Today, brands such as Pepsi, Coca-Cola, Ikea, Snickers and many others are known to every consumer. But they started from the smallest, being created as a small family business. But the right marketing campaign allowed them to achieve more. Competent marketing moves have done their job, and now these companies are known not only in their homeland, but also far beyond its borders.
Golden Selling Principles
In order to increase the number of customers, and therefore sales, you need to pay attention to the problems and needs of consumers, and also remember to remind yourself. Every successful marketing move is preceded by the golden principles of sales:
- Sponsorship and word of mouth. The more a business owner will sponsor small events in his city, the more visitors he will receive. People tend to share news.
- Branding on the Web. It is very important not to forgetabout the promotion of goods/services on Internet platforms, since every year people increasingly begin to make purchases without leaving their computer monitors.
- Demonstration. Perhaps one of the main strategies for attracting customers. The consumer needs to present his product, for example, you can organize a tasting or give out trial samples.
- Satisfying needs. Every product or service that enters the market must solve consumer problems. If a person gets what he needs, he will definitely return, and regular customers are the key to success.
- Analysis and optimization. You can't stop there. You need to constantly explore the market and introduce new ideas. Consumers are not a stable substance, their requests and needs are constantly changing, and you need to keep up with these changes.
- Marketing research. Only after analyzing the market, you can make an effective marketing move.
- Remind yourself. It is necessary to focus the company's activities on long-term cooperation with consumers, so do not forget about the memorable logo, slogan and image of the corporation as a whole.
Eight moves
To attract customers, companies most often use the following actions:
- Calling databases of "cold" clients. This allows you to find out if there is a need for a particular product, as well as tell about your assortment.
- Affiliate programs. To increase sales, the Internet is increasingly used, companies resort to the help of partnerprograms that help reach the target audience and distribute advertising information.
- Assortment and prices. It is very important to keep track of the sales season. Of course, there are goods that the buyer needs all year round, but there are also those that are in demand only during a certain time period. Therefore, in order not to be left without profit in the off season, you can change the assortment, reduce prices or hold a promotion.
- Local sale. If the corporation's network has a store that customers bypass, that is, it brings the least profit, a local sale would be an excellent marketing ploy. It is necessary to notify customers in advance that this particular store will have a sale of goods.
- Advertising and sweepstakes. There is no such person who refuses a freebie. Therefore, it is important to hold draws with subsequent advertising. This marketing ploy is very popular on social networks, where you need to share a promotional post to enter the drawing of a product or service.
- Active in social networks.
- Introduction of new products. Man is such a creature that he eventually gets tired of the same product, so you need to take care of creating something unusual, interesting, in demand and useful.
- Coupon service. Offer discount coupons to potential customers.
Advertising
Such marketing moves are known to every entrepreneur. You could even say that this is a classic of the genre. But to become a well-known firm, thisnot enough. You won’t get far on marketing alone, it is important to pay attention to advertising, and it is better to attract a specialist in your field for this purpose. If an entrepreneur can cope with marketing functions on his own, then advertising is the lot of the elite.
Marketing and advertising are initially complementary phenomena: with the help of marketing, you can determine the needs of customers, while advertising focuses on them. Depending on what image the brand will have, the number of sales will increase or decrease. Each advertising campaign must answer the question of what kind of product it is and who it is intended for. For example, 25 years ago, Leo Barnett created an ad for Marlboro cigarettes that had a cowboy image. Even today they are considered the best-selling in the world.
Thus, marketing and advertising should complement each other qualitatively, attracting as many buyers as possible. To understand how this "kitchen" works, it is better to give a few popular examples of product or brand promotion. Then it will be possible to realize how important marketing moves are in trade and advertising.
Camel Offensive
Camel became famous for its non-standard marketing move. It was difficult to surprise smoking America with some new tobacco product, but marketers did not give up. One fine morning, an unusual announcement appeared in all cities of the United States with one word: "Camels." A week later, they were replaced by no less intriguing announcements: “Camels are coming.”
The day before the cigarettes were supposed to hit the market, the labels were changed again, finally arousing human curiosity. Now the announcements were extinguished: “Tomorrow there will be more camels in the city than in Asia and Africa combined!” On the day the cigarettes hit the market, the same ads were changed again: "Camel cigarettes are already in town." This message removed the tension that had grown from curiosity, the Americans laughed at such a ending and eagerly tried new cigarettes.
Battery not dead
Red Bull also became famous with a well-known marketing ploy. When this company first appeared on the market, the niche of energy and tonic drinks was already occupied by the brands Molson, Pepsi, Labatt and Coca-Cola. Of course, these products were not pure energy, but in advertising there were references to the tonic effect.
The advertising campaigner, Dietrich Mateschnitz, knew perfectly well that it was impossible to stand on a par with these giants using standard marketing tricks. Therefore, the following was proposed: to reduce the volume of the can and make it look like a battery, which hints at being charged, and, of course, double the price. Therefore, the advertising campaign was not expensive, and such “batteries” were placed in stores in the most non-standard places (however, this tradition has survived to this day).
