P is for Pricing

Last week I was looking for flights from Brisbane to Rockhampton.

Flying the friendly skies

I know this will come as a shock to many, but Rocky is not the most popular holiday destination. The majority of travellers are either heading there for business or for family.  The purpose of my visit was the latter.

My mother is staying with her father for the week as we recently lost my grandmother.  I was looking at flights to stay with her and Grandpop for the Mothers Day weekend.  I found that the only flights I could get heading there under two hundred dollars were at 6am on Friday – therefore I would have to miss a day of work. When you work casually,  missing a day of work is not conducive with contributing financially to the household, which my partner wants me to do    In a nutshell, there were no flights on Saturday or Sunday at a reasonable price. My mum tells me that her flight there wasn’t even full. One passenger to a row.

What occurred to me was that I was priced out of travelling. But for the price of the tickets, I definitely would have spent the money on heading up for a spontaneous family weekend. From the perspective of the airline, is it worth it to them for these domestic short haul flights to price travellers out of flying? Especially when approximately 50% of the plane is empty.

What has this got to do with your business?

Is your business pricing your customers out of purchasing? Alternatively, are you not charging enough?  How long has it been since you looked at your pricing structure?

Let me know what you think. Have you had an experience similar to this?

Leona

Marketing is a long term strategy

It really is.  It takes time to grow your audience, customers and earn their loyalty.

You can make informed decisions now about where your market is  – such as searching for information on the web – but you can’t psychically know at what stage your potential customer is in their purchasing cycle when they come to you.  Sometimes, because of this,  you’ll probably spend money on something that may not pay off for your business. Actually it may pay off – but not when you want/need it to, which is naturally right now.

I’m not suggesting you lower your expectations of marketing and advertising for your small business – it does makes a huge difference.  But to be honest – the difference is made with marketing and advertising as long term investments – relying on consistency and thoughtful targeting. The short term scattergun approach is not the way to create the brand you want. By short term, I mean putting an advert in for one month and expecting long term results.

You’re Not the Only One….

Big corporations have huge budgets and factor their marketing and product development as long term investments. But not every dollar they’ve spent has yielded results.  Think about how much Coca-Cola spent on the “New Coke” debacle, how much Vegemite spent on iSnack 2.0, how much Tourism Australia spent on the “Where the bloody hell are you?” Its trial and error for big brands too.

The Good News

The benefit you have as a small business is the control and ability to adjust your message, pull advertising, push e-mail newsletters without having to spend weeks/months consulting with upper level management/purse strings to make those decisions. You are a flexible entity – able to adjust to market changes in the blink of an eye. Use this to your advantage.The idea is to maintain a consistent presence within your market to enable your consumer to find you easily when they want to buy.

Has  a quick fix ever worked for you?

A realistic approach to choosing your small business marketing

Lately I’ve read a crazy amount of articles on ways SME’s should be using advertising, marketing & public relations to get a Return on Investment in 2010. The recommendations, directives, success formulas, methods and guaranteed results are coming out of the woodworks. The sheer amount of content available is mind boggling.

Just in case you hoped or expected me to, I should let you know I’m not going to summarise those articles, or form them into some super-duper list.  However, I’m going to make the following statement and explain my reasoning.

With so much choice available – you won’t get what you want from your  marketing dollar.

A friend (thanks @mktgdouchebag) put me onto this brilliant preso from Psychologist Barry Schwartz on the paradox of choice, which succinctly summed up my feelings while reading one THOUSAND articles.

In a nutshell he says the following:

We have too much choice.  And because we live in a society that places a high value on having many choices; your expectations are now such that whatever choice you make, you’ll be disappointed.  You’ll believe that another option that was available to you would have yielded a better result. So, who do you blame? Yourself because the choice was yours. Not cool dude. Not cool at all.

So, how does this relate to you and your small business?

Well, at this very moment in time you are able to choose to market your business by advertising in national magazines, trade publications, newspapers, local media, television, radio, sponsorship, trade shows, exhibitions, news sites, social networks, pay per click, on blogs, on forums, direct mail, newsletters, bus shelters, billboards, A frames, catalogues, affiliate marketing and these are just a few of the myriad of options available to you.

The amount of choice you have for marketing your small business is enough to paralyse anyone into inaction.  Your expectations are so high as a result of the sheer volume of choice and the perceived value of having these options, you will invariably be disappointed once the decision is made. You will always be wondering if advertising in Yellow Pages really would have made a difference to your business. ( By the way…it wouldn’t have – see earlier post).

