How did you decide what marketing to do?

[Frimley111R]

I am having a discussion on another forum about this and thought I'd 'cross post' the subject here. It revolves around a woman who has just bought a beauty salon and who is wondering what to do to grow her business. There's a wide range of 'suggestions' but I thought it was quite a good subject to post here and applicable to almost every new/growing business.

 

[ethical PR]

You're right - it's quite common for people to buy or set up a business without having an understanding of how they are going to bring customers in the door or indeed whether there is a market for their product or service.

Lots of businesses have posted similar questions here over the years.

What did you suggest as an approach?

 

[fisicx]

Location, location, location.

A hairdresser set up near us, they did loads of marketing but none of it worked. The reasons were simple: no parking,they were right on a busy junction and there wasn't any foot traffic past their door.

Where is this beauty salon? Is there are competition? Did she buy the goodwill? You can't answer a marketing question like this without knowing a lot more about the business.

 

[Text Marketer]

As fisicx said, it depends on a variety of things, as a beauty salon in the centre of London will need a completely different marketing plan than one in a small town.

To expand on fisicx answer, a couple of good questions to answer to determine what marketing strategy you should take are;

1. What kind of beauty salon is it? - high end?
2. Location of the salon - on the high street, is there parking, is it easily visible/findable?
3. Do you have a marketing budget?
4. Who will you be targeting? - male/female, young/old?
5. Are there other salons in the area?
6. What makes this beauty salon stand out above the others?

These are just a few questions, but answer these and we can help.

 

[Ashley_Price]

See if you can find out what marketing your successful competitors are carrying out to get business. Yes, you might think cold calling or leafleting, or whatever, is dead, but if other businessess in the same industry are using those methods successfully then you need to take notice, rather than dismiss them.

 

[Alan]

"How did you decide what marketing to do?" is the head line.

The real question is how do successful companies decide what marketing to do?

The answer is simple, testing.

Testing is systematic process doing something and evaluate the results. Its just like @fisicx preaches about websites- it doesn't matter what anyone thinks is right, it even doesn't matter what the competitors do as they may be getting awful ROI - although you cant test all channels at once so if you are testing 2 or three at a time starting with what other use is a good idea.

 

[Frimley111R]

Yes, I agree, but for smaller and growing businesses, they all have to decide between websites, social media, email, leaflets, adverts, shows, etc. i guess the question is where to start and also how to decide what to try (partly answered here already).

PS: The salon was just an example, the question is really about any type of business.

 

[Alan]

The question, where to start? For businesses without time and with money, where to start is to engage expertise, whether that is a marketing consultant or business coach with knowledge of marketing in that sector. No substitute to working with experts.

Where to start for businesses with no money and plenty of time is to study techniques. For instance read up on the bullseye technique and 19 traction channels, Google for books on that.

Asking on a forum, without very specific disclosure about the business that you would never disclose on a forum, as every business is unique, you will either get generic advice like mine, or more dangerously specific prescription without proper diagnosis.

 

[ethical PR]

Hi @Frimley111R

I don't want to teach 'your grandmother to suck eggs' as you are a marketing consultant....but the obvious answer is with market research.

Once they have established a demand for the product or service, at a price that is profitable for them and understand their competition (and how they market) and their customer base, then they can develop their brand position, marketing plan and identify tactics, budget and evaluation.

People should decide which marketing approaches and tactics to invest in (in your words 'what to try') by understanding their target customers, which communications and consumer channels they use, and what benefits are likely to appeal to them.

Small businesses either use the services of people like you, me and many others, who understand how to carry out market research and develop marketing and communications plans, get advice through business support organisations and/or read up on marketing content available on line.

More commonly, they often muddle through trying different channels without understanding whether they will reach/work for their target customers and whether they are identifying benefits their customers want. And without having an adequate budget to invest in their marketing.

How many hundreds have come on here and announced they have started up a business (because they enjoy doing something/don't like their job/have been made redundant), have zero/a tiny budget and want to market their services to the world , have no money and therefore are going to use social media and online content.

 

[Alan]

lol I didn't bother to check if this thread was started by a marketing professional.

My responses would have been different.

I am having a discussion on another forum

What forum?

There's a wide range of 'suggestions' but I thought it was quite a good subject to post here and applicable to almost every new/growing business.

Why didn't you summarise them here?

It revolves around a woman who has just bought a beauty salon and who is wondering what to do to grow her business.

Really?

PS: The salon was just an example, the question is really about any type of business

No not really!

i guess the question is where to start and also how to decide what to try (partly answered here already).

Your are the expert - why don't you tell us?

where to start is to engage expertise, whether that is a marketing consultant or business coach

Oops I was suckered there wasn't I?

 

[Bookmemate]

For a bricks and mortar business your online activities obviously need to focus on your catchment area. If that's a big city then great, you'll probably find lots of applicable social media groups or forums which you can engage and either pay for marketing or just use your Sig as many seem to do here. If it's a small town try whatever tool allows you to target based on geographical location as well as interests.

Best of luck with the project.