Category: Social Marketing

Categories
Social Marketing

Creating A Market Research Plan

Having a solid market research plan is a critical first step in starting, buying, or growing a successful business.

You may think you have the best idea ever for a business or product, but without laying the proper groundwork, it could easily go the way of the Edsel. Not only do you need to size up the competition, but you also need to identify who will buy your product, how much it will cost, the best approach to selling it and how many people will demand it.

To get answers to these questions, you’ll need a market research plan, which you can create yourself or pay a specialist to create for you. Market research plans define an existing problem and/or outline an opportunity. From there, the marketing strategy is broken down task by task. Your plan should include objectives and the methods that you’ll use to achieve those objectives, along with a time frame for completing the work.

A market research plan should provide a thorough examination of how your product or service will fare in a defined area. It should include:

  1. An examination of the current marketplace and an analysis of the need for your product or service
  2. An assessment of the competition
  3. Data about customers
  4. The direction for your marketing in the upcoming year
  5. Goals to be met

How to create your market research plan

Doing business without having a marketing plan is like driving without directions. You may eventually reach your destination, but there will be many costly and time-consuming mistakes made along the way.

Many entrepreneurs mistakenly believe there is a big demand for their service or product, but, in reality, there may not be, or your prices may be too high or too low, or you may be going into a business with so many restrictions that it’s almost impossible to be successful. A market research plan will help you uncover significant issues or roadblocks.

Step 1. Conduct a comprehensive situation analysis.

One of the first steps in creating your marketing plan is to create a SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats), which is used to identify your competition, to know how they operate, and then to understand their strengths and weaknesses.

Step 2: Develop clear marketing objectives.

In this section, describe the desired outcome for your marketing plan with realistic and attainable objectives, the targets, and a clear and concise time frame. The most common way to approach this is with marketing objectives, which may include the total number of customers and the retention rate, the average volume of purchases, total market share, and the proportion of your potential market that makes purchases.

Step 3: Make a financial plan.

A financial plan is essential for creating a solid marketing plan. The financial plan answers a range of questions that are critical components of your business, such as how much you intend to sell, what will you charge, how much will it cost to deliver your services or produce your products, how much will it cost for your basic operating expenses and how much financing will you need to operate your business.

In your business plan, be sure to clearly describe who you are, what your business will be about, business goals, and what your inspiration was to buy, begin or grow your business.

Step 4: Determine your target audience.

Once you know what makes you stand out from your competitors and how you’ll market yourself, you should decide who to target with all this information. That’s why your market research plan should clearly delineate your target audience. What are their demographics and how will these qualities affect your plan? How do your company’s current products and services affect which consumers you can realistically make customers? Will that change in the future? All of these questions should be answered in your plan.

Step 5: List your research methods.

Rarely does one research avenue make for a comprehensive market research plan. Instead, your plan should indicate several methods that will be used to determine the market share you can realistically obtain.  This way, you get as much information as possible from as many sources as possible. The result is a more robust path toward establishing the exact footprint you desire for your company.

Step 6: Establish a timeline.

With your plan in place, you’ll need to figure out how long your market research process will take. Project management charts are often helpful in this regard, as they clearly divide tasks and personnel over a timeframe that you have set. No matter which type of project management chart you use, try to build some flexibility into your timeframe. A two-week buffer toward the home stretch comes in handy when a process scheduled for one week takes two – that buffer will keep you on deadline.

Step 7: Acknowledge ethical concerns.

Market research always presents opportunities for ethical missteps. After all, you’ll need to obtain competitor information and sensitive financial data that may not always be readily available. Your market research plan should thus encourage your team to not take any dicey steps to obtain this information. It may be better to state “we could not obtain this competitor information” than to spy on the competitor or pressure their current employees for knowledge. Plus, there’s nothing wrong with simply feeling better about the final state of your plan and how you got it there.

Outsourcing the work

If the thought of trying to create your own market research plan seems daunting or too time-consuming, there are plenty of other people willing to do the work for you.

How to Create a Market Research Plan [Business]

Categories
Social Marketing

The Psychology Of Colors In Marketing

Do you feel serenely calm when surrounded by green fields and blue skies? Have you ever wondered what the color red represents and why you feel slightly alarmed when staring at a stop sign? Those are just two of the many effects color has on the human psyche. It’s all part of a study referred to as the psychology of color.

What is the Psychology of Color?

Color psychology studies how different colors determine human behavior. The psychology of color is used in advertising and marketing to evoke emotional reactions. That sounds simple at first blush, but there’s a lot to unpack in that statement.

Before we look at how color meaning affects human behavior (and how certain colors elicit different reactions), let’s take a quick journey through the history of color.

In the 17th century, Sir Isaac Newton observed sunlight passing through a glass prism and how the light was reflected into various colors. He identified initially six wavelength shades: red, orange, yellow, green, blue and violet. He later added indigo, according to Wikipedia.

But color psychology predates Newton’s time by thousands of years going back to the Egyptians. They studied color’s effect on mood and used color to accomplish holistic benefits.

