Small businesses are starting to truly embrace “local area marketing.” But most don’t really understand what it means, it is not just printing some fliers and posting them in letter boxes, it goes much deeper than that.
In the past simply sponsoring your local football team with a sign on the fence or your name on the back of the jumpers, showing up at the local chamber of commerce meeting or putting an advert in the local school newsletter then stepping back and you are done!”
Well, not quite.
A well thought out Local Area Marketing strategy is the key to your businesses success.
In the USA we seen people standing on the side of the road majestically twirling banners, here in Australia our sidewalks are populated with A-frames, and we say “Yeah that worked, but could we do it better? I wonder what would happen if it had a clear strategy?”
5 simple steps to success.
To be successful at local area marketing you need to have a clear understanding of who your customers really are, dont be delusional, not everyone want to be your customer or buy your widget.
Have a clear idea of what message you want to send to them, these are just some of the things that can influence your marketing message: age, social beliefs, sex, race, religious beliefs, dog owners v’s cat people, so you may need a few different messages for the same product or service to cater for the different personalities in your target market.
Once you have done this you are now in a clearer position to start drafting your local marketing strategy here are 5 steps that will guide you.
1. Evaluation – I like to go to a local coffee shop with a not pad and pen and brainstorm on things that I could do in the local area to build brand awareness.
The trick is to avoid advertising ideas and focus on marketing activity that connects you with like minded complementary businesses.
2. Innovate –Be entrepreneurial