“Marketing is a contest for people’s attention; – Seth Godin, America’s Bestselling Author, and Entrepreneur.”
Marketing can be described as a process of reaching out to the customer, and marketing strategies are the blueprint, the roadmap for achieving this goal.
Have you observed the way selfies have taken on the world? Youngsters, especially teenagers, are almost addicted to selfies, and they leave no stone unturned to express themselves most amazingly and then present that to the world via social media. Selfies are a form of marketing wherein the person is trying to sell an image of themselves to the world via a visual medium. When you persuade someone to take action, it’s marketing. In selfies, the action will be alike on that selfie, and the product is the image of that person.
Marketing is an essential and critical business process whose objective is to fulfill business goals by influencing their customers and convincing them to buy or subscribe to their products or services. The American Marketing Association describes marketing as “the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large.
In 2017, the New York Times defined marketing as “the art of telling stories so enthralling that people lose track of their wallets..”
What are Marketing Strategies?
Marketing can be described as a process of reaching out to the customer, and marketing strategies are the blueprint, the roadmap for achieving this goal. In a way, it’s a form of a formula, a recipe for business growth. Be it a new business or an existing one; every business requires marketing strategies at every stage of its existence.
Despite being a household name, Coca-Cola and Pepsi still spend billions of dollars on marketing campaigns and creating the best marketing strategies. Why? Because they know that once they stop marketing, people will soon forget them, and their competitors will take over.
4 Types of Marketing Strategies
There are different types of marketing strategies that exist in the business world, and depending on the business goals, they can be modified and revamped as per the needs. Be it B2B marketing strategies or online marketing strategies, the goals and the purpose remains the same:
- To entice and delight the customer and convince them to choose your business.
- To solve the problems which your customers are facing, and providing them the solution which they seek.
The four most common types of marketing strategies that encapsulate the essence of the entire marketing universe are:
- Cause Marketing: When we link the business objectives with a social cause or movement.
- Relationship Marketing: When you focus on developing relationships with your customers for long-term value addition.
- Scarcity Marketing: When you produce less and create a perception of scarcity to drive more sales, using the psychological factor of Fear of Missing Out.
- Undercover Marketing: The stealth mode of marketing, wherein the customer is not even aware that they are being marketed to.
Low-Cost Marketing Strategies for Small Businesses
When we described, what are marketing strategies? The most common aspect was ‘Getting Attention’, which summarizes the entire marketing process.
In case the small business cannot allocate a huge budget for marketing, there are different types of marketing strategies that are low cost and can bring in excellent results.
For example, gifting little utilities such as a pen or a cap with your branding is one of the best B2B marketing strategies for small businesses. Creating a blog and voicing your opinion on social media, for instance, is one of the widely known online marketing strategies for small businesses, which always ensures a consistent flow of leads and new business. The objective here is to educate, entertain, or persuade your targeted audience and convince them to initiate a business relationship with you.
Ecommerce Marketing: Step by Step Online Strategy for Bringing in More Sale
Here are some of the best strategies for marketing with a low budget for startups and small businesses:
- Launch a Website and a Blog: Most probably the cheapest yet most effective direct marketing strategy is launching a website and a blog. It creates a foundation on which your entire online and offline marketing can be done.
- SEO and Social Media: SEO or Search Engine Optimization is a free marketing strategy, and social media is also free for all users. Use them to bring more traffic to your website, create more awareness about your product/services/ideas.
- Send Email Newsletters: Emails are still the world’s #1 direct marketing medium, and despite the rise of social media, emails still work wonders. Laser-sharp targeting and creative messaging with zero spam is the key to success.
- Attend Industry-Relevant Seminars, Networking Events: This is a tried and tested method to get more clients, especially in the B2B sector. Meet new people, share your vision, and make a follow-up. Repeat.
- Gift Little, Useful Items: As shared earlier, gifting useful items to your target audience helps in the longer run. Say, for example, pen. Everyone uses a pen, and every time your potential customer uses the pen you gifted them, you will get a brand recall. Simple, effective, and cheap.
- Cold Calling: Yes, most people hate getting cold calls, but even with a 1% conversion, you can get one new client for every 100 calls. If you can scale it, the sky’s the limit. But with responsibility and ethics.
Marketing is a vast, ever-expanding universe, and you need a mentor, a guide to help you sail through it. This is where MSMEx can help you out. MSMEx is a micro-advisory platform wherein business legends, and veterans offer live assistance on marketing, business models, govt. loans for MSME, sales, finance, taxes, and more. All you need to do is book an appointment with one of the business coaches at MSMEx, and get all your answers instantly.
