Do you have a system in place for your next product or event promotion? Believe it or not there should be a method to the madness that is promotion. When you are relying on events or product launches to be successful, how do you ensure that you increase revenue for your successful small business? There is a great system to implement to get you one step closer to a passion and provision company.
The Basic Promotion System
Below, the system is broken down into 6 steps for you to have successful promotion efforts. If you read these points and want to start implementing them into your strategy, you will need to do research and utilize your whole team to make this system work properly. So what are the steps?
Know What People Want
When you are creating a product or service, ask yourself, "Is this something that people will want or will this help them?' When you are promoting something that is relevant to your potential customer, your efforts will be more successful. This goes back to understanding your customer and always trying to be helpful. Solving people’s problems is crucial to creating a successful small business.
Frequency
When promoting a new product or event, you may think that using traditional frequency rules may deem it successful. But the 3 times a week running 52 times a year rule won’t be successful especially when you are promoting something that is time or location sensitive. What do you do? First evaluate your budget allocated for promotion. Then you will start promoting your message an hour before the start time and then the previous hours before that for as long as your budget allows.
Need an example? Say your product launch starts at noon on a Wednesday, you will start your promotion at 11 am and so on. Frequency regarding promotion relies on your potential customer’s short term memory. So consistent bursts of your message close to the time of the event will yield the best results.
Reach
The reach of your promotion depends on how large your budget is, the amount of resources you have and the number of people you would like to sell to. If you are promoting an event that only seats 100 people, it might not be necessary to try to reach 50,000 especially if you have a restricted budget. So analyze your budget and needs accordingly so you can get the biggest return for your buck.
Message Quality
This may seem obvious to some but it is important to put time into crafting the message that you are promoting. The message must convey that your product or event is relevant to your potential customer so that the message will stick when it is distributed properly with the correct amount of frequency.
Channels
The different ways that you are distributing your message are the different channels. Some examples of channels are radio, TV, posters, social media etc. When you are deciding on what channels you should promote on, be consistent on one channel before you add another. So when you have frequency on a specific radio station, you can add another station while keeping the first station consistent. Don’t be random about your channels. Have a strategy and stick to it. Strategy is key to creating a successful small business.
Archenemies of Promotion
There are three archenemies of promotion: distraction, competition and commoditization. Distractions that you will face are the thousands of messages that are taken in by a person every day. Even though you only may have a certain number of companies that you directly compete with within your industry, you are still fighting the other messages that a person tries to remember in a day. And when your product or event becomes a commodity, this increases the competition because other companies can offer a similar product or event. These archenemies make promotion more difficult to be effective.
Are you thinking about implementing this basic promotional system within your successful small business? These steps will help increase the efficiency of your promotional efforts. If promotion isn’t your company’s strong point then we can help! Half a Bubble Out is a marketing, advertising and consulting agency that wants your company’s end goal to be full of passion and provision. Contact us today!
