We’ve all received them, haven’t we? The unsolicited e-mails received that promise a miraculous solution to that problem we have and for a short time only it’s 30% off. We’ve also said to ourselves that we, in fact, don’t have that problem and therefore not on the lookout for a solution or way to spend X amount of dollars (with bonus added value items!). That businesses big and small need to make money is not really the problem. We all as consumers of business owners ourselves understand the need to make money. The real issue is with indiscriminate selling what I call paint splatter marketing. In this article, we’ll discuss a much more effective way to market services and products that won’t have individuals and other businesses cringing and calling your marketing efforts a SPAM tsunami. Keep reading to find out more.
Why did you say that?
The typical e-mail, direct message (DM), PM (private message) or comment you will receive may come to your business e-mail, your message inbox on your social media platforms or be left as a comment. My personal experience has been with repetitive comments that always have one aim, to redirect any and all attention back to the commenter. This will usually be a comment along the lines of, “Pay us $x per month and we guarantee you x amount of followers.”, “Great photo. If you want help with xyz than check out our profile or DM us”, “Check out our profile to find xyz <website link provided>”, etc. This type of message is sent by businesses selling the same services that I am selling, in this case, digital marketing or copywriting services. Even a cursory look at my social media profiles or website would tell that business that Atelier Breugnot it not the ideal client for them. They are in fact wasting their time and ours. Their SPAM tsunami usually has individuals deleting their comments and blocking their accounts which is antithetical to their aims.
Tell me who I am For any marketing effort to be successful, it needs to speak to your intended audience. Your heart and ego need to be taken out of the equation. You need to be able to answer the following questions, “I’ve never heard of your product/service why would I choose you? Why would I care about your product claims? Why wouldn’t I just go elsewhere or go without?”. Your answer has to be able to be backed up and needs to be specific. To do this you need to know who exactly you're selling to. It’s not enough, for example, to say, “I want to sell to everyone that shops at Bunnings”. That is far too broad, and you will never be able to find a marketing message that will appeal to such a large audience. How exactly do you create an elevator pitch for everyone from 18 to 80? To market well you need to know your audience. To know your audience, you need to do research in order to tailor your message. It’s not a one-size-fits-all scenario. That’s why sending a generic sales pitch within five minutes of someone accepting your contact request on LinkedIn, for example, will always be an epic fail.
Persona development A way to determine who exactly it is you’re selling to is by developing buyer personas. A buyer persona is a fictional representation of your ideal customer. You’ll develop this persona on real research about your marketing sector, product or service category, and retail or wholesale trends. The better you know your customer the better you will be able to market to them and actually get them to choose you. It can be useful to have multiple buyer personas and to define demographic information (name, age, occupation, salary, location, education, family), goals and challenges and values and fears. This will give you an idea of what specific product or service would best suit them and help you to think of potential objections they might have. Remember you need to answer the questions “I’ve never heard of your product/service why would I choose you? Why would I care about your product claims? Why wouldn’t I just go elsewhere or go without?”.
Case Study
As an example, imagine that there is a brand called Argyle & Silk. Their tagline is ‘A Cut Above the Rest’ and they sell Professional Business Clothing for Men & Women Aged 25-35 on a retail basis. They currently have a flagship store, several local concessions and intend on expanding internationally in the near future. The flagship store is in Chapel Street with smaller stores in High Street and Camberwell. A clear demographic segmentation has been used and a psychographic dimension has been considered using factors such as personality, motives, and lifestyle because they necessarily impact on purchase choices of consumers. The aim of the brand is to develop the perception of Argyle & Silk as being the premier purveyor of sustainably sourced, ethically made, high-quality business apparel for socially conscious consumers. Given all the above and assumed research that would be done we could develop the following buyer personas.
So now that we’ve seen how to develop buyer personas, we can see how our product and services can be marketed using a marketing message that will appeal to our target market. Our elevator pitch will be vastly improved now, will be more impactful and hopefully lead to increased business and engagement online. We will no longer have the reputation of being a SPAM tsunami but rather a trusted brand or business that doesn’t have to resort to annoying or creepy tactics to be effective.