Post #6: Build a Foundation!

The importance of the 5 success steps in online marketing.

There are 5 different points of proven online marketing: credibility, usability, visibility, sellability, and scalability each of which can apply to any website and business. All points combine to create an effective and efficient marketing machine for your website or business, so it is critical when starting a new marketing plan that each of these areas meet together making a congruent marketing plan.

Credibility makes you trustworthy and can build people’s confidence in you knowing what you are talking about and selling. It is also the beginning of a platform for you and your customers to have conversations and connecting on more human style interactions.

You will see that usability is self-explanatory. The people you are targeting need to be able to find the resources on your site that they need. Use common sense and simplicity to encourage people to return. This includes links to other social media sites where you are active, email signups, other resources, and blogs. Usability can help you stand out and provides a recognizable experience for the user.

Getting more visible can start by simply having an online presence. This is boosted in other ways as well, such as buying advertisements online, multiple social media presences, and by just continuously updating blogs and other helpful resources.

Sellability is all about getting the right message out in the world. The message should be the selling point of your product. This includes things like testimonials, why it is of value, tutorials, and anything that helps explains the reason someone should buy your product.

Bring these points altogether and you get scalability. This way you won’t be surprised with new techniques as your audience grows. This way as time continues your message, resources, and trustworthiness only grows. When starting these points together your message won’t need much modification in the future saving time and money.

The importance of understanding target markets.

Even though you may want everyone to buy your product but not everyone is the best to buy your product. Because of this, you want to build a target market. A target market is about knowing who the best people to buy your product are and to target them specifically in your marketing. The best way to understand a target market is to come up with the profile of this customer.  

The profile you build is technically fiction but should be very specific. Think to include details like geography, race, sex, age, income, and employment. This helps maximize the effect of your marketing in an efficient way. When you have a target market, you know whom you want to spend time on in order to get them to buy your product. Think of trying to pitch your product to everyone, that would be a strenuous process, and not everyone is going to buy it. With target marketing you only try to sell to those who are the most likely to buy the product.

Having a complete profile and understanding it can give you and your team an edge in marketing. When you blog, you have a better idea of what your target market might be more interested in reading. You will know what social platforms you should be more active. All of this makes you a more effective and efficient marketer.

My plans.

I love the idea of a blog but I think the best way to start by going through the 5 points of marketing. I think doing that thoroughly will make it, as the last point states, scalable. I would start obviously with the first point and find a way to build credibility. Obviously, thinking to myself now, I will need to decide what I want to do in order to know what I need credibility in. Then, build the website in a functional way that fits with the target audience. Now, we are back to the blog with visibility. I would combine sell ability with designing the target market. For now, I can do homework and see where it leads.