Here’s my solution to the paradox of choice in relation to small business marketing.  Forget about the number of options and choices. Take the time to research and find out where, when and who your customers are and go to them using the medium they use. Be consistent…building your business will take time.

Do you disagree/agree/not care/ or are you frozen by the choices I have given you?

Leona

P.S. If you want to know more about Barry Schwartz – click here. He wrote the book on the Paradox of Choice….literally.

Tags: psychology

Small Business Marketing on a Teeny Tiny Budget

Starting and running business can be, and usually is, a very costly exercise. Managing a businesses outgoings while enhancing your incomings is a balancing act that keeps many small business owners up late at night. One often forgotten challenge facing small business owner’s is the challenge of working on the business (ie. Marketing, looking for efficiencies etc) while working in the business, especially during those first few formative years.

To assist in spending a little less time wondering how to market your small business, see below for some excellent resources that may be applicable to your business and industry and may help get you started.

www.sourcebottle.com.au

This is a site that connects freelance writers and journo’s with credible sources. For example, in the case of a children’s clothing store; a journalist doing a feature on the latest fashions for under 5’s approaches Sourcebottle to assist in locating sources/products for their story. This gives you the opportunity to pitch to the journalist who is already keen to hear your ideas and see you product.  Genius for small business.

www.handleyourownpr.com.au

A great resource where you can purchase media lists with pre-qualified journalists. The lists are not prohibitively expensive and would be a good investment. Definitely use the advice centre when writing a media release or pitching a story. These lists are a precious resource not to be overused.

www.startupdonut.co.uk

Resource for small business. Although it’s British, they have great articles. You can sign up for e-mail newsletters so you can have their great tips delivered to you. There is also www.marketingdonut.co.uk for those interested only in marketing info. Below is a link to one of their articles about marketing on a budget.

10 Ways to Advertise on a Budget

www.networxevents.com.au

These events are networking and educational events for marketing, communications and business professionals. They cover a range of topics from marketing on a shoestring budget to the topic of the next event (19th November) on Memory and Memorability.

www.thehive.org.au

The Hive is a networking and educational group for entrepreneurs. It is an opportunity to hear from established business owners about their struggles and successes, while enjoying an opportunity to speak with other people in small business. A really great and well run event.

www.zerobudgetmarketingideas.blogspot.com

Last but not least, this blog is written by the founder of Networx and is a great resource for small business owners who are looking for ways to improve their marketing without the expense. Sign up for the newsletter. You will not regret it.

These are a few resources to help you find your way that won’t take a big chuck out of your budget.  I do recommend you set aside money in your budget for marketing. You don’t have to spend it all, but targeted marketing and advertising can really boost your business.

Best of luck,

Leona Skene

What Vegemite could learn from Smiths Chips…

After such a disastrous week for Vegemite, the analysis of where they strayed from the highly hopeful path of diversification has begun. I do feel sorry for the poor marketing/pr team.  Though, by not being available to the media is just adding to their woes at this stage. (Tim Burrowes 30.09.09)

Smiths Chips are currently running a competition to find the newest flavour to add to their repertoire.  They have utilised crowd sourced ideas, four of which have been decided on by an expert panel, including Matt Moran. Now, it is back to the public to vote a winner from those four.  User generated all the way!! Not like vegemite, who started with a good campaign, but then let people with no grasp of the ‘connected’ public make the final decision.

So Smiths Chips are at TWO stages during their promotion consulting with their target audience to find the right addition to their product line.  I believe if Vegemite had chosen a select number of entries from the 40+ thousand then asked the public to vote, they would have avoided this whole mess.

Vegemite have ended up looking like that uncle wearing a white pleather suit with piano key neck tie trying to get ‘down with’ the kids, while Smiths has and will remain scandal free during this promotion – and be very successful.

These bottles will be worth a fortune one day

@SBSnews is just now reporting that Vegemite will abandon the name and conduct a new poll. Its such a  shame. I really hope that this does not affect the long term growth of what is by all accounts, a good product.

I’m still going to buy isnack 2.0 as I believe the bottles will be worth a fortune one day soon

Leona Skene

Tags: #vegefail

What does the future hold. New business venture?

For those that are blissfully unaware, I’m three weeks away from handing in my Masters dissertation. I am stressed out of my brain and could probably single handedly support the Brisbane coffee trade and keep Cadbury in business (as an aside I like their old stuff better than their new stuff).

However, the thoughts that are plaguing me are naturally not those of the imminent end to my studies, but the future that follows.

