If you are trying to reach your industry's upper echelons with your company, you probably know that your ad campaigns will be part of what gets you there. Marketing matters, and how you put your products and services out there will determine whether anyone buys or uses them. You can't afford to have your ad campaigns be duds, or you will not make any headway in what is probably a crowded marketplace.
Very few niches have single companies dominating them, with essentially no competition. In a nutshell, that's why your marketing choices are just as important as whatever it is you make or offer. Keeping that in mind, let's talk about the most basic marketing elements you should remember as you get ready to launch your next big ad campaign.
Should You Mention Your Competitors or Not?
Let's say that your company makes and sells nylon slings for moving heavy equipment. You have a competitor that makes polyester slings.
It's true that you can run an ad campaign, and the basis of it can be whether nylon or polyester slings are better. Since you make nylon slings, your commercials or YouTube videos might be all about how much better of a material nylon is versus polyester.
The real issue with this approach is that you're acknowledging the competition. This is not automatically a doomed strategy, but it's one you might want to avoid.
If you mention the competition, regardless of what you're selling or service you're offering, it's as though you're inadvertently giving the consumer another option. Even if you depict the other company and its services or products in a negative light, you're still planting the idea in the consumer's head that another choice exists.
You might have better luck launching an ad campaign that acts as though your products and services are available in a vacuum, and there is no competition. You may not be the only game in town, regardless of your industry, but it doesn't hurt to act as though you are.
Market to the Right People
Another mistake that some companies make when it comes to their marketing efforts is trying to cast their net too widely. If you make a niche item, you will need to do research and construct your ideal customer profile.
That profile might contain information like whether your ideal customer is male or female, how old they are, their race, sexuality, income level, their political leanings, whether they've bought their own home versus renting an apartment, and much more. It might sound discriminatory if you're only marketing to one particular population segment, but that's not an accurate way to think about it.
Targeted marketing isn't meant to discriminate. It is meant to save your business from spending money on ads that you will direct at people who, according to your research, are not likely to buy the products or services anyway.
If you manufacture toys, would you market them to children or adults? That's why toy commercials come on your TV Saturday morning when your kids are watching cartoons and not so much in the middle of a primetime football game. During that primetime football game, you're getting beer and truck commercials because of the demographic that is watching it.
The Right Channels
Using the proper marketing channels is also a critical thing for you to do if you only have a limited ad budget that you're trying your best to stretch. You probably know that you'll need to use social media, for instance, but which of the many options is suitable for your company?
You'll need to do research to figure that out as well. For example, you might decide to target Facebook if you're attempting to sell your products to middle-aged parents, members of the Millennial generation who now have kids. You might use TikTok if you're after a younger crowd.
Once you determine the right social media platforms to use, you should next hire a marketing team, or perhaps just one knowledgeable individual. There are social media managers now who can help you out in this area. This is a job that didn't really exist just one short decade ago.
There are more fundamental marketing basics, but these ones should start you out and point you and your business in the proper direction. Remember that if your marketing efforts fail, it's going to be almost impossible for your company to rise out of obscurity.
