It’s kind of obvious, but marketing messages must be interesting. Whatever the method or medium, ‘Be interesting’! Another way of putting it is ‘Don’t Be Dull’. Another way of putting it is ‘Get their attention and make them want to hear your message’.
Have you ever bought a product that you weren’t interested in? Probably. But no doubt it was something like toilet paper. Unless you are selling commodity items, you need to appear interesting to your potential customers. More accurately, your service or product needs to be interesting. Sex it up.
Tell your prospects something they have never heard before. Tell them how your goods will benefit them, how it will improve their life. Tell a story about it. Give a statistic - as long as it is relevant, and INTERESTING!
Francesco Consultancy is an interesting company, with interesting people, interesting customers and above all, interesting marketing solutions.
Here at Francesco Consultancy, we are passionate about the power of the internet for business. The ubiquity of the business website is so great that we are shocked to the point of dumfounded when we come across a client who has been running a business without having a website.
Clearly, some business models can operate reasonably well without an internet presence. In some cases, businesses set up a website just for the sake of having one. Most small business websites will be static, acting like a digital business card.
The problem is when businesses need to market themselves. They need to grow, release a new product line, expand. They may be experiencing increased competition. More to the point, there may be a global financial crisis, resulting in a contraction in all economic activity! What is your website going to do about that?!
To use the internet for marketing requires marketing thinking, effort and commitment. All of which will pay dividends for your business. The Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB), highlight a variety of benefits to internet marketing:
“Internet marketing allows you to engage consumers at every stage of the consideration process. Unlike most other media, the internet can be influential at both the point of interest in a product and the point of purchase. Online can build awareness, provide detailed information, gain registrations, build a customer base and of course, display products.”
Content is vital. Your website can be a respository for content that is relevant and interesting to the people who you want to buy your wares. A blog is a way of engaging prospective customers by finding common ground. Twitter is a good tool for raising awareness.
Search enginge optimisation (SEO) is another way to get the internet to work for you. If your website is correctly structured, relevant and up to date, you will climb above your competitors in the major search engines. SEO is a complicated business technologically speaking. Fortunately Francesco Consultancy can provide sensible and straightforward advice.
If you want a business website, we can do that. If you want an effective internet marketing strategy, contact Francesco Consultancy today.
Many established businesses we have spoken to have uttered the phrase “We don’t do marketing”. Quite often, smaller firms go about their business carrying out day-to-day operations, not considering a [management-speak alert] ‘bigger picture’. This happens with varying degrees of success.
The fact is that even if you don’t think you are doing marketing, you are doing marketing. If you are in business, selling goods or services to customers, you are in a market. Somehow, the customer has found you and you have managed to inform them of the qualities and the price of your wares. It’s hard to think of this objectively when you are making the sale, but this is ‘the bigger picture’.
Marketing Strategy? Once upon a time you decided to sell a product or provide a service. You will have decided where to ‘set up shop’. You will have thought about who would want to buy your stuff. This is the beginnings of a marketing strategy.
Even the seemingly mundane things are part of your marketing mix. The way you answer the phone, the way you present your merchandise, the appearance of your staff, the way you do transactions - all of this is marketing.
The trick is to make thinking about these things part of the way you run your business. Conveying the right messages to customers, promoting your products and presenting your company in the best possible way should be a day-to-day thing. Marketing needs to be at the forefront of the minds of all staff, not just the boss.
Those who say ‘We don’t do marketing’, probably mean ‘We don’t do marketing well, or enough’, or ‘We don’t do advertising’. What they should say is ‘We will ‘do’ Marketing, starting today’.
If you need help marketing your business, contact John at Francesco Consultancy on 0844 292 0842.
Not that we are obsessed with Apple here at Francesco, but we can’t overlook yesterday’s news that Apple’s share price is at it’s highest ever. The firm have already sold 9 million iPhones in 2010 and it’s first quarter takings were $13.5bn. BBC news reported that Apple is now making almost as much money as Goldman Sachs.
The iPhone is still at the centre of this amazing performance. Sales of the device will continue to grow in 2010 and 2011 according to analyst’s estimates Francesco has seen. We love the iPhone here at Francesco Consultancy and are constantly on the look out for opportunities to develop fun and innovative apps. Long live the iPhone we say.
Apple’s computers are also selling pretty well. What is even more impressive about these results is that these figures pre-date the launch of the iPad.
Stay tuned to our blog, it’s not always about Apple!
Apple must be pretty pleased by the news that the prime minister of Norway was using an iPad to run the country. Norwegian premier Jens Stoltenberg has been stuck in New York due to the volcano-related flight ban. Undeterred he has been keeping the wheels of power in motion using Apple’s new tablet device.
Governing a nation? There’s an app for that!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/apple/7606722/Volcanic-ash-cloud-Trapped-Norwegian-PM-ran-country-on-iPad.html
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