I am currently contemplating starting my own integrated marketing and communication consultancy that specialises in small (very small) business. I have a great name, but that is about all. My research has hardly begun, my business plan is still garbled nonsense in my head and I have no idea the time it might take to get the business up and running.

My thoughts are currently running back and forth like a Wimbledon Final, between the risk of massive failure and celebrated success. Though my version of success at the moment involves being able to afford to fill the car up with petrol. Don’t judge me.

I would love to know if anyone else has struggled with their decision and what was the catalyst that made you decide to go ahead with starting your own business.  Bravo, by the way.

If you need marketing/communcations advice for your small business…. e-mail me. hehe

Thanks for reading,

Leona Skene

Tags: small business, start up

Welcome to Typo Townn – an advertiser’s nightmare

This morning while flicking through a real estate magazine (as if one day that penthouse on the river might be under $150,000), I came across an advert for a mother and son real estate agency. The image was great, the text was great and the advert itself was in a great position – however, one thing was blindingly clear.

There was a spelling mistake in the tagline.

The text was embroidered onto a Tshirt, which was the focal point of the gorgeous image.
Having made the assumption that no advertising or marketing agency was used here, I believe there would have been at least six people who could have stopped this mistake going to print, however none of these people caught it.

The six people I can identify are:
1) The owner of the real estate agency, who would have been sent proof after proof
2) The embroiderer, who sewed the wrong spelling onto the tshirt
3) The photographer who took the image
4) The advertising sales person from the magazine
5) The graphic designer who does the magazine layout
6) The editor of the magazine in which this was printed

Why then, when so many professionals are involved in making an advertisement happen, can something so obvious slip right past? The best thing you can do is to ensure you don’t make the mistake in the first place.

Some tips for ensuring correct copy in your communications:
1) Read your text out loud. This can make it easier to spot errors both in spelling and grammar
2) Proof read your own work
3) Use spell check. It’s there for a reason.
4) Ask a colleague to proof read your work. New eyes will look at your copy more objectively.

Comments and feedback? What other gatekeepers can you think of? Any other tips for proof reading?

Thanks,
Leona

Tags: Advertising, copywriting, small business

Good business is just like good coffee

Strong and hot???

Maybe not…
Many people will tell you how advertising, networking and other tools of the trade will automatically get you the results you want.

The awesome & consistent coffee at Campos

Well, its true that those tools will get you noticed, but what will turn those maybes into raving fans is the effort you put in once they are through your door.

You see an advert for coffee – you go out of your way to try it – and it’s awful…do you try again??

Your customers need to be receive your ‘great coffee’ the first time and everytime they walk through your door, or they will not be back! You’ve heard people say that consistency is key? Its so true when running a business.

A good business will spend the time communicating and imprinting the business core values to their team to ensure that the clients/customers expectations are managed.

Comments and feedback welcome.

Thanks,
Leona

Tags: management, marketing, small business

Small Business Marketing – Branding Tip #1

Say you have two levels of service/product that appeal to two very different markets in your small business.
By branding them differently, you can achieve reach to two very different markets – even if the product/service itself is not that different.

Using big business practice as an example of how this works; Unilever owns both Dove Deodorant and Lynx. By branding and advertising the two and giving them separate identities, they appeal to very different markets; even though the products themselves are very similar if not the same. Small businesses have the power to do the exact same thing with their own products or services.

A good example of how small business uses this branding technique is the tale of a friend of mine who owns a cafe. They wanted to branch out and do some high end catering but the name and brand of the cafe didn’t exactly scream class or elegance. So in order to get around this, they registered another business name and branded the catering service as something more suited to the clientele they wished to attract. They did have to factor in the costs of creating the new brand and any collateral this involved. However those costs were far outweighed by the calibre of client they attracted with their new brand.

Any comments or other ideas are welcome.

Thanks for reading,
Leona

Tags: branding, service branding, small business

Balancing Friends & Work

I’ve been doing a little “volunteer” work for a friend’s business – helping with the website writing and marketing planning for the future of the business.

It’s come to an end because my friend and I didn’t agree on the best way to manage the brand over the long term.  She didn’t agree with my advice and tried to argue with me.  I was not going to spend my very precious free time developing strategies and campaigns for someone who a) wasn’t paying and b) wasn’t appreciative.

We’re still friends and I do understand the pressure she’s under starting her own business- but have determined that its not healthy for one side of our relationship if the other side – (the business side) exists.

I would love to hear about your experiences regarding working with/for friends and how you balanced the two.

Thanks
Leona