The marketing world is incredibly dynamic and ever-changing with trends, technology, and tactics that are constantly evolving. With this change, it’s imperative that startups are up to date with new developments in the industry, and are aware of the differences between both good and bad marketing to stay ahead of the competition.
While 70% of marketers are currently invested in content marketing, it doesn’t necessarily mean that positive results are reaped. Just going through the motions without a target audience or strategy in mind, can do more harm than good. By being able to differentiate between good and bad marketing, your business will see positive results, and develop long-lasting relationships with your customers.
Common reasons why startups fail
There is a multitude of reasons that can be attributed to the failure of a startup. The risk of burnout, for example, is incredibly high as founders usually end up shouldering most of the burden. To resolve this, it’s necessary for startups to have a solid diverse, and driven team to share the responsibilities.
Another significant factor is poor marketing. As a startup, it’s crucial to know your target audience, how to get their attention and convert them into leads. At times, startups tend to overlook marketing and forget that it plays an integral factor in building their target market and growing their company.
Good marketing vs bad marketing
In layman’s terms, good marketing reaps positive results for businesses — while bad marketing generally has a negative effect or doesn’t help in improving the state of the business. It isn’t about how visually pleasing your website looks or how creative your advertisement is. Instead, it’s about whether or not your customers are resonating with your brand, and helping to improve your business results.
An example of a marketing fail would be the launch of New Coke in 1985. While New Coke might have tasted better, customers had already identified with the original coke as it resonated with them from a young age. By changing it, people felt like they were losing their identity with the brand, and this caused Coke to lose many of their customers to fellow competitor Pepsi.
Good marketing is crucial to startup success
When companies utilize good marketing, there are plenty of rewards to be reaped. JetBlue is a popular budget airline that makes their customer service highly personalized and catered to their audience. Instead of just promoting what they’re able to do for customers, they’ve instead established rapport, which helps in boosting consumer confidence. Another example is Nike’s New York City flagship store that’s both an innovative and customized experience for shoppers.
What these companies have, is a comprehensive marketing strategy that helps to pave the way to success. With a proper strategy in place, companies not only have a framework to be a more efficient and effective organization, but they’ll also have greater customer satisfaction and increased ROI.
The importance of product marketing
Products are often tangible and can be demonstrated, showed as well as displayed to an intended audience. Even though these products are tangible, a proper marketing strategy also needs to be in place. With the right marketing, you’ll not only find the right market for your product, but you’ll also get the best response from your target audience. Product marketing is also essential to growth as it helps in the overall long-term success of the product as well as your customer’s perceptions.
Evernote, for example, is a company that embraced product marketing. Its product is incredibly simple and can essentially be used to take notes, make lists, etc. To grasp the attention of its audience, Evernote communicated a clear benefit to its user without overcomplicating things. Thanks to their clear and consistent messaging, Evernote has grown to over 100 million users and distinguished themselves from other productivity tools.
Summing up
While the above gives a great snapshot of the difference between good versus bad marketing, there are plenty of other factors that distinguish the two. It’s also about understanding your competitors, developing the right marketing strategy in accordance with the marketing landscape, understanding the market, and more.
Once you’ve grasped the points above however, the rest will come naturally and you’ll be on your way to practicing good marketing for your business. Just know, however, that it probably won’t happen overnight, but with perseverance and understanding will certainly come success.
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