Marketing Basics Businesses Get Wrong

Not even professional marketers can agree 100% on the definition of marketing. Peter Drucker’s definition – that marketing is the totality of the business – is the most effective when applied correctly. It is also the most challenging to understand.

Peter’s definition implies that although organizations hire outside agencies and consultants to help guide marketing efforts, ultimately marketing can never really be fully outsourced. Marketing must be intrinsic to everything the organization does for sustainable growth.

Ultimately marketing can never really be fully outsourced.

The launching (or re-launching) battle cry of start-up businesses today is often, “I need a website!” This is only a variation of more seasoned organizations external focus on competition, marketplace dynamics and product enhancements. The result is the same for both: an unrealistic amount of calls to action vying for buyers’ attention.

There are over 60,000 new websites launched every single day, and that volume is growing. Follow ads, seasonal specials, time-saving offers, increased social presence, click-funnels and endless other initiatives are confusing at best, and overwhelming to the point of exhaustion at worst. The reason is that “everybody” is doing noticeably similar things while claiming innovation and uniqueness.

The result of all this supposed innovation (which by definition is rare since true innovation alters the way a market operates entirely) is that businesses fail over 80% of the time. Manufactured uniqueness does not work without other vital components in place first.

“Everybody” is doing noticeably similar things while claiming innovation and uniqueness.

The great news is that no organization needs to end with financial disaster from poor marketing foundations. Businesses of every size can thrive, regardless of market conditions, when they remember the following sneaky marketing fallacies, and take action to eliminate them, once and for all.

Marketing Basic #1: Purpose First, Last and Always

This sounds like a broken record only because it is given so much lip service. Actual action is required to generate the results organizational purpose promises. Growing numbers of organizations embrace the idea of a “why” statement, and have developed mission, vision and even values statements. Unfortunately, these core concepts are only rarely integrated into the fabric of the organization once they are created.

Additionally, there is a deep thread of bias that refuses to embrace purpose and values as the powerful game changers that they are. Recently I was working with a young, growing organization that was struggling to create a set of clear differentiators.

Actual action is required to generate the results organizational purpose promises.

What they kept presenting was a list of service features and benefits – but not any true points of difference in a very crowded market space. Unfortunately, their experience is extremely common, and the equally common result is commoditization, where price becomes the determining factor for purchase. That is an untenable place for any organization to be.

Even though they were struggling to stand out with their current un-purposeful approach, some of their leadership team strongly objected to taking the time to articulate a set of values as well as a purpose statement. Their reasoning was that this was just a feel-good exercise which was a waste of precious time. Having faced that resistance before, I shared the hard data that has demonstrated organizations with a clear set of values and purpose actually have greater and more sustainable growth.

The organization agreed to at least try the purpose-drive approach, but continued to struggle with consistent application. Each time I stepped back and let them lead their own marketing, those pervasive features and benefits statements kept showing up, purposeless. The reason, I believe, is that the business circumstances (such as prospecting, and competitor activities) felt like trying to row upstream at the same time they were building the purpose-driven boat underneath themselves. Since they were already a company in motion, it felt utterly impossible to shift at the core of the business while in the current of doing business.

The false belief was that must either stop rowing (which they were terrified to do) or stop building the “purpose boat” and stick with the raft they were on before (which wasn’t very aerodynamic, but it stayed afloat). Thankfully, that scenario is only an illusion.

Integrating your purpose into the fabric of your organization means that every customer, every executive, and every team member knows the purpose word for word.

Purpose can be integrated one initiative at a time, so that it is more like building the boat alongside the raft, while the raft is in motion. Then you simply step into your boat when it is complete and pick up momentum.

Integrating your purpose into the fabric of your organization means that every customer, every executive, and every team member knows the purpose word for word. It means every initiative begins with the question: does this further or impede our purpose? And every communication is framed by the purpose. For more ideas on how to develop your purpose statement, stay tuned for future blogs.

