Have you ever had a thought or idea and wondered how you could turn it into a product or service that others would value? Chances are, you’ve been asked this question at some point or another given that marketing is often described as the “process of getting someone to buy what you sell” (hence the often-quoted expression, “You can’t buy happiness, but you can buy peace of mind.”)
If so, congratulations! You’re in the right place. You’ll learn various ways to market your own products and services, including
Direct Mailing
One of the simplest yet most effective forms of marketing is direct mail marketing. This type of marketing often involves sending out physical mailers to people. These mailers can contain a variety of marketing and sales material, but are usually targeted at people who have expressed an interest in the subject matter covered. The goal is to get the person to read the material and then make a purchase or take some other kind of action.
To set up a direct-mailing list, you will need to have a list of people who would be interested in receiving your mailings. You can either purchase a list of subscribers from a direct marketing company, or you can build your own list by getting people to sign up for a mailing list where you will circulate information about your product or service.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Another form of marketing that can be quite effective is search engine optimization (SEO). With SEO, you are trying to improve your site’s performance on search engines like Google or Bing. This typically involves taking control of the words and phrases that people enter into the search bar to find your site. Your content, keywords, and links all factor into your site’s SEO score, so you want to make sure that everything is working together to push your SEO number as high as possible.
SEO is a broad term that can refer to a variety of different methods, so it’s important to note that there is no one-size-fits-all approach when it comes to optimizing your site for search engines. The way you perform SEO on your site depends on the nature of your product or service, your target audience, and the search engine you are using.
Social Media Marketing
Many businesses and organizations have adopted a social media-focused marketing strategy, as these platforms give you the opportunity to connect with customers and potential customers in a way that was never possible before. Your social media platforms give you the chance to publish content regularly and share it with your audience, connecting with your audience on a personal level.
Additionally, you can use social media to have a two-way conversation with your audience. This can be achieved with either real-life interactions or with automated tools that allow you to engage with your audience via status updates, content, or photos.
There are many different social media platforms, such as Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn, that you can use to market your product or service. Each one has its perks and quirks, so it’s important to find the right one for your needs. For example, maybe you want to use Twitter to engage with customers, but you need a Facebook page to actually sell your product. Or vice versa.
Traditional Advertising
To put it simply, traditional advertising is any type of advertising where you aren’t interacting with the end user, or potential end user, in any way. This could include ads on radio stations, television listings, magazine spreads, or billboards. While it can be effective, it’s often seen as a last resort when nothing else seems to be working.
There are a variety of tools and platforms that you can use to target traditional advertising to specific demographics or geographical locations. This can be a cost-effective and efficient way to reach your audience, but it does require a lot of work to make sure that the ads are being presented in the right way and will convert well.
Product Demonstrations
Another effective way to market your product or service is by demonstrating it. This could include showing customers how to use your product or service, how it works, or how it benefits them. You could get professional chefs to demo the food truck for you, or get photographers to walk you through the steps of taking a picturesque family portrait.
If you’re fortunate enough to have a physical product that you can demonstrate, consider using a tool like Handymannecker to find consumers who are near your location and are interested in your product. This tool simplifies product demos by connecting you with local consumers who can show you how your product or service works in real life.
Offline Marketing
While most businesses and organizations operate primarily online, it’s important to remember that not everything can be done online. You need to be able to walk the talk, so to speak, and ensure that your marketing efforts translate into actual, physical, interactions with customers and potential customers. This is often referred to as offline marketing.
When planning your offline marketing strategy, you need to consider various mediums including radio, outdoor displays (like billboards and bus stop signs), magazine spreads, and handouts (like flyers and business cards). Your print media and your radio station might not be available to you in digital form, so you need to consider other platforms like outdoor displays and handouts to get the word out.
Website Marketing
A website is a wonderful tool for both marketing and sales, but it doesn’t happen overnight. Just like any other piece of marketing and sales material, you need to get people to come back to your site over and over again to learn about your product or service. To do this, you need to set up a solid website marketing plan.
The first step in developing a website marketing plan is to set up a Google Analytics account. This will provide you with detailed website traffic information that you can use to measure the efficacy of your plan at any given time. To set up a Google Analytics account, simply visit https://analytics.google.com and click the “Get Started” button. From there, you will need to provide your email address and click the confirmation button to continue.
Once you have set up your Google Analytics account, you can begin working on your website marketing plan.
The next step is to take some time to work on the content of your site. There are many free tools like Google Docs that you can use to write and edit your content, so don’t feel like you need to spend money on expensive software to do something that can be done almost for free. Create content regularly, regardless of whether it is sales material or just informative articles about your product or service.
Once you have content on your site, organize it into categories and sub-categories to make it easy for your users to find what they are looking for. For example, you might have a category called “FAQs” or “How to Use / Best Uses for This Product,” and sub-categories under those headings, like “FAQs for Dummies” and “How to Use This Product for Parents.”
Organizing content this way will help users discover content that is relevant to them. If you have a lot of content, consider using tools like HubSpot to create mini-blogs or FAQs about your product or service. These tools make it easy to create and edit blog posts (FAQs) and allow you to connect those posts to specific pages on your site (such as a “Contact Us” page or a “Thank You” page after a purchase).
Once you have a basic understanding of how to set up a mailing list business, you can begin thinking about various ways that you can use it to grow your business.