Inexpensive Marketing: 7 Things You Can Learn From Offline Marketers

In the internet marketing community, we are constantly exposed to strategies and tactics to market your product / service online and drive traffic to your website. I do not mean to discount the value of any of these methods. In fact, we use most of them ourselves.

But, it almost makes you wonder … “How did people get to market before the Internet? “

That question served as a starting point for me to develop this list. You see, it seems like everyone is talking about how to increase your online marketing, but no one is talking about what you can do to increase your offline marketing with little to no money.

So here it is: 7 tried and true tactics for low-cost marketing. Online or off

Tip 1: become newsworthy

Getting a mention of your company in the right medium can do wonders for your career and your business. How much better do you think a book works when Oprah adds it to her book club? Because of that fact, would there even be a Dr. Phil? I can only hope not.

The trick to this one is to make yourself interesting in some way. Gary Vanderchuck from winelibrary.tv is the perfect example. He would be the first to tell you that selling wine is not the most newsworthy topic. So how did he do it? His exaggerated personality and antics. Selling wine is not entertaining. Getting Conan Obrien to eat grass and suck rocks on national television to “get his popsicle ready” is it.

Tip 2: take advantage of other people’s work and money

Best Story Ever: David pwn3s Goliath – A startup I worked for called eRoom Technology used this tactic against Lotus, a painfully well-funded corporation at the time. eRoom had the best product, but Lotus had the marketing money.

Lotus was giving a press conference about its new virtual collaboration package at a major industry event in Las Vegas. They paid handsomely for all the top reporters to fly in and lavish prizes and luxury gifts. They had elegant presentations, great location … all nine. ERoom’s stroke of genius was buying the 4 giant posters that were located directly behind the speakers’ heads (remember this was an industry conference accepting ad sponsors). The next step was to place 100 capped babies, with tiny eRoom T-shirts, on each reporters chair immediately before the conference began.

Food to go: Even the last journalist spoke about the eRoom coup as part of his article on Lotus. Lotus paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for the press conference, eRoom spent less than $ 5,000. Sparkly.

The Mall concept is another perfect example of this tactic in action. Smaller stores move to a space with larger “anchor” stores in hopes of attracting traffic heading to the anchor store. Have you ever seen what happens to a mall when all the anchors go? It’s not pretty.

As you can see, this rule does not have to be limited to physical location. Find a synergistic company (preferably outside of your industry, but serving the same market) and find a way to take advantage of what they are doing anyway. It could be your location, it could be your advertising program, it could be your brand, it could be your research. Find that angle and work it out.

Tip 3: the identity kit and a ruthless brand

The marketing maxim that a person needs to see something 6 to 7 times before they sign up is still valid after all these years. But remember, just because it’s on the internet doesn’t mean it doesn’t apply everywhere.

Create an identity kit that includes business cards, letterheads, envelopes, fax templates, email signatures, and folders. Make sure everything includes your logo, business name, and tagline, if you have one. A nifty trick is to also use your logo as a profile picture for message boards and social media sites. A crucial step is to make sure you are consistent both online and offline. Same logo, same fonts, same color palette. When this works well, it will appear that your business is EVERYWHERE. Better yet, it is very cheap.

Tip 4: keep your customers happy

This should be a no-brainer, but I see it happening over and over with web-based businesses. All the emphasis is on generating traffic and new leads, while current customers wither and rot. The truth is that keeping a customer is 5 to 7 times cheaper (that is, 700% of children) than acquiring a new one. Also, the probability of selling to an existing customer is 60-70%, while for a potential new customer it is 5-10% at best.

What you need to do is include a customer retention program if one doesn’t already exist. Reach out to them as often as new prospects and deliver as much as you’d like to attract a new prospect. Just because it’s cheaper to get a customer online doesn’t mean that customer is worth less.

Tip 5: maximize referrals

The instant messaging community is beginning to make great strides on this front. However, the problem I keep seeing is that referrals still take place on the lead side, not the client side. Again, this relates to rule n. # 4: Keep your customer happy. For example, you offer a free download of an e-book and encourage that person to refer 5 friends for an additional bonus. Until that first person buys you something, they are not a customer, they are still a prospect.

The fundamental difference is: when a potential customer refers to another potential customer, you still have to start from the starting point with the new potential customer. When a customer refers a prospect, they have a 50% (yes, FIFTY) percent chance of making a new sale.

Food to go: Spend AT LEAST as much time creating a referral program for current clients as well as potential new clients.

Tip 6: Form a Joint Venture

The term JV and JV Deal is used a lot on the Internet. In most cases, it actually refers to an affiliate program and not a true joint venture. A true joint venture is when both you and a partner do something to achieve a common goal.

For example, let’s say you sell investment real estate. You discover that 99% of your clients need their property managed after purchase. What is the obvious JV? You guessed it, a property manager. In this case, you could form a joint venture with a property manager to split costs on advertising, office space, technology, or anything else that helps you achieve a shared goal.

Tip 7: donate your time or things

Most likely, you are interested in something other than the Internet or business world. Why not find a way to explore a hobby while helping others and creating goodwill towards your business? The key emphasis in this is subtlety. You don’t want to do this just to boost your business. Hopefully, he should get something from helping people himself. Goodwill is just an asset. Although he has a very strong one.

A great example I saw recently was a real estate agent who bought a large passenger van and posted a giant photo of his head with the logo, name, and phone number. He had originally purchased the truck for his clients to use when buying or selling a home with him (it was perfect for moving locally or when new buyers needed to buy big things like a refrigerator, dryer, etc.). This was a great idea in itself. What made him brilliant is when he read a newspaper article that said a free after-school program was closing because they no longer had the budget to take kids from school to recess. center. So what did he do? He donated his truck between 3-5 hours downtown. They drove and paid for gas. As you can imagine, he instantly became a rock star in the community.

Tracing: I spoke to him a year later. His already successful business was up 400% and he was able to cancel the rest of the lead generation marketing. Genius.

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