Marketing Basic #2: Know Your Customers

It can sound deceptively simple, yet knowing who you serve can actually be one of the most difficult tasks any business undertakes. There is a compulsion among start-ups to create overly-broad customer categories, while more mature organizations forget to recalibrate as markets shift.

“Women” is not a customer. It is an impossibly gigantic demographic. Yet I still hear even major corporations use it as their customer description. “Small business” is another common one. These categories make having a dialog with a prospect or customer feel impersonal and vague. It requires too broad of a marketing channel to realistically cover, regardless of the budget scope, and makes the sales process needlessly slow and frustrating.

“Women” is not a customer. It is an impossibly gigantic demographic.

To grow sales fast, it is vital to develop 3-5 ideal customer “avatars.” This is not a unique, untested process, although often it can feel as though it is. Getting some clients to let go of the need to talk to “everyone” for fear of losing that desperately needed sale, is actually losing them that desperately needed sale. But it can be difficult to understand how narrowing an organization’s focus is more effective than broadening it – until you experience the results for yourself.

An effective customer avatar has roughly 90% of the following information filled in, and is usually based on an actual, existing customer who the organization considers to be “ideal”.

AVATAR INFO LIST:

1. Name

2. Age

3. Race

4. Family structure

5. Income level

6. Employer/Job Title

7. Education level

8. Area of residence/type of home

9. Type of car

10. Personal preferences
    

11. Friends

12. Entertainment

13. Activities

14. Social media

15. Foods

16. Stores

17. Personal frustrations (time, debt, family challenges, work demands, fulfillment, health, etc.)

18. Personal aspirations

No question that this is a lot of very personal information, and there are companies that can offer up some or most of it for a hefty fee. But there is no substitute for building strong personal relationships with your existing ideal customers, getting to know what makes them tick, and then speaking directly to them when building your marketing messaging.

Marketing Basic #3: Consistency is the Mother of Growth

Messaging, imagery and frequency are the trinity of consistent marketing. Organizations can get message fatigue when they see their own marketing played over and over again across social platforms, tradeshows, web ads, and various other channels. The important thing to remember is that while the organization may have seen it a thousand times, the customers have not, and repeating it helps solidify the brand in their minds.

If a brand is building a thought leadership position for itself, a consistent (weekly) blog or podcast, and dissemination of that content across multiple platforms is a commitment to keep that regularly scheduled content flowing as the audience grows. That being said, another “consistent” marketing tactic – click funnels – are over-used and increasingly ineffective. Consumers are tired of the email/social media invasion, and quickly becoming hostile towards them. Hitting someone’s inbox numerous times over a week is not consistency. It is harassment, and needs to stop. Click “unsubscribe.”

Within an organizational marketing messaging platform, there can certainly be more tailored content for various customer avatars. Still, the larger message needs to be present because the larger message is always about the purpose. That never disappears or becomes diluted when a particular customer is addressed. In fact, it comes to life, by helping solve their unique needs effectively. That’s when you know your purpose is being fulfilled.

Unfortunately, many brands are riddled with what appears to be intense self-doubt that manifests as schizophrenic marketing messaging. When they attend a tradeshow for one organization, they have one set of content, and then when they go to the next they become almost unrecognizable as the same organization. Ultimately, they have no brand whatsoever. These organizations are in a “purpose vacuum.” If you aren’t clear on your purpose, then the ability to really serve customers is missing. When that’s missing, then a sense of scarcity and intense competitiveness takes over communications. Although it may not be a click-funnel, it will certainly feel similarly aggressive (and repulsive) to the customer.

To build consistent messaging, you must first know why you have something important to say, that no one else can say the same way, and then know who most needs to hear you. Once you have those things in place, your tactics become obvious, focused, and reliably generate the very sales the organization had been intending to create.

While many organizations get lost in the weeds of tactics, organizations that slow down log enough to build a solid foundation for their marketing that includes Purpose, Values, Customer Avatars, and Consistent Content, will find themselves leading their industry instead of competing, commanding higher price points since they are no longer a commodity, and insulated from all but the most major market conditions