Monday, December 24, 2007

Marketing Plans

Most business owners do not have any marketing plans. Marketing plans are very important to have for a business. Marketing is the key to sales. No marketing, no sales, it's that simple. Having a variety of marketing plans going at one time gives you more leverage and more exposure. It also helps you see what is working and what is not working in your marketing campaigns. Having only one marketing plan in action can actually hurt your business. Let's say your marketing plan proves to be ineffective, you must then build a whole new marketing plan and start from scratch. Now let's say you have multiple marketing plans working at once, you now have a variety of results to look at. Then you can pick and choose what works and what doesn't work. Marketing is all about testing/trial and error.


Many business owners make some key mistakes when creating their marketing plans. First they expect their first marketing campaign to be a huge success. Now this may or may not happen but marketing is all about trial and error. You must learn from your marketing plans. You must look and see what worked and what did not work. Then adjust your marketing plans and start a new campaign.This is how you market effectively. It's all about trial and error. Let say you see a certain ad pulling in all kinds of new business. Before you jump the gun and throw your entire bankroll behind the ad, run a couple additional tests to see how well the ad pulls in different markets. You want to do as much testing as possible before you come out with a major marketing campaign. Once you have everything as it should be, take full advantage of your marketing efforts.


Another key mistake I see with many business owners is they have either no way of tracking their marketing campaigns or they do not track their marketing campaigns. Not tracking your marketing efforts is bad for business. You must be able to see what is working and what is not working. Then you can stop spending in certain areas and increase spending in areas which are working.You must track your marketing campaigns in order to produce the most amount of sales for your business. Yes you can still have an effective business without tracking your marketing but it is kind of like cutting a steak with a butter knife.Yes it is possible to cut a steak with a butter knife but you make cutting the steak so much more difficult. Just like not tracking your marketing campaigns.



Building effective marketing plans is vital to building a business. Marketing is a key component to business. You should always have a budget setup just for your marketing efforts. I cannot stress how important marketing is to any business planning to become successful. I would even go as far as hiring a marketing company, if you have no experience in creating effective marketing plans.


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Marketing Strategies

Business owners need to use a variety of marketing strategies in order to build a successful business. Many business owners do not use multiple marketing strategies when building a business. This is a key reason most businesses end up failing. Marketing strategies are essential when building a business. Having one marketing strategy is great but in order to make the most out of your business you should employ lots of different marketing strategies . Your marketing strategies do not have to be complicated, in fact the simpler the better. Having a complex marketing strategy does not necessarily mean it will achieve better results. In most cases the most basic marketing strategies have achieved high levels of success for me. There are many ways to market both offline and online. You should use a combination of both to reach the most consumers. Your marketing strategies should also be tailored towards your targeted consumer base.


Your offline marketing strategies should include flyers, letters, business cards, and drop cards.Flyers are great to pass out at large events, depending on what you are selling. For instance conventions are perfect for flyers. Passing out flyers at ball games, malls, and church events is not really effective unless your product is in line with one of those themes. Finding a convention inline with what you are selling is priceless. For instance if you sell computers, passing out flyers at a convention centered around computers would help you increase sales. Setting up a booth would also help. Sending actual letters to your current customers and local community is also a great way to find new and repeat business. Lastly sponsoring events for your local sports teams, youth organizations and churches is a great way to build a relationship with your local community. Free promotional give always are a great way to gain new customers. Take a look at Mc Donald's they do an excellent job of this with the free toy which comes with every happy meal. And their monopoly game brings in huge amounts of business. The key is to offer people something they want, like a free appliance or something. Promotional giveaways can really help bring new business to you.


Some online marketing strategies are writing press releases. Press releases are a great way to get your business out in the open. Another way to get free publicity although it is not online marketing is to build relationships with your local papers. Having a paper write a story about your business will give you instant creditability and lots of exposure. Using Pay Per Click is also a great way to build your business online. With pay per click you must know what you are doing or have someone who knows what they are doing in order to be effective. You will also need at least a budget of 1,000 dollars a month depending on what keywords you are going after.


These are some very basic marketing strategies but they can be very effective if used properly.
 
 
 
 
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Saturday, December 22, 2007

Viral Marketing

Viral Marketing


How A Viral Marketing Campaign Will Build YourBusiness And Lengthen Your Mailing List



Viral marketing is a marketing technique that uses the freedistribution of information through social networks to produceincreased product awareness. Just as a virus replicates itselfby spreading from person to person (or computer to computer),viral marketing uses the powerful networking resources of theInternet to spread the message about a product by motivatingpeople to pass interesting or amusing information such as textmessages, jokes, games, video clips, on to their friends andcolleagues. Each viral message contains at least one link to the websitethat is behind the campaign. Another example of viral marketing is the placing of affiliate links in e-books. The e-book is theneither given away free or marketed at a huge "discount". Part ofthe packaged includes a "re-branding" offer that allows othersto market the products under their own name. Of course, thee-books come with links back to the main product website. Aspart of the re-branding package, affiliates may replace thelinks in the book with their own affiliate code so that they canearn commissions from sales generated via the books that theygive away or sell. As more and more people take up there-branding offer they spread the word about the e-book in thehope of earning affiliate commissions and so the message aboutthe product spreads like a virus through the Internet.



Another aim of a well planned viral marketing campaign will beto build a mailing list and database of the target market. Inorder to do that, anybody wishing to access the e-book orwebsite is first required to register their name and emailaddress. Thus, a good viral marketing campaign achieves tworesults – a widely advertised product and a massively expandedcustomer mailing list that can be advertised to again and again.It should be noted, however, that the success of a viral marketing campaign depends on the quality of the e-book orsoftware that is being distributed. The agent of the campaign,whether it is an e-book or an online game or free resource,needs to offer some compelling and well constructed content,something the value of which is immediately obvious and whichmakes people eager to pass it on to their respective networks.It has also been found that the inclusion of a request to passthe product on to friends, and an easy method for doing so – asimple form or email link – will increase the success of thecampaign.



A recent example that I was motivated to pass on was a mini"crazy golf" game that was fun to play. I was drawn into thegame, had a good time playing it. As a result, I was keen topass it on to my golfing friends to see how they would fare onthe crazy golf fairway. Even so, I might not have passed it onif there had not been a link built into the site. If you are not up to creating a game, writing and giving away afree e-book is something that anybody can do if they have thetime. For people in a hurry, however, there are a large numberof sources that provide hundreds of good e-books for thispurpose. One that I would recommend is called Viral Marketing Giveaway 9. It is designed for people who either want to startonline businesses or want to grow the businesses they have byharnessing the potential of viral marketing without having towrite their own e-book.


About The Author: David Hurley is the webmaster ofhttp://grasp- the-nettle. com, and writes articles on Internetmarketing strategies. For more information about Viral Marketing Giveaway 9 see: http://hopurl. com/38705.


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