How many different marketing types do you use?

[PromoAde]

I read recently that it's a good idea to use at 7 different types of marketing in your business. ie, flyers, magazine adverts, referral etc.

At the moment, we only use one! Adwords.
It works for us, but I like the idea of using several different areas
to advertise.

How many types do other members use? Which works for you?

[jamiebaxter]

ONE? Nah use many but be smart and use the ones that are free or dont cost much like facebook, youtube and classfieds marketing.

[Christiane]

I use maybe 5 or 6. You should try a few types then put your money in those that work for you and your type of business. It took me 3 years of trying various things but I now know where my marketing money should go.

[BootCamp]

We'll be using flyers, banners, magazine ads, posters and flyering in person in city centres

[davidshaw89]

I don't want to cause offence to anyone who has previously posted, but:

you can't pluck a number out of the sky and say "you must use x types of marketing". Every business is different. What works for one business may not necessarily work for another.

The most important thing is that you test your marketing thoroughly. One piece of marketing that leads to 20 conversions, could be better than 20 pieces of marketing leading to 20 conversions, for example.

More is not necessarily better, especially if they are not effective.

Another thing is the cost of marketing - you can't just say "free marketing is best" or "paid marketing is best" - as I said, it depends on your business.

There are many great free marketing techniques, such as press releases! which, by the way, will probably work a lot better than an advert in the very same news paper (due to the trust factor of someone else writing it).
The same goes for paid marketing; PPC is extremely cost effective if implemented properly, and longer term forms of marketing such as SEO/SEM.

But as I said, you will never know what is most effective for your business unless you continually test and tweak!

Cheers,

[PromoAde]

I agree there is no magic number. But I think it is more fun to use quite a few, it would allow for more creativity allows for experimentation.

[BusinessIdeas]

I get lots of referrals so I dont need to market my main business (small cash loans) :) Gina

[davidshaw89]

I agree there is no magic number. But I think it is more fun to use quite a few, it would allow for more creativity allows for experimentation.

Definitely. I completely agree that more than one marketing method is essential in most cases.

What I was trying to get at is that without testing, you might as well not waste your money on marketing. For all you know, all your revenue could be coming from one source, while you were happily wasting thousands on newspaper ads that were bringing in very little leads.

Testing is a lot easier than people think. With domain names being very cheap, it is easy to create a URL which is only for one specific type of marketing, and the same with phone numbers 0800/0844 etc. can all be used to measure the response of a piece of marketing.

[PromoAde]

Testing is a lot easier than people think. With domain names being very cheap, it is easy to create a URL which is only for one specific type of marketing, and the same with phone numbers 0800/0844 etc. can all be used to measure the response of a piece of marketing.

Those are some good ideas, I think some alternative URLS could be useful for tracking. Yes, testing and tracking all advertising is very important! I think that is why I love adwords so much, but those other techniques can be used for less technological marketing. (for want of a better phrase!)

[Phoebe0804]

l see all of these talk ... l export Optical Lens for camera and for other equitment l feel that sometimes it is also depend on your luck.We all have our owe business.l have a colleague,she knows little english.And she register some b2b websites,the half of mine,only a month on ec21 trade web she got 2 enquires.But Another of my colleague use ec21 for a year didnt get any enquires from that website.Which also means she is lucky.Now economic crisis,Make things really tough,even though we offer really low price and good quality product.b4 almost all enquire gave order...but not now...When we know that it might lasting 3 years min,it is even more disappointed.Wish us good luck!

[CarolGabriel]

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[lanyards&wristbands]

Will you use promotional products in the recession economy?

[jack2007]

I don't want to cause offence to anyone who has previously posted, but:

you can't pluck a number out of the sky and say "you must use x types of marketing". Every business is different. What works for one business may not necessarily work for another.

The most important thing is that you test your marketing thoroughly. One piece of marketing that leads to 20 conversions, could be better than 20 pieces of marketing leading to 20 conversions, for example.

More is not necessarily better, especially if they are not effective.

Another thing is the cost of marketing - you can't just say "free marketing is best" or "paid marketing is best" - as I said, it depends on your business.

There are many great free marketing techniques, such as press releases! which, by the way, will probably work a lot better than an advert in the very same news paper (due to the trust factor of someone else writing it).
The same goes for paid marketing; PPC is extremely cost effective if implemented properly, and longer term forms of marketing such as SEO/SEM.

But as I said, you will never know what is most effective for your business unless you continually test and tweak!

Cheers,
I agree with this! It is not determined that how many tactics you use. It is more inportant that which way fit you well and really reward you profits.

[Call Tracker]

I agree with David, if you market your business without a specific marketing telephone number or url you cannot possibly guage which area has brought in the most leads. Once you set up your numbers and allocate them to say an A5 mailout, website and an email campaign you can use the reporting that goes with them to clearly see who has called in response to each campaign.

You may not need 7 ways to market you may only need one. If that one is providing sufficient roi for your business then I would suggest rather than go for something else, expand on it. The key to successful marketing is to measure it and keep assessing it as markets change and customers buying habits change too.

[othellotech]

you can't pluck a number out of the sky and say "you must use x types of marketing".

for all situations where X > nil of course :)


if you market your business without a specific marketing telephone number or url you cannot possibly guage which area has brought in the most leads.


you could always just ask people - I've always found clients very happy to tell us how they found us, or which search engine they used, or which existing client gave the recommendation :D

[nass]

Hmmm, no I don't buy the argument that you have to use a lot of different types.

Point being, if one source of marketing acquires you leads at £10/lead, and the others all acquire at £100/lead, I'd rather invest into the £10 source and lose the others. Sure, keep some money back to experiment, but seriously I don't agree with this quantity idea of "more is better". I prefer the quality idea of "maximise the most from the best".

[adventurelife]

I use over 100 ways to market what I do. Everything is a system and all get applied in different ways at different times taken into account a huge amount of factors.

If you want to grow a large business you need many , many different ways all in systems that can be omplimented and measured and adjusted.