You have acquired as much market research as possible-- now what? This is the last installment in our six part series of sales and marketing. This installment serves as a review and wrap-up session of parts one through five and concludes with various marketing what not to do’s.
Our previous modules were geared toward helping you develop and gather knowledge about your customers and competition, growth methods to consider, and associated marketing tactics.
Part 1 of 6: What Makes You Unique?
In our first installment of this series, we identified how you can develop your unique selling proposition (USP) that would resonate with your customers and target audience.
Your USP is developed through assessing your environment and conducting market research that reveals how you are viewed internally (i.e. by your employees), and externally (by your customers).
This research unveils how you are different and unique with regard to your competition and will ultimately help you craft a resonating message embodied within your USP.
Part 2 of 6: The Marketing Mix
Our second installment focused on marketing fundamentals within the marketing mix's 4 Ps— product, price, promotion and place. Your marketing mix centers around your target market.
Therefore, you need to elevate the perception of value that your customers and prospects have for your products or services, and for your company.
Using the marketing mix to your advantage is one way to attain the desired perception of value.
Part 3 of 6: Using Quick Sales to Increase Revenue
For our third installment, we introduced how you can use quick sales to increase your revenue.
The intent of a quick sale is to quickly capture new business from your current and past customers to tailor and customize your message to those select customers.
These customers are selected based on their previous or current buying history, along with several other factors that determine whether your message will resonate with your current or former customers and result in a quick sale.
Part 4 of 6: How to Effectively Use Market Research
In our fourth installment, we discussed several ways to maintain and sort your customer relationship databases (CRM). Some common CRM databases include:
- Act
- Prophet
- Salesforce
You can use these CRM databases to build and manage your database of customers, prospects and general network.
We also identified where your customers are likely to find information regarding new products and services.
Knowing the information outlets that your prospects and customers are using helps you determine which marketing tactics to use that will have the greatest business growth impact for your company.
Part 5 of 6: Tactics for Growth
Our fifth installment focused on various methods and models for growing your business.
Based on the market research you completed through the previous installments, you were able to determine which model was most appropriate for your target audience.
From there, we introduced some marketing tactics that you could employ and which would have a relative impact on your business growth model.
Wrapping It All Up
When you are trying to effectively put all this research together, there are a few marketing mistakes you will want to avoid, including:
- Not clearly defining your target markets and market segments
- Not researching your target markets
- Not communicating a Unique Selling Proposition that resonates with your target market
- Not having a strategic marketing plan
- Not leveraging the marketing resources already available to you
- Not utilizing direct marketing
- Not approaching your marketing activities as a system
In this last installment, we have reviewed the important elements of the last five modules as they relate to your particular business; and, with market research you can formulate decisions regarding your next steps.
We hope that you will utilize the information provided in our six part blog series in Sales and Marketing to develop and implemnt your own customized marketing program. If you need further assistance, please contact CMTC for a complimentary consultation.
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