Why Market Your Market?

The purpose of marketing is to introduce and promote your products and services to potential customers. For your business to succeed, people need to know about it. Marketing creates the awareness necessary for increasing sales and establishing customer relationships (which prompt them to return and to continue purchasing from your business, versus competitors’). As your awareness grows, customers begin to spread the word – establishing word-of-mouth marketing. Marketing also creates brand name recognition. If your business meets customer expectations, it will develop a positive reputation. Marketing efforts support this, by communicating to customers why they are right to choose you! It gives them the extra confidence they need to make the purchase … and the complementary purchases! It gives your business a competitive advantage by informing potential customers that you are their best option.

To make the most of your marketing strategy, it helps to use a wide variety of platforms. A few options include website development, public relations, print and broadcast advertising, endorsements, trade shows, special events, and social media. Creativity is key! With so many different options, you will want to use your creativity to discover which platforms work best for your business. Looking at your marketing budget will give you a good idea of where to start … can you guess why social media marketing is so popular?

To design effective marketing materials, you need to first ask yourself, “Who is my target market?” Understanding the answer to that question will be the difference between a successful marketing campaign and an unsuccessful one. To really know whether your efforts are successful or not, make sure to track them. Set specific goals. Know what you want to gain from each marketing effort. By keeping track of click-throughs, numbers of coupon sales, increases in sales on an item you recently marketed, etc., you can use numbers to see spikes in sales. If one effort reaches or exceeds your goals, record it. Use it in the future. If another effort hardly makes a dent, record that as well. Remember that it wasn’t so successful. Go back and figure out what exactly it was that didn’t work well and fix the problem. As with any other part of your business, following through on your marketing efforts is crucial! So, instead of sending out an ad or tweet or email and checking it off your list, you need to track your efforts.

Your customers know what works best, so why not ask them? Surveys, when done correctly, can give you some of the most beneficial information you can gain. Ask the people you are targeting what they want, how they want to receive information, what convinces them to make a purchase, etc. Chances are, someone wants their opinion heard – take advantage of this opportunity to gain valuable insights into that very first question: “Who is my target market?”

A Final Recap:

• Marketing convinces customers to choose you.
• Ask yourself “Who is my target market?”
• Be creative when choosing marketing platforms.
• Track your efforts and follow through.
• Ask your customers what they want.

Socialize to Success

As a company, using social media can bring in more traffic, connections, conversations, and customers… and ultimately more success! In 2014, 92% of marketers stated that social media was important for their business, according to Hubspot.

Here are 10 reasons why social media marketing is important for YOUR business:

1. Customer Insights

Social media gives you an incredible opportunity to learn about your audience! There are tools that allow you to understand exactly who is viewing your content. See their demographics, locations, devices and browsers they used, patterns that led them to your content and more. You can pin-point your target market, and deliver new content that better addresses their needs.

You can also see what customers think about your company. Read comments! People are not afraid to speak their minds on social media. It is a great resource for instant feedback. If someone has an issue, use the opportunity to comment back and mend the customer relationship. If someone really enjoys your service or product, let them know you appreciate the recognition and offer them more.

2. New Customers

Finding new customer is a cinch! Search keywords related to your business to find people already talking about it – you can invite them to try your service or products.

Having your company talked about on social media can expand your click-throughs like wildfire! One person you know might mention your products, which will be seen and possibly talked about by one of their connections and one of their connections and so on… The sooner you begin, the sooner your audience will grow. Make sure to reach out to anyone clicking through to your website – start the conversation!

3. Brand Recognition, Authority & Loyalty

Social media ultimately increases your visibility. The more you are out there for people to see, the more people will recognize your brand. This one is simple!

When people post on social media about your brand, other potential customers will follow you. The more your brand is talked about, the more authoritative and valuable it will seem.

Increase your brand loyalty by building customer relationships. Social media is a platform that allows you to appreciate recognition and resolve dissatisfaction. By proving to customers that you really care about them and are a “good” company, they will choose to purchase from you again.

4. Conversions

Every single post, tweet, status, picture, comment, etc. can lead to a click-through to your website and a conversion. Every opportunity matters! Using social media is an excellent source for humanizing your company. Your company gets to act like a person and people like to work with people.

