|
The
profitability of a business depends largely if not
totally on marketing. But what is marketing, anyway?
There are many definitions. Here’s a simple one:
Marketing
is doing what it takes to convince enough customers to
pay the necessary price for your products and/or
services to produce the desired profits for the
business.
I’ll
tell you eight secrets that will improve your success.
Secret
No. 1: Give marketing top priority. The primary reason
any customer chooses to come to you is because of
effective marketing. The marketing process starts at the
very beginning and continues forever; it’s often
expressed as “The Four P’s.”
Ensure
that the product (in most cases, for rental companies
service is the “product”) fills a need, so potential
customers will want to buy it.
The
next step: price the product or service to ensure that
customers will perceive the price to be less than the
value of the benefits they receive, and that the
business will be profitable.
Effective
positioning allows potential customers easy interaction
with the business to evaluate the product or service.
Finally,
promotion: the business tells potential customers about
the benefits of its products/services to entice them to
learn more.
When
customers perceive that value exceeds price, it’s
called “sales.” You generate successful sales only
because you completed the marketing process well.
Secret
No. 2: Do not confuse advertising with marketing.
Advertising is only a part of the last marketing step,
promotion, and it occurs late in the game.
Secret
No. 3: Do not base your marketing solely on your own
opinions and desires. Business owners sometimes believe
their power, as the boss, gives them freedom of choice
and they don’t have to deal with the opinions of
others. Your job is to convince the customer to buy your
service product. Focus on fulfilling the perceived wants
and needs of your customers, from their perspective, not
yours. Ask them. And ask your employees — especially
those who deal most often and most directly with the
customer: the counter and yard people.
Secret
No. 4: Learn all you can about your potential customers.
Conduct in-depth market research. Learn everything
possible about who your potential customers are, what
your potential customers want to buy, why they buy, how
they buy and when they buy.
Secret
No. 5: Screen out undesirable customers. You have the
right and obligation to determine which potential
customers you will agree to serve. Screen out
undesirable customers early so you can focus on those
you want to serve.
You
may not know how to select desirable customers from the
pool of potential customers. As a result, you spend too
much time, money and energy trying to deal with a
handful of hard-to-please customers who frequently
demand lower prices at the expense of better customers,
who go elsewhere because they were ignored. Decide the
key criteria to identify the customers you want.
Secret
No. 6: Know and appreciate the value of your existing
customers. You may often become so focused on getting
new customers you ignore your existing, repeat
customers. Your business will probably not survive
without repeat business. Repeat customers represent a
wealth of opportunity. They frequently provide excellent
feedback, reference and referral service; they are the
least expensive and most likely source of additional
business — losing them causes substantial damage.
Upset customers will complain to at least five, perhaps
as many as nine others — do the math. Stay close to
your existing customers and learn as much as you can
from them.
Secret
No. 7: Create a positive identity that is distinct from
your competitors. Most customers compare. They need a
good reason to choose your product or service over
others. Understand your competitors extremely well and
position your products or services for positive customer
comparison.
Secret
No. 8: Consider the overwhelming power that emotion has
on the process of deciding to buy. The entire buying
process is governed by emotional forces — some say
more than 80 percent of the entire process is emotional.
Yet
you probably focus your energies on price and avoid the
real emotional reasons customers will buy. You should
know and feel the emotional connection your potential
customers will attach to your business, your products
and/or services, and the way customers interact with
your business. You will want your entire marketing
program to address the emotional issues to attract and
keep the right customers.
The
normal human thinking process of deciding to do business
with one company instead of another almost always starts
with an emotional need. The customer needs to fill it.
The search for and evaluation of the possible choices
are also frequently emotional.
The
price issue comes in near the end and, in reality, the
customer wants to know the price to help justify the
emotional decision he or she has already made. Business
owners succeed when they know how to deal with this
emotional process. |
