The Three Phases of Marketing You Need to Know to be Successful

During my tenure in corporate marketing departments I learned that true marketing-oriented organizations budget for each of these elements as part of their marketing arsenal. This is what makes for long-term success. Though the numbers and budgets for these large corporations are far bigger than a small business can afford, the strategies and tactics are exactly the same and can be easily implemented to fit small business marketing needs.

Have a close look at the diagram. What do you see? I hope you notice that Acquisition surrounds all the other elements. This is because the Acquisition phase happens first in any new business, but also because in my years of working with hundreds of small businesses I've seen that oftentimes, the reasons a customer leaves you can be out of your direct control (they move, sell or go out of business, etc.) therefore, Acquisition should be an ongoing task in order to keep your pipeline full.

And, businesses should work at keeping their customers through great Retention Strategies as well. If your product/service is price-sensitive, then you stand a good chance of losing a recently acquired customer to a low-price competitor. A great retention program keeps customers tethered to your brand.

Finally, Reactivation strategies should be used to win back those who haven't done business with you for a while. This too, could be for a variety of reasons, but a well thought out Reactivation plan can be very profitable.

Acquisition - All new businesses are in Acquisition mode. This is where you'll acquire customers for the first time. To do this, you must use the right marketing techniques to let your target audience know you exist. This is typically the most expensive phase.

Retention - Once you have customers you must work to keep them because it can cost up to 10x more to acquire a new customer than to keep an existing one, so consistent Retention practices should become part of any business's marketing activities.

Reactivation - This is a sub-segment of the elements above. For myriad reasons a customer may stop buying from you (they moved, or entered a new life stage, etc.). Depending on what your product is and why they stopped, some portion can often be reactivated to become viable customers again.

To ensure your small business marketing success each of these three phases should be part of your marketing arsenal to ensure your success for the long haul.

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3 Questions to Ask Before Embarking on Your Next Small Business Marketing Campaign

The best strategic ideas not executed well will always end badly. They're a waste of money, time, and in the end, you'll be no better off than you were prior to the effort. And, in some cases, you could be worse off. So, before embarking on your next small business marketing campaign, ask yourself these three questions:

1. Am I ready? This seems simple, but in actuality is very complex. Take for example a recent campaign fail I experienced: A full page ad on the back cover of a magazine that cost $7500 (according to the magazine's media kit) + creative costs, etc. It was perfectly attuned to the audience of the magazine, looked nice, had great calls to action, but when I went to their site I got several 404 errors. This is so bad...they didn't check their links so that their back end would hold up and support their marketing. Embarrassing to say the least, and because I couldn't get through, I couldn't purchase from them.



2. Can I handle the new business? If you're a solopreneur be careful that your campaign doesn't blow you out of the water. Some examples I've seen are: Buying a list with a 5000 minimum, plus spending a huge chunk of your marketing budget to get to those names (postcard, for example), then scrambling not to fall apart on the back end because you can't keep up. Hire temporary staff if you have to; recruit friends and family too; but do everything you can to prevent your effort from backfiring. This makes for a poor service model and while you may have acquired them, you likely won't retain these new customers if they have a bad experience. Or, here's another example: A local store put a Grand Opening ad in the paper, but didn't have enough staff on hand to handle the customers. People walked out grumbling. Not a good first impression.

3. Do I understand exactly how the media works? Every day in the professional trade journals I read about more new technology platforms to use for marketing. However, if you don't really understand how they work and/or what they can do for you then you may run into trouble. For example, I recently worked with a business owner who bought into a new app program thinking that he could adjust offers, etc. on the fly only to find out that yes, he could...once his turn on line in the workflow came up. Often this turned out to be a week or so too late for him to jump on an idea or take advantage of a news tie in. So the effort did OK, but it could have been great.

Always be sure that your back end will support the front end marketing effort you just spent a lot of your heard-earned dollars on as this can make or break your small business marketing efforts.

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What is the Purpose of your Website?

I receive a lot of calls regarding websites. It's confusing to most people and unless you're entrenched in this media it's likely you find it all frustrating and so you put it off, filing it in the 'too hard' pile.

Common questions I get are:

Can you get me on page 1 of Google? Sure, but depending on your business it could cost you many thousands of dollars each month to stay there. This is a big misconception about websites, what's far more profitable for your business is to speak to your target audience and show them why they should choose to do business with you.

I have a website, but it's looking tired. Can you help? Absolutely! But I need to know the goal of your site and the part it plays in your business before we can get started, and even before I can get you a quote. If your site looks like it was built in 1999, then it likely needs to be refreshed. If the content is still good and it's ranking, then perhaps change up images, font (so many more are now readable by the search engines), tie in all your social media, etc. First impressions are everything. And please (I beg you) remove the counter at the bottom of your site. That's a dead giveaway your site should be put out to pasture.

I used a canned solution for my site and it's not performing. Any suggestions? Depending on the solution you're currently using, you may have to start from scratch. I won't mention names here, but there are some that simply won't work because they cannot be read by the search engines. Thankfully, WordPress has made it a lot less expensive than it used to be get a new site, so for under $75 (and sometimes even under $50) purchasing a template that can be customized is a great solution.

Not all websites are created equal. For example, if you're an artist or designer, you may want to use your site as a digital portfolio to showcase your work. If this is the case, then fewer words and more visuals are the way to go. I wouldn't recommend spending on SEO or related items. I'd just make sure the images are the highest quality they can be (but, please...protect yourself by using watermarks and/or copyrights on your original works.)

Or, if you're selling product you'll likely want a fully-optimized site picking up all the keywords that people search on so they can find your site. [Quick note here: just because it's found doesn't mean they'll purchase from you. That takes a lot more strategy and includes many other moving parts.]

What if you're a service provider (like my business is)? Then you want testimonials, lots of content highlighting you're expertise, perhaps case studies or white papers too. SEO is important here so that you incorporate the phrases needed so people can find you.

Websites are critical to your business success, but each business must tailor their site accordingly. Using the right blend of images, words, content, great strategy, calls to action, and more all with a great marketing spin is the key to success.

Once your site is done, the real marketing begins. You can't stop there. Your site is just one marketing tool of many to build a sustainable marketing presence in your targeted audience.

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