More recently, Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung called color the “mother tongue of the subconscious.” His psychological studies led him to develop art therapy. He believed that self-expression through images and colors could help patients recover from trauma or distress.

Have you noticed how colors go in and out of style? In the 1970s, earth tones were popular but gave way in the 80s to turquoise and mauve. Later, pinks and blue-grays came on the scene.

For example, look at the TV series Mad Men, which ran from 2007 to 2015, but whose fictional time frame ran from March 1960 to November 1970. Viewers may recall how color palettes changed over the years. The muted browns and grays of the Eisenhower era succumbed to the bold shades of chartreuse, persimmon, and banana yellow of the late 60s.

How Do Colors in Marketing Influence People?

Color meaning and the psychology of colors can powerfully impact people’s behavior and decision-making. People make subconscious judgments about a person, environment, or product within a few seconds or minutes. Color plays into this initial impression.

That fact is not lost on brands and advertisers. They know certain colors, tints, hues, and shades evoke emotion and move people to action. This effect is both subtle and powerful.

Through their choice of color in logos, packaging, signage, and advertising, brands can influence consumers to buy on impulse, or choose their product or service over a competitor’s.

Think about your favorite brands and how certain colors predominate. Do their logos sport bright red like Target or Netflix? Or are you a person who likes the colors black and white like Nike? Perhaps you prefer yellow and are drawn to Best Buy or Subway.

Color can often be the sole reason someone purchases a product. Research conducted by the secretariat of the Seoul International Color Expo found that 93 percent of buyers focus on visual appearance. And close to 85 percent claim color is a primary reason when they make a purchase!

Let’s take a look at color meaning as it applies to marketing, including the best colors to use. We will also evaluate meaning of colors and examples of branding colors.

Red Color Psychology

The color red creates a sense of urgency, suitable for clearance sales. It also encourages appetite. Thus it is frequently used by fast-food chains. The color physically stimulates the body, raising blood pressure and heart rate. It is associated with movement, excitement, and passion. It gets people to act and is important for call-to-action buttons, for example, on a website.

McDonald’s chooses the high-energy color red (combined with yellow), which appeals to children, kindles appetites, and creates a sense of urgency. This tactic has been great for Micky D’s. It might not have been the same ridiculously big chain it is today without using the color so effectively. Red is all about emotions and passion, which is how McDonald’s wants you to feel about its products. Remember the McDonald’s advertising campaign, “Loving it.”

Target provides another example of the use of the color. Its logo, one of the most widely recognized symbols in North America, grabs customers’ attention. It creates the idea of excitement in shopping there, and the urgency to purchase the brand’s great deals or latest, trendiest merchandise.

Green Color Psychology

This color is associated with health, tranquility, power and nature. It is used in stores to relax customers and promote environmental issues. It stimulates harmony in your brain and encourages a balance leading to decisiveness.

Starbucks is a major global brand that uses this color scheme. Green shows that Starbucks hopes to promote a sense of relaxation in its cafes, inviting customers to come in for a coffee break during a stressful day.

John Deere is another company that uses the color in its branding. This makes sense because the brand is associated with farming and agriculture. John Deere’s color branding is immediately recognizable on its machine in a field or back yard.

Whole Foods also incorporates the color in its logo. The brand is associated with health and nature and prides itself on high-quality, natural, and organic products. In fact, wholesomeness is the very essence of what the company stands for.

Interestingly, BP also uses the color, whether intentionally or not, associating it with the environment.

How to Use the Psychology of Colors When Marketing [SmallBizTrends]

Categories
Social Marketing

Benefits of FREE Online Events Invitation Services

Free Online invitation services offer a very superb means to keep tabs on guests coming to an event, let them know of changes, and, of course, dish out any sensational invite available to family and friends, regardless if it’s a corporate event, dinner party, or once in a lifetime occasion. 

Such invitation has been in use for several years now and has once again gained eminence in recent years. At a time, Outlook invite and Google Calendar was the only means of sending out digital invites but lately, many sites now deliver digital invitations that have advanced options for customization with several features that greatly aid event planners to make decisions.  

Online Events Invitation Services and software event planner have benefits they offer to event managers and others interested in using them, among which are the following:

Redesign

Even though a calendar app can be used to inform people of an event, developing a creative and dynamic online invitation will help you build momentum towards the event, increase donations or ticket sales, and rev up attendance because this is an important aspect of your event. Digital invitations when compared to paper invitation enable you tweak the invite design and layout. You will be able to add high quality graphics, images, videos messages and also include other interactive features. Online invitations allow you experiment with custom wording designs. 

Management Options for Online Events

Despite that a number of sites offer only online invitations services, some event organizing tools give you the privilege to integrate other features along with this, with the addition of an attendee list management feature and collection of RSVPs. This infers that your invitation can serve as the leadway to obtain and export attendees info, design seating charts and communicate with your invitees at large. 

