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Guerrilla Marketing

Sounds kinda scary, but not really. This term Guerrilla Marketing was originally meant as an unconventional way of marketing on a low budget, by relying on time, energy and imagination instead of big, expensive, mass marketing campaigns. The term has since entered vocabulary to also describe aggressive, unconventional marketing methods generically and to some people makes it sound some what scary because of that.



In order to get a better idea of this type of marketing there are some main principles used

• Guerrilla marketing is geared towards small businesses and because of this it relies on gination instead of money.
• this type of marketing is concentrated on more connections and referrals rather than being in competition with other businesses it focuses on working with them.
• Guerrilla marketing encourages using other marketing methods in conjunction for a marketing campaign.
• make use of current technology and human psychology

Guerrilla marketing is nothing to be scared of in fact as a small businesses on a low budget it is probably already incorporated into your marketing plan without you even realizing it.

here are some tactics that you may already be using or should think about using

• Get involved with your community. Attend functions tell everyone you know about your business.
• Donate a percentage of sales or items to a charity and then let the media know
• Joint Marketing with other business
• Write a tutorial or hold classes
• Mail Postcards to past customers offering a discount
• Hold a contest
• Ask for referrals maybe offer discounts or free product for referrals
• Host a home party invite all your contacts and ask them to bring friends.
• Post a flyer on any and all bulletin boards you can
• Add your tag line and url to all emails send funny jokes, and when someone sends a funny joke to you hit reply to all and let them know you thought it was funny!
• Join social networking sites on and offline. Join forums where your target market would most likely be.
• Window decals for your home and car

These are just a handful of ideas some that you are probably already implementing. A good idea to come up with your own guerrilla marketing plan is to sit down and brainstorm. Think about who your target market is, and where they are think of ways you can make your business stand out and be remembered. The more memorable the better you are only limited to your imagination that is one of the great aspects of this type of marketing.

More On Finding Your Target Market

First I need to apologize to the many people who have been waiting for this... I had some family issues come up and as much as I love you all my family comes first. All is well now and I am back!

I really want to stress something in regards to finding your target market, When starting out and with limited funds the smaller you can make your target market the better. I could say that my target market is anyone who wears jewelry or knows someone who wears jewelry but really that is very unreasonable sure they could but by finding out all the info that I can on my target market and narrowing it down I can find a specific group to target with a more effective marketing plan.

So with that said if you haven't read the first part of this please take the time to scroll down the page. If you already have we are on to the next step of figuring out your target market.

The next step in this process is all about information analyze your customers and as you get more customers keep these questions and anymore that are relevant handy.

1. Why do your customers buy from you? People choose to purchase things for many different reasons, A person doesn't buy a Ferrari because they need transportation to work they buy a Ferrari because it is a status symbol. Do your customers buy from you because it is something they need, is it something that saves them time, money, is it for a status symbol a treat, think of the benefits they will receive from purchasing your product or service (remember benefits not features). Once you have pinpointed the benefits you can start to look at what type of people are looking for those benefits.

2. Influences? People are often influenced by someone to make a purchase, just the other day I purchased eyeliner I was nearly out and a friend recommended a new brand so although it was a small purchase it was still influenced.Who influences your customers and how? Spouses, mother, father, neighbors, Friends, professional colleagues, children and the media can all affect buying decisions. keep an eye out and think about who or what influences your target market.

3. Buying Preference? Do your customers prefer to shop in person or online? A lot of business may benefit from selling online as some may do better selling in person where people can see the items in person.

4. Competition? Why would your customers want to shop from you and not your competition? What do you offer that they don't? This may seem like a difficult one but go ahead brag yourself up here as long as it's true!

If you can think of some questions to ask add them you can never have to many!

I promise I will be back with more and it won't be near as long next time! If you are enjoying reading these or have anything to add please leave a comment and if you love my blog favorite me or add my link and check back often!

Who Is Your Target Market?

Marketing can be as simple as you make it or as complex as you want to make it. I am trying to put things a little simpler but in doing so I think I have over looked an important step here and I am going to back track some here.

Taking the time to find your target market is a really important step to make sure you are using your marketing resources to their fullest potential. Your target market simply put are the people who are most likely to buy your product.

When trying to determine your target market it is important especially for small business with a low start up fund to narrow down their market as much as possible as your business grows than you can broaden your target market. Time to get out your pen paper remember the more specific and narrow you get the better your marketing efforts will be, and not all of these questions will apply to you, and if you have more things you can do it.

Here goes:
1. Gender male or female? You may have both but use the higher percentage here
2. Age? What is the age group of the people most likely to buy from you try to stay within a 20 year limit here.
3.Geographical location
4. What types of position if the workforce do they hold?
5. Salaries what is the approximate salary of your customer base?
6. Lifestyles ie are they people who would be likely to use a computer? Are they fast paced type people, do they have children and if so what does that say about their lifestyle etc as much as you can think of here as this may end up giving you some ideas about where you should market to these people.

