As per definition, marketing strategy is, “A long-term, forward-looking approach and an overall plan of any business or organization with a fundamental goal of achieving a sustainable competitive advantage by understanding the needs and wants of the customer.”
But the question is how to make it effective? Effective marketing strategy starts with a considered, well-informed marketing strategy.
Marketing strategy affects the way you run your business, so it should be planned and developed in consultation with your team.
It is a wide-reaching and comprehensive strategic planning process that includes:
- Understanding consumer.
- Analyzing market.
- Analyzing competition.
- Research distribution.
- Define the marketing mix.
- Financial analysis.
- Review and Revise.
Each business is in a unique situation in terms of its sales growth, top-line sales, profit margin, etc. and each entrepreneur collaborates to build an effective strategy for moving forward.
Here are few things to be kept in mind while making effective marketing strategy-
1. Strong storyline: No matter what plan is put into place; the basis of a successful implementation is founded upon the existence of a strong storyline. You should be clear in your mind about what do you and your company stand for?
2. Build an emotional connection: In a competitive market, you need to have strong relationships with potential customers before they make a purchase decision. Building and maintaining a relationship with existing customers happens naturally—but making connections with potential customers requires more effort. Understand customers’ emotional drives that eventually become raving fans.
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3. It should be consumer-centric: At its core, every organization or business exists to fulfill certain needs, solve certain problems, and meet certain demands. If there are no customers for what your company produces or offers, there’s no point in running your business. A customer-centric organization is where every process starts and ends with customer satisfaction in mind.
4. It should be multi-channeled and multi-platformed: Whatever plan you put into place, it also needs to be multi-channeled and exist on multiple platforms. This will make you reach your customers easily. You want to reach them through different platforms like Facebook, AdWords and also advertise it on Instagram or YouTube and anywhere else they might congregate. This is the power of being multi-channeled and multi-platformed, you are effectively following them around everywhere on the internet after they’ve shown interest in your business, it helps to convert them from prospective buyers to buyers.
5. Scaling is a good idea: Any effective marketing strategy must be scalable. Scalability, whether it is in a financial context or within a context of business strategy, describes a company’s ability to grow without being hampered by its structure or available resources when faced with increased production. Small steps should be taken before a big spend. Once you have an offer that converts, you can scale that offer to infinity. Afterward, the more you spend, the more you make. But it should be scalable and should make a profit.
6. Agility is a must: Agile organizations are performance-oriented by nature. They explore new performance-and consequence-management approaches based on shared goals across the end-to-end work of a specific process or service and measure business impact rather than activity. When a business fails to adapt and be agile enough to change market climates or increasing competition, they fail. Do not over-commit or be so established that you are unable to pivot whenever necessary.
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7. Support thought-leaders: Thought leaders are influencers who help in influencer marketing. It is not just about thought-leaders but power-users. These people can help us spread our word in the most creative ways. However, it is not that easy to get in touch with them but once you get the right thought-leader on board there’s no one stopping you. You can take your marketing to reach the next level. That is why celebrities and influencers are paid a big amount of money because companies know that this will enhance their sales with the right endorsement from the right person.
Melon DxB is a full-service Marketing & Advertising agency in Dubai, focuses on delivering service and solutions that draw more potential customers to your brand. We add value to your campaigns and work closely with brands to fulfill marketing objectives.