A chat about marketing essentials

 

Much to cover. So little time. 

I've offered my advice on a myriad of subjects. From helping a friend of mine run their Facebook marketing, to helping a struggling maintenance business. I do my due diligence and offer an educated opinion. If my old mentor could see me he'd probably be proud (and afterwards list all the improvements I can make with the grace of a machinegun). I'm glad the rules he taught me as a kid are still applicable 10 years later, and the one rule I agree with the most is this: 

No size fits all. 

What do I mean by that? 

It's exactly what it means. It means what you're offering is not applicable to everyone. Just because the shoe fits you, doesn't mean it'll fit the person next to you. Not everyone can use it. Not everyone is going to be comfortable with it. Not everyone is going to like it. Not everyone is going to need it. Whether you'll use that pair of shoes depends on your foot size, but also your preferences, your other options, and your price range. A tailored experience. 

Tailored experience you say? 

Much like how no product or service can cater to all audiences, marketing consultancies cannot generate a single, universal strategy that covers all the difficulties all clients might be facing. Humans, at our very core, are emotional, unpredictable creatures. Which is why marketing is not an exact science, it is experimental. Audience. Design. Functionality. Convenience. Messages. Trends. Competitors. There are many aspects one must consider when building a marketing strategy, much like how a customer has to juggle their internal queries before purchasing. Doing particularly poorly in one or multiple aspects can result in your marketing strategy hurting your business. 

Take the Pepsi Jenner debacle as an example of experimenting and failing.

(Picture taken from The New York Times)

The Live For Now commercial could've been memorable, in the good way. Pepsi is a big client. A product adopted by generations all around the world. You have the grandson of Bob Marley providing music and Kendall Jenner as the face of your film. The people behind the commercial clearly understood the technical factors. Whatever high production values the commercial had were overshadowed by the sheer tone-deaf nature of the narrative. 

Strife, such as civil unrest, protesting, can sometimes bind people together and change things for the better. But here the theme of protesting is portrayed as something energetic, hip, grandiose, almost like a celebration. The reality of police brutality is downplayed by using a can of Pepsi as the universal unifier. Kendall Jenner, a person so far detached from the plight of the average Joe, is the symbol of this change. 

Although I strive to avoid commenting on sociopolitical matters, I've lived on this planet long enough to know that people don't protest because they're happy with the way things are going. Protests are a serious subject. Police interactions are a serious subject. Oppression and police brutality are grim realities. And yet, Pepsi has managed to clumsily force itself into the world of protesting and created a film that is a crude parody of the reality of civil unrest. 

The backlash was so deafening, the commercial was pulled after a day. The fact Jenner and the other people behind the ad acknowledged its horrendous nature only after the public backlash, enforces just how little they understood what they were dealing with. They simply did not understand the nuances of the source material and instead went for a generic, almost conveyor belt result. It's cynical. It's without spirit. 

Again, they had the ingredients to make something memorable in a good way, but Pepsi's ham-fisted attempt at social justice resulted in people avoiding their brand. 

Preferably, you don't want that when you're making a marketing strategy.  

I doubt anyone who follows the rulebook of Live For Now would meet any success. It was just one of many case studies of not accounting your variables and that no universal answer exists. Had they actually tried to make something that people can stand behind, it would've worked. 

To be fair, you cannot know exactly what's going on in the minds of your customers and competitors at all times, but you can notice correlations and benefit from them. These correlations, such as habits and trends, coupled with good interpretation, allows you to make sense out of the senseless, on a client-to-client basis. 

Where do I fall in all this?

As a consultant, it's my responsibility to make sure your chances of meeting your objectives are as high as possible, bearing in mind the confines of your resources and your intentions. I cannot offer an approach that is generic. I cannot overpromise and I will not give you results that are not relevant to your specific needs. 

The important thing when working with consultants is that you be open with them. As a client, it is your responsibility to relinquish all relevant information regarding your objectives so that I can help you meet them. A consultant cannot give you reliable solutions if you're not open with them.

Here's a list of solutions I've offered thus far in my consulting career. 

• I’ve created sample website designs.
• I helped my client design their website.
• I’ve made sketches of possible ads and created samples clients.
• I’ve created internal material, such as a design document and training material.
• I’ve made pitches and presentations on behalf of a client.
• I have contacted other freelancers, such as artists and translators, to broaden the list of services I can offer to my clients. 
• I have performed market research.
• I have helped our client run their Facebook page.

