Marketing is often misunderstood. To many it looks like an insurmountable mountain to climb with every possible view increasing in size, depth, the manpower to accomplish it.
Marketing is often misunderstood. To many it looks like an insurmountable mountain to climb with every possible view increasing in size, depth, the manpower to accomplish it. Having been in the ever-changing world of marketing for much longer than the internet has been around, I’ve witnessed some major shifts in the way we communicate to both the B2B and B2C markets. Whether or not your company has the advantage of a marketing director, manager, a staff member that wears many different hats, or you employ a marketing agency, here’s a sensible approach to the most basic but most important marketing efforts you should be incorporating to keep your customers and grow new ones.
Who’s this for? Your customers, so let’s start with what’s important to them. Because ultimately, marketing is pre-sales. Know thy customer. What do you provide that your competition doesn’t so your customers can do their jobs better? Match their needs with your specialties. Do you work with customers who require cylinder inventory reports? Being able to show what cylinders were used for separate projects or departments has provided a specialty niche for Middlesex Gases and Technologies of Everett, Massachusetts, which has been tagging cylinders since 1987 because a large part of their customer base, life sciences and universities, have strict controls on their purchasing process. By realising what was important to their customers and acting on it made it possible for Middlesex to become the expert in this arena.
A discovery trip. Gather what you already have in place and decide if it’s working for you or not. What are you trying to accomplish? What are your expectations? Gathering everything together enables you to see your marketing efforts as a whole and set goals for accomplishing what is feasible. Determine your top objectives that would be most likely to enhance your customer relationships and increase your business if implemented. Maybe it’s a new more efficient website, customer service training, a better fill plant, or cost saving delivery methods that will put you above your competition.
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