I am about to show you how to increase and improve marketing strategies with 16 marketing tactics examples. It is a continuous learning goal we all should have no matter how good we are. But first, I need to tell you an important story.
More to learn: Some Great Story and Storytelling Examples to Study
This is an awesome story that does a great job of illustrating continuous learning and improvement and thereby marketing ideas. It is a story I love to share. Here goes:
Once upon a time, a very strong woodcutter asked for a job with a timber merchant, and he got it. The pay was really good, and so were the work conditions. For that reason, the woodcutter was determined to do his best. His boss gave him an ax and showed him the area where he was supposed to work.
The first day, the woodcutter brought in 18 trees, and of course, his boss congratulated him. Motivated by his boss’ words, the woodcutter tried harder the next day, but he could only bring in 15 trees. The third day he tried even harder, but he could only bring in 10 trees. Day after day he was bringing in fewer and fewer trees.
The woodcutter thought he was losing his strength, and he went to the boss and apologized, saying that he couldn’t understand what was going on. His boss then asked, “When was the last time you sharpened your ax?” Appalled by the question, the woodcutter harshly replied, “Sharpen my ax? I have no time to do that. I’ve been busy cutting trees.”
So I pose this question to you: Are you too busy chopping trees on the front line and not allocating the time needed to sharpen your marketing ideas? What is that costing you and your business? Furthermore, how much time would it really take to keep your marketing ax sharp?
Becoming obsolete is a reality in today’s fast-moving environment. Yes, today’s marketer needs to leave their comfort zone and venture into an environment that does not seems to want to sit still. Luckily, it doesn’t necessarily mean abandoning the principles they’ve learned along the way. It just means evolving their thinking and applying these same principles to the new mediums.
Here are 16 ways we have found to continuously sharpen your marketing ideas, with some excellent examples:
Marketing tactics examples … Network. Network. Network.
Word of mouth is always going to be one of the best forms of marketing. Take the opportunity to go to various events and network with other business owners and the general population.
How well do you know your customers? Do you know what they cook in their kitchens? If they run a small business out of their homes? Do you know if they’re lonely?
Here is an example of a business that made it their business to get inside the homes of their customers, understand them more deeply, and find a way to help:
Kraft recognized that their customers weren’t working with fully stocked gourmet kitchens to prepare meals for their families. So Kraft decided to have their food analysts be as close as possible to their customers.
Each of their test kitchens contains the stuff found in the average family kitchen and nothing more. No new appliances or tools either. Instead, they use standard tools and appliances.
So what is the bottom line?
It’s not always about surveys and focus groups. The best businesses try and put themselves in their customers’ shoes. And they do that by gleaning the best customer insights they can.
Marketing tactics examples … step out of your comfort zone
Putting yourself and your business out there is never easy – you won’t survive if you stay within your protected bubble. You have to pop that and seek out ideas and opportunities to grow as a business owner and to grow your business. Michael Dell once said, “If you’re the smartest person in the room, find another room.” This applies to your comfort zone as well.
Use social media, but not every platform
There are only so many hours in the day. Look at what your customers are using and use that. Just because there are lots of social media platforms, that doesn’t mean you have to do them all.
https://digitalsparkmarketing.com/power-of-persuasion/
Marketing tactics examples … blog
Give people a reason to keep coming back to your website. Blog and give them tips, case studies, your latest products – make sure you keep giving them a reason to visit you on the web. Make it about them.
Here is an example where a business focused on teaching customers with their blog. Blue Apron is a subscription-based service that delivers to your house all of the ingredients you need to make a few meals a week.
The ingredients are seasonal, healthy, and sometimes include the hard-to-find stuff you can’t usually get at your grocery store. It’s a fun concept that gets couples and families cooking stuff they wouldn’t normally make each week, and they have plenty of great marketing ideas, too.
One of the unique features of Blue Apron is the ingredients themselves. The meals (which include exact amounts of ingredients you need) feature stuff you’ve never cooked with before — things like heirloom eggplant, choy sum, and stone fruits.
They also have how-to videos for the basics like mincing, dicing, and caramelizing, and their recipes have pop-outs that give some background on a certain ingredient and its typical uses and flavors. Every meal is an adventure, and you learn a new technique every time.
Here is the thing:
When you teach people something, you give them something to talk about. It’s a long-term word of mouth topic they’ll share with their friends the next time they bring a caramelized onion and butternut squash goat cheese pizza to a dinner party.