Different businesses will need different solutions, but there are general practices that can help regardless of your situation. An example of general practices is the 3 stages of a marketing strategy format. 

Preparation Stage

You can't build a house without having a blueprint. You also can't conduct a marketing strategy without having a clear idea of what you want to achieve.

Let's have an example. You want to start your own confectionery business. You have experience making sweets in your free time and you want to make a business out of your hobby. Here's the most important things to consider: 

• Understand food safety laws. Know the food safety laws in the country you're operating in. Make sure your business is inspected by an environmental health officer (or your country's equivalent) on grounds of proper sanitation in the workplace, food hygiene such as safe cooking and storage, and elimination of hazards. You also need to understand all the basic principles of food handling, labelling and packaging.
• Register your business. Depending on your region, you'll have to register your business. 
• Calculate startup costs. What resources do you need to start your business and how much will they cost?
• Understand your options with the resources you have. You need to have specific, achievable key performance indicators. Talk with your consultant and make objectives based on the S.M.A.R.T format (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-constrained).
• Research. Research is all about understanding your clients, your competitors, by answering a few important questions. Is there demand for a new confectionary business? What are the current trends regarding sweet foods? What audience should I focus on? What's are their spending habits? Will my new type of candy be well received? Questions like these can be answered in different ways. Through "desk research", such as old public reports, online testimonials, app analytics etc. Cheap, relatively fast and accessible, but not something that's 100% relevant. Alternatively, "field research", which is known as primary research, is about gathering data directly from the source, such as customers. This is useful because it offers the best chance to acquire the most relevant results at the downside of time and costs. What research is used depends on the objectives of the business owner. If research dictates that there's a high demand for vegan macarons with one confirmed shop selling them, it might be a good idea to create your own version of vegan macarons in order to tap into that audience. 
• Interpret findings. Make sure the findings you present are relevant and easy to understand. Do not lose sight of your target audience and your message. 

Many people forget the importance of using the PESTLE (Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Legal, Enviromental) approach when analyzing the macro-environment. 

(Picture taken from Dell's official website)

An example of seizing opportunity through the PESTLE approach is Dell moving its production to Poland where it benefited from cheaper labor. Shutting down the Limerick plant did result in almost 2000 people losing their jobs, but it was done so they can be more competitive in the long term. A difficult, but measured decision. 

It is not the most grandiose thing, but the PESTLE format offers a systematic way to look at the world around you and highlight opportunities and challenges. Research conducted by me will be done in respect to PESTLE.

7Ps And Implementing A Marketing Strategy

Ask yourself these questions.

• Do I have the right product? 
• Am I selling at the right price? 
• Is my product at the right place?
• Is this a good promotion? 
• Do I have the right people? 
• Is there something wrong with my process? 
• What is my physical evidence?

The 7Ps of marketing as they are called, is an approach similar to S.M.A.R.T or PESTLE, in the sense that it funnels you into analyzing your business and the world around you in a systematic way. You might want to enhance your chocolates in order to separate yourself from other domestic brands or add a marketplace to your website in order to boost sales by 10%.  

This is where the no size fits all approach really falls into place. Not because the activities undertaken are something exclusive to that particular business, but because the KPIs (key performance indicators) are different. A marketing strategy is specifically tailored for a business to business due to each business being unique. Maybe someone wants to increase their sales by 20% instead of 10%. Maybe someone wants to focus on a more niche audience? Or maybe you want to try out a new radical type of influencer endorsement? Once you understand your objectives, you can determine how you can achieve them. 

Post Analysis

Otherwise known as the postmortem of a marketing campaign. 

This a crucial step to success. Record how your strategy has performed so you can measure its effectiveness and determine whether you need to improve anything. 

• If you already defined your goals, analyze your metrics. 
• Interpret the data.
• Analyze key findings.
• Present findings in a way that is understandable. 
• Gather feedback from relevant team members. 

Whether you maintain a similar strategy for your specific business, or you need to change things up, depends on the post analysis. 

The Main Points Of This Post

The main points I tried to convey are:

• Marketing solutions need to be catered on a business-to-business format. 
• A marketing strategy is based on many factors. 
• An example of a marketing strategy fail. 
• The preparation stage of a marketing strategy. 
• PESTLE.
• S.M.A.R.T.
• 7Ps of marketing. 
• Implementing a strategy. 
• Post analysis.

If you learned something new, then I'm glad.

Stay tuned for more marketing related posts!