of meatball-specific restaurants creating a big stir in New York City. The artisanal food trend is spreading and now includes previously mundane foods like ice cream, cotton candy and marshmallows. But the real food fight is in the dessert arena as sweet treats like macaroons, brownies, pies (including whoopie pies) and doughnuts have tried to topple the almighty cupcake from its lofty perch. So far, cupcakes still rule