Also, Mateshnits suggested handing out boxes of drinks for free near student buildings, this is practiced andstill. In addition, the company sponsors various youth events, tactfully silent about the fact that students prefer to mix energy drinks with vodka.
As a result, marketers have gained independent positioning of the product in the market and created their own niche that distinguishes them from other drinks.
Increase sales
An interesting marketing ploy to increase sales was used by Alkaseltzer. In the 60s of the last century, an advertisement appeared on TV screens, in which they began to throw not one, but two pills into the water. As a result, the number of sales doubled.
Also, in order to increase sales, you need to properly target advertising campaigns to the needs of consumers and understand the mentality of the country where the new product comes from abroad. For example, in 1992, a Snickers bar appeared on the shelves of the domestic market. At first it was advertised as a snack that can replace lunch or dinner. However, the domestic consumer did not understand how a chocolate bar could replace soup, so the bar was bought as a dessert for tea. Seeing this state of affairs, marketers changed their advertising strategy, focusing it on teenagers. These children do not like soups, but they love sweets. This successful marketing ploy made the product a success.
Other marketing features
In the 80s of the last century, the now famous company Timberland was going through hard times. Pumps, although they were of high quality, comfortable and inexpensive, were poorly bought. Then the company made a simple and effective decision: set the price higher than that of competitors. As a result, sales increased, because the more expensive the product, the more desirable it becomes.
An interesting marketing ploy used by Thomas Dewar, selling Dewar's whiskey. In 19th century London, drinks such as brandy, rum and gin were popular. Selling whiskey was unprofitable and very difficult. Dewar, the founder of the Dewar's brand, took a very unexpected move to attract customers.
Thomas hired front buyers who went to pubs and asked if Dewar's whiskey was on sale. Of course, this drink was not available, and the sham buyers left in frustrated feelings. After some time, Thomas Dewar himself began to appear in pubs and offered to conclude a contract for the supply of whiskey. In two years of work, its turnover has grown 10 times.
Full failure
We have given only some examples of marketing moves. Good luck, of course. But such events are not always successful. Even the largest and most popular companies from time to time bring to the market a product that does not bring them the desired profit and success. This happens for many reasons, but most often because marketers do not pay attention to the little things, such mistakes later become fatal.
At one time, even Apple "screwed up". In 2010, she launched the Ping music community network. Steve Jobs assured that this service would become number one for listening to iTunes music. True, this service could not compete with Twitter and Facebook.
iTunes users withoutthe launch of the Ping social network was particularly enthusiastic. It was possible to follow the creative achievements and public life of your favorite artists, as well as watch how the musical tastes of friends change and make personal charts. Launch day was September 3rd, with company vice president Eddie Cue announcing that a third of iTunes users had already joined Ping. But the matter did not go further than this. The next day, a lot of spam and fake profiles of musicians appeared on the social network. Journalists also reacted with coolness to this service. The failure was evident even in 2010: Ping had few artists registered, was available in fewer than ten countries, and was not integrated with Facebook because Zuckerberg had imposed onerous conditions (or so Jobs thought).
In mindless agony, Ping lasted another two years, until it was declared a failure in 2012. The social network died quietly on September 30, leaving behind a farewell message: “Thank you for your interest in Ping. We are no longer accepting new users.”
Failed New Coke
The Coca-Cola Company also experienced defeat when it tried to increase the number of buyers. In the mid-1980s, Roberto Gazuete, who was considered the most successful sales manager of the 20th century, became known as the "chief fool" as he tried to replace Coca-Cola with "New Cola".
Basically, it was done right: New Coke went through hundreds of tastings, the results of which said that it was slightly sweetertaste is sure to be the key to success with consumers. But when the company announced that the new cola would permanently replace the old one, customers rebelled because they weren't given a choice. They stopped buying a new drink purely out of principle.
Skeleton
Danone's slogan sounds interesting enough: "Take care of your skeleton, kids." It seems to be nothing bad, but when a skull, skeletons and crossbones are painted on fermented milk products, it is too gothic. Representatives of the Danone company believed that such a design and slogan would attract Russian teenagers, but the “terrible” yogurts did not cause much enthusiasm.
Worse than that: such packaging scared the parents of the main target audience. A resident of Moscow even filed a lawsuit against Danone, demanding to stop producing products, which has a devastating effect on the child's psyche. The Russian Orthodox Church is also outraged by this, considering such packaging an outrage against the dead. Later, the Expert Commission on the Ethics of Social Advertising joined in and convinced the company to stop producing this brand in Russia.
It is worth noting that this is not the first time Danone misses the mark with the name of products entering the domestic market. In the 90s, the slogan of advertising baby food “Bledina is everything your child needs” was repeated by the whole country, only parents were not particularly eager to buy an “indecent” product for their babies.
Any marketing move requires preliminary preparation. You need to carefully study the market, consumer needs and eventhe mentality of a separate region, so as not to fall into the dirt face. Starting small can lead to great heights, but for this you need to work, and not rely on luck.
