How successful are your marketing communications?
Get ahead of the competition…
Marketing communications is about the promotion of an organisation and its products and services. Advertising some might say! Advertising is certainly a part of it, but it also embraces sales promotion, personal selling, public relations, sponsorship, packaging and the brand. Typically PR, market research, sales and communication departments have operated in silos. Today the emphasis is much more on the integration of all these different functions.
To successfully market your company and its products and services there are a number of things to consider:
- Your target market
- The size and geographic dispersion of your market
- Buying behaviour of your market
- What you want to achieve
- The budget you have available
- External influences, such as social and economic conditions at the time.
Marketing communications is vital for reaching your customers and successful businesses have realised that building a loyal customer base needs targeted marketing communications in their business strategy.
A good advert can achieve limited success. A poor quality product or service says more to the customer than any amount of advertising. The price of a product or service communicates its value and the place where you buy the product or service communicates its worth - which is why it is important to understand the expectations of your market. Getting all the elements right can prove very successful. Next time you rush to put that advert in the newspaper, ask yourself some of these questions:
- Who is the message targeted at?
- Will this message reach the right market in this medium?
- What is the message looking to achieve?
- What image do you want the customer to retain?
- Is the message being delivered in the right way?
- Does the message ask customers to take action?
- Are systems in place to meet the requirements of that customer action?
- How are you going to measure the success of this message?
Do you need help creating a marketing plan or to review your communications strategy? With over ten years experience helping companies improve communications with their customers and employees, First Impression is your one stop shop for communications. Improve your marketing communications and give us a call now on 0870 204 8507 or email contact@firstimpression.co.uk or visit our web site www.firstimpression.co.uk.
