Do You Marketing a Product or a Service?
Primarily a service - strategic advice or project coordination.
Explain Your Product or Service
Basically I concentrate on two aspects - advice/coordination for multimedia production and distribution as well as event management.
How Did You Start Marketing Your Small Business?
Primarily it was word of mouth...networking and working the phones to let my critical mass of contacts know what I was doing. From there I ventured into social media with posts on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. Have also dabbled with paid marketing all of which works in concert to build up brand awareness.
How Did It Work?
So far it's had good success...word of mouth has garnered several clients within the Toronto market...social media has helped attract and engage several prospects, partners and clients. Finally, the paid advertising had limited success vs the investment but that doesn't preclude doing a more targeted approach in the months to come. Something that a "marketing expert" could potentially be called upon to assist.
Advice
- First and foremost - network, network, network...talk about your "solutions" with people - they can become prospects, clients or advocates of your brand.
- Assemble a host of supporters to vet your marketing strategy with - being able to identify the gaps before you hit the street is crucial to having the phone ring vs hearing the crickets. I call my supporters my "creative brain trust" - I call upon them whenever I need a sober second look at what I am about to launch.
- Test, adjust, re-test and launch your strategy...plans are just that until they are put into action. Best of luck.