5. Website Traffic

Without social media, the majority of people looking at your website are already familiar with it. Every profile you create is another path back to your website. Make sure you post quality content and use keywords and tags to increase your viewers and your website traffic.

6. SEO

Search engines calculate rankings using social media as a significant factor! Since most strong brands use social media, your company becomes more credible when you use it too. However, it isn’t enough to simply have profiles. Again, you need to post quality content and use keywords and tags.

7. Competitor Intelligence

Gain insights on your competitors by searching them on social media. Learn not just about their products and services, but also about their upcoming events, their marketing strategy and their customer relationships. Having this knowledge gives you the ability to make strategic decisions to stay ahead of the competition.

8. Fast & Easy Content

Creating and sending out emails, mail, newsletters, etc. might be important to your business, but it isn’t exactly quick! Post content instantly on social media. Quit wasting time and get your company out there, now.

9. Low Marketing Cost

Social media is FREE. Yes, there are options to pay for additional advertising and plans, but you can get started for no cost at all! Once you get a better idea of your voice and expectations from social media, you can begin to increase the budget and conversions.

The labor cost can be low, as well. An article on Hubspot said that 84% of marketers found as little as 6 hours of effort per week to be enough to increase traffic. Create meaningful, quality content for only about 1 hour each day and you will see results.

10. Loss is Insignificant

Your company really has nothing to lose by using social media. Time and money spent is minimal. When used correctly, social media marketing leads to more traffic, conversions and success!

Check out our resources: Hootsuite and Forbes

For more insights, go to our website at 32Market.com

& Let’s get social!

Marketing FAILS!!

Marketing fails are made all the time! Some of them seem so obvious, it’s hard to believe anyone could make the mistakes. While creating marketing material and campaigns, it is crucial to consider the context in which it will be used, the placement near other ads, and the current events that might put a dark cloud over the intended humor. Some marketing fails can have detrimental effects on a company, which is why it’s so important to take the time to catch mistakes before they are published. In other cases, marketing fails might simply cause laughter.

Take a look at these:

After BP’s major oil spill

Never handwrite signs!!

These are funny, however we understand the importance of proper and successful marketing and of checking and double checking our work before printing. We can assure you that with Three Square Market, you will never have to worry about marketing fails!

Opening a Successful Market – By Marketing …

Congratulations! You have signed a contract for a new market location, and you’ve worked out all the equipment, set-up, kiosk and product details with your distributors, suppliers and 32M staff.

Question: How do you make sure that the opening is a success?  Answer: Marketing!

– Your market is only new once!  You should capitalize on the new and trendy aspects of your micro market – it will never be as relevant as it is right now!

– If you don’t instruct customers how to use the market in a clear and simple message – some potential customers might not even try it.

– You are making an investment into you business with this market, and why wouldn’t you do everything possible to gain ROI as quickly as you can?

To make the most out of your new location utilize a marketing plan!
Marketing/Advertising is like the icing on the cake – the cake is good without it, but without the beautiful decoration and delicious taste the icing provides how many really want to try it?

Here are some quick marketing solutions that we suggest you employ with your new market location: 

1) Make your future customers aware of the market prior to your grand opening by using temporary banners, posters, flyers, and email messaging that will prepare and excite employees at the location.

2) Create or purchase a “Launch Marketing Packet” from 32M – to put the icing on your cake.  Launch marketing should include: Instructional Guides about market features, hand-outs, and colorful displays to attract attention.  To purchases a “Launch Marketing Packet” for your location go to 32MarketStore.com.

3) You!  Have a friendly face at your location for the first 24-48 hours so that you can assist customers and help them to realize the great benefits and products you are providing!

4) Have a sampling!  Or call it an Open-House! This is a great option at any time for new products that you are bringing in.  Doing a sampling will draw in customers and create demand for a product and thus a demand for your market.

5) Offer promotions or prizes for using the market.  Offering a discount or giving out $5 in market cash for the first X-amount of customers may seem  like a lot, but in reality it is the greatest form of promotion you can supply.

a) it’s easy to do
b) nothing motivates people like free money!

Other tips and tricks: 

Think about what draws your attention at a store. Is it the 50% discount and cash savings, the smiling faces of the friendly and helpful employees, the beauty and the allure of the location?  All of these are factors that motivate buyers.  It’s important to remember that all buyers are different and to be successful in “casting a wide net” you should cover all aspects!