These should get you started tomorrow I will discuss some market research questions to ask yourself.

A Few Xtra Tips For Viral Marketing

This is going to be a short post today just a few things I want to add to yesterdays post on viral marketing....
* you can get a free newsletter subscriber for your site through ://bravenet.com
* you can submit articles here or snatch some articles http://www.articlesnatch.com/
* And someone mentioned You Tube this can also be a great source of viral marketing especially if you have some funny or important stuff in your video give people a reason to watch it and to want to show all their friends!
Again I would love any feedback maybe you have tried some of these or maybe you have some more suggestions I would love to see them!

More On Marketing Viral Marketing

OK so I am assuming you have read my first marketing post and you have made a simple marketing plan (or maybe you really got into it and made an in depth one) If you haven't already scroll down and take a few to complete it then come back.

So what is viral marketing? It sounds a bit icky and like you might need some antibiotics after or a vaccination at some point....
Viral marketing simply put is whatever means you use to get people to spread your advertising message for you and using their contacts.
Hot mail is one of the most popular examples and for good reason there viral marketing was one of the best
They offered a free email address
When customers that received said email address sent an email at the bottom of their email it said sign up for your free email @....
So they literally used their customers mailing lists to grow themselves

So right now your probably thinking great for hot mail but how does that apply to me?

*A good way to get started is link exchange encourage people to exchange links with you so that you are putting yourself in their loop of contacts and vise versa

* Write articles for websites to use for free on their site. Everyone knows something that other people want to know make it informative and include links to your site. The more useful your content the better this will work.

* Newsletters If you don't have one its a good idea to start one and when you are having some type of special, contest etc send the newsletter out and always remind people to forward the newsletter on at the end sometimes people just need a reminder.

* FREE this word is one of the most viral words in the dictionary people love something FREE! Have a contest or giveaway (don't forget to email your contacts and tell them to pass it on!) Give away samples of your product whenever possible. If it's not feasible to give away product or service in your business then give FREE information that people want to know.

* Include a tag line and your URL for your signature on all out going emails and on forums that allow signatures. Try sending a funny joke that people will want to pass on with your signature on the bottom.

* Start an affiliate or referral program (this is a pretty in depth subject that I will get into more at a later date)

* Send a press release to local newspapers or send them articles of interest and include your contact info website etc.

These are just some ideas to get you started hopefully they will keep you busy until my next marketing post a ton more great ideas coming keep checking back . I would love to hear more ideas on viral marketing or which one's you try leave me a comment .

While writing this I realized I am in some need of links exchanges if interested let me know

Marketing Made Easier

Marketing can be a very complex thing especially for a small business owner such as myself really I just want to make jewelry but if I want my business to succeed I have to step out of my safe bead bin. Part of that is marketing and I love sharing what I learn!

So what is marketing anyway?

basically in a nutshell marketing is EVERYTHING you do to get your product or service in the in the hands of the people who want your products. Marketing is your branding, pricing, packaging, placement, advertisement and everything you do to get your product to your customer. Sounds complicated but can be broken down to make more sense of things A good way to do this is to have a marketing plan, you can get really in depth templates for marketing plans but because I like to keep things as simple as possible I am going to layout a simple plan for you so grab a pen and paper and start answering these easy questions:

1. What is your product/service? Pretty self explanatory write a description of what product/service you offer.

2. Pricing? What is your pricing on your product are you offering expensive luxury items or rock bottom bargains. Take a look at your highest priced items and your lowest to figure a rough price point.

3. Distribution? How will you get your products to your customers. Will you sell online in stores, through affiliate programs, through catalogs, home parties etc try to go into detail like what type of stores etc.

5. Target Market? Who is your target market try to be as specific as possible for example Male between the age of 18-40 athletic, middle class+ income

6. Competition? Be realistic here I am talking direct competition I wouldn't say I was in direct competition with a famous jewelry designer when I am not even in that league

9. Strengths and Weaknesses? List your strengths over your competition as well as your weaknesses.

10. Goals? One of my favorites goals are sooo important! What are your goals from your marketing strategies? Try to make these specific and something that you will be able to measure if you are reaching your goals.

11. Budget? What is your yearly budget for your marketing tactics?

12. Tactics? What are some of the marketing tactics you plan to implement ( I will be talking more about tactics in upcoming posts)

Remember as with any plan what you write is not set in stone and can be changed as you see fit. I recommend that you look back on your marketing plan at least every 6months but some people will every few months or every year. In upcoming post I will be talking more about marketing and different marketing tactics I am by no means an expert but hopefully this information will help some.