Marketing is a weapon that if used effectively can take your company to places you never imagined.But at the same time if not aligned well,it can become a total mess and waste for the company.It becomes a very crucial step for marketing managers to construct and develop their marketing mix after analysing the market and reading their competitors.
- Demographics: We need to understand what our market consists of and how do they react to different advertisements when brought to them.Not all the people are same and not all of them have the same choices.Your strategy might work in the up country but might totally torpedo itself in the south.So figuring out the mentality,dislikes/likes becomes the first step especially when you are working PAN India.Companies in their home ground generally perform well.The real test starts when you step out of it.For instance,an advertisement in one nation meant “Fly in leather” whereas once translated meant: Fly naked in Spanish.Vocabulary changes with nations so should your taglines.
- The Product and Its Market: Marketing strategies are driven not just by their customers but also by the product being promoted. For example, handing marketing in the education sector where schools and colleges are your major stakeholders is not easy.Marketing is limited here when compared to FMCG products in which everything and anything can be used as a marketing tool.In such a closed industry TV commercials,radio ads and outdoor campaigns don’t work as effectively in the education industry as probably email marketing or exhibitions/conferences do. It becomes important for the manager to understand the daily behaviour of the concerned target followed by situating the right promotional activity where possible.
- Budgeting and Freedom: It’s easier said than done. It only takes about an hour with your team to sit,brainstorm and get out of the room with 10 different mind boggling marketing ideas only to face the harsh reality of” shortage of funds”.Same goes with creativity and freedom. Your company might not necessarily be as open mouthed as Zomato, sometimes killing the creativity. A marketing manager needs to analyse the kind of budget and freedom he has in order to curate his strategy and further implement it.With limited budget you might restricted to only a certain number of ideas, not necessarily meaning poor marketing.Latest trend suggest the uprising of Guerilla marketing. Guerilla marketing is a technique where ample results are generated using the most economical ways. Very popular example of it being Flash Mobs. In the past 2 years, flash mobs have proved their existence and have been used by every other companies fetching them decent results.
- Channels and Content: Channels are basically medium or mode of marketing/promotion being used by a company. Channels vary from on ground campaigns to leveraging social media each having it’s distinct pro and con. If you are targeting millennials, probably giving advertisement in a newspaper is not such a great idea considering an average person spends almost 150 minutes on the social Media per day.Basically these channels need to be chosen according to the age group, paying capacity and interests etc. of your market. Second thing that has gained importance in the last 2 years is content. Now a days where our newspapers,magazines and televisions are filled with ads, there is need to stand out and not blend in. And the most effective way of doing so is to present strong content in the craziest way possible.
- Last but Not the Least: Vision: Where do you want to see your company after 5 years. Vision differs from one marketing manager to another considering his/her long term goals in alignment with the company objectives.One might looks at achieving faster sales and quick results for his company, at the same time other might look at the bigger picture and create a brand for itself. Both are correct on their part. So the vision becomes pivotal while creating your sales/marketing strategy for the upcoming year.
About Author
Naman Singhal, Co-founder at 3Dexter has an experience of more than 5 years in the field of education. Initial 2 years were spent for an NGO, teaching the under privileged kids and understanding the ground realities. And last 3 years have been spent revolutionizing the education sector with modern teaching methods as an eminent member at 3Dexter. He has a special inclination towards finance and investment related knowledge with respect to startups.