Related post: Some Great Story and Storytelling Examples to Study
Partner up with other businesses
Form a strategic partnership with businesses that share the same target audience. Sell jewelry? Host a joint event with a retail shop! Own a local coffee shop? Partner with a bakery! The possibilities are endless and this will give you great exposure.
Here is an awesome example, again from the Blue Apron. On their site, Blue Apron shares information about their suppliers like the farmers that grow their peppers, the dairies that make their goat cheese, and the noodle makers that supply their ramen. They also feature their customers’ in cooking video compilations and photos customers submit from the meals they make.
Here is the deal:
Blue Apron knows that to get people to talk about you, you have to make them look good, too. The more they highlight the people around them, like their customers and vendors, the more networks their message will spread to.
Learn more: Blue Apron Partners
A dynamic organization is a social organization
The result of these changes will inevitably move away from marketing and become embedded in all parts of the organization. A responsive, dynamic organization means that PR, HR, Product development, Inventory Management, Operations will need seamless communication channels to properly receive and disseminate information intra and outside the company to stakeholders and customers.
The future CMO, in my opinion, will become more operations-minded but will rely on the collective organization to function effectively.
City governments are social and a lot like businesses. Their customers are their citizens, their product is their town, and their competition is just down the road.
And some city governments have gotten creative to connect with their residents, humanize their work, and create a community. A great model to follow isn’t it?
The entire town of Jun, Spain, is connected through Twitter. The mayor tweets, the city electrician tweets, law enforcement tweets, and even the school lunch lady tweets.In fact, the town’s street sweeper has become a local celebrity on Twitter. It’s allowed them to handle issues like replacing a streetlamp out in the open:Someone tweets the mayor about it, he tweets the electrician, and the electrician tweets back a photo of the fixed streetlamp.Residents say it’s about more that reporting problems though — they read the town’s tweets like they read a newspaper. It’s all about creating a strong sense of community. |
Give great customer service
People will pay more for a product over a lesser-priced one if you continually give them phenomenal customer service. Now, not every business or person is perfect so you may have an off-day, but treat your customers as you’d want to be treated by your favorite business.
Recently, Fast Company shared an article on “The Science Of Why You Should Spend Your Money On Experiences, Not Things.” According to a study by a psychology professor at Cornell University, experiences and service connect us to other people, give us stories to tell once they’re over, and are harder to compare against when it comes to keeping up with the Joneses.
Marketing is not the same as advertising
You can market your small business in literally hundreds of ways without spending money (aka, advertising), so it pays to know what they are and then eliminate the ones that won’t work, or that you can’t afford, up-front.
Balance online and offline
You have to have a presence online but don’t let it suck up all your marketing time and energy. Find a balance between doing the stuff online and offline.
Improve marketing strategy … value is the new currency
One of the hardest lessons for marketers to have learned was to refrain from leading with an overt company or product messages. “Leading with value” has become a difficult principle to adopt, after years of “me-me-me” communications.
Declining performance of digital ad units means marketers must rethink content from the position of the customer. The rise of the editorial as an essential function within marketing will be necessary to instill this new discipline.
Mix it up
Don’t only do TV ads or just do flyers on dorm doors – mix up your marketing efforts. Doing the same thing gets stale and boring over time, doesn’t it?
Think outside the box
Some of the best marketing ideas came from this kind of thinking. Chick-fil-A cows for example. Who would have put cows with a chicken restaurant?
Improve marketing strategy … give your business a personality
No one cares for those businesses that are as exciting as a cardboard box. Let your personality as the business owner shines through your business.
Customer-centric is the standard
As digital grows up, the areas mentioned above will move companies to start to shift in ways that put the needs of the customers at the center of the organization. One-to-one marketing will a reality as data allows us to truly customize experiences for each customer.
Retention will get increasingly harder as mediums and platforms rise and fall with the nomadic consumer and Facebook and Twitter become less standard platforms.
Where pundits have prophesied the death of marketing, a more responsive, dynamic and collaborative organization will take its place.
Focus on relationships
Marketing to the masses is one thing, but for small businesses, you want to build that relationship with your customer. Send them a birthday card. Tag them on social media. Build a relationship with them and they’ll keep coming back.
Have fun
Marketing your business will be one of the most fun things you do. You don’t have to balance any accounting sheets or clean a store-front. Have fun and show the world why you love your business!