Protect the planet and bring down expenses

Let’s not forget that online invitations are paperless. Unlike in the past when a hundred trees had to be killed for a major event, you can invite people these days without sending out a piece of paper. Think about how much you will be spending if you were using paper as your means of invitation. With digital invitations, you will be able to save the invites, envelopes and also all postages. By choosing online forms of invite, you help protect the planet from waste and reduce cost at the same time. This is a lot good you are doing. 

The Opportunities to communicate is increased

When a paper invite is sent out, the options you have to communicate with others is limited, mostly at times when you’re on a budget. The majority of events give you only a chance to pass information across to your invitees, or create an urge in them to attend. If the guest list you’re reaching out to is online, you therefore, have the chance to dish out follow-ups to RSVPs, reminder notifications and a check-in with guests who have not responded yet, make updates or changes to the ceremony and give out thank you notes once the programme comes to an end. 

The value of your invitation is increased 

There are a number of methods you can use for your online invitation to make it increasingly valuable to your guests compared to a paper invite. Maps and directions that can be included are within reach and there is an option to input the event into a calendar, skip to a conversation, preview the venue easily with a link, and create buzz for the event around on social media.   

Online invites offer a great benefit of being convenient in delivery. You don’t go through the hassle of designing invites, mailing them and printing it to the guests.

Categories
Social Marketing

Turn Instagram 1 Billion Followers Into Revenue

One billion people use Instagram every month, 63 percent of whom log in at least once per day. Those are huge numbers that should catch the attention of any marketing professional or entrepreneur. Better yet, 200 million Instagram users visit at least one business profile daily. If you run a business or are in charge of branding for your company, Instagram offers enormous opportunity. You just need to know how to take advantage of it.

In The 2020 Ultimate Instagram Influencer & Marketing Bundle, you’ll learn the Instagram tips and techniques you need to build a massive, engaged following on Instagram.

These six courses are led by digital media experts and offer up 16 hours of training material. You’ll learn how to grow an account from zero to 10,000 followers by using step-by-step, proven strategies, and then you’ll delve into influencer and celebrity growth secrets that can push your account even higher. You’ll learn how to use Instagram’s SEO algorithm and rank in the Explore tab to attract more organic traffic, and how to use hashtags to increase your posts’ life expectancy and ranking.

Additionally, you’ll delve into how to build strong, trustworthy relationships with followers and how to turn them into loyal customers. You don’t need to be huge on Instagram to start earning money from it; there’s even a course on how to earn extra income with as little as 10,000 followers.

If you want to take your Instagram marketing strategy to new heights, you need to put in the work. The 2020 Ultimate Instagram Influencer & Marketing Bundle is a great start and it’s on sale now for just $34.99.

Get the Most Out of Instagram With This $35 Online Training [Entrepreneur]

Categories
Sales & Marketing Social Marketing

Incorporating Tik Tok Into Your Marketing Strategy?

So, it’s 2020 and you finally figured out using Facebook to market is a great plan. You may have even added Instagram, Twitter, and Snapchat. But, as is standard in the world of Social Media there is a new platform to understand. Enter TikTok.

What the Heck is TikTok?

TikTok is currently the fastest growing Social Media platform of the 2010’s.

TikTok is a video-sharing social networking service owned by ByteDance. It is used to create short lip-sync, comedy, and talent videos. (Wikipedia) The minimum age for a user is 13 years old. Users can sign up using Facebook, Instagram, Twitter or an email account.

“Lip-syncing videos have proved a popular form of user-generated content among teens.” (WebWise.ie)

TikTok Advertising

TikTok is already offering advertising placement. Providing businesses “engaging and interactive formats for your brand story” and touts tapping into unique ways to connect with an audience.

TikTok drives advertising on competitor platforms. Additionally, TikTok allows sponsoring hashtags, which allows users to brows products associated with the sponsored hashtag without leaving the platform.

3 Reasons You Should Incorporate TikTok in your Marketing Strategy

1. Build a Community

Users consume most content through videos. You should consider users as a part of a community that shares ideas, invokes interested of like-minded people and grow your following using Creating an engaged, interested, and active audience of potential customers.

2. It Doesn’t Feel Like Marketing

Generation Z does not like to be pestered with ads or the direct sell, so much so that 51% of them use ad blockers. When targeting this generation traditional marketing techniques will not work.

3. Establish User-Generated Content to Market

Millennials value authenticity and the opinions of their peers or influencers. They are fully aware of marketing tactics and will not fall for these traditional ploys. They look to user-generated content for suggestions of what to purchase and what services to use.

TikTok is the biggest source of user-generated content and it is the shiny new object, which draws even more attention to the platform.

It’s Going to be Big

TikTok is on track to be one of the biggest Social Media sites in 2020. Though it is new to the Social world, it could possibly dominate as the top Social Site in 2020.

Currently only 4% of Social Marketers in the US are using TikTok, now is the time to dominate the site!

Though your targeted consumer may not be using TikTok yet, it is important to note that as the popularity for this site grows, your consumers will eventually migrate over. Will you be there?

3 Reasons You Should Incorporate TikTok into your Marketing Strategy [Business2Community]