Where Great Marketing Starts

by Stuart Ayling of Marketing Nous


"I was thinking about advertising in this paper."
"I'm just about to print this brochure, can you give me your comments."
"We've done direct mail before, but we weren't happy with the response."

As a consultant I'm often faced with comments such as these. But it's vitally important to recognise that marketing is a process. It's not just an activity or two.

Most businesses that have marketing problems haven't fully considered their marketing process. As a result they focus on a short-list of marketing tactics that are often being used for the wrong reasons.

Great marketing starts at the beginning. And the beginning is the same as the end - your client.

Marketing is the process that attracts new clients, manages the process of client satisfaction, and keeps those clients coming back (or referring others to you). So the focus of great marketing is on the client, not just on the marketing tactic.

This means that to develop more effective marketing tactics you need to think more closely about your clients (or prospects). What should you think about? Try something along the lines of:

• What are their real problems?
• Who would they normally turn to for help?
• Why would they use your type of services?
• Where can you find them?
• How can you get your message to them?
• How can you help them, and in turn get them to recognise your business?
• What concerns would they have about using services like yours?

The answers to these questions will help guide you to a sensible choice of marketing tactics, and give you a better idea of what you need to include in your marketing messages.

Quite often simple marketing can be very effective. For example, one of my clients had been advertising in a trade journal for around 12 months. Over that time they had zero response from their ad. Not one call. Of course prospects may have read the ad's, but there were no leads generated.

As part of a progressive marketing makeover for that client I designed another type of ad. It was very different from the previous one, and very different from competitors' advertisements. But it was very simple. It focused on the prospects needs.

From the very next issue of that same journal my client started receiving leads from the ad. They were happy. I was happy. They had improved their results.

Great marketing starts with your client. Without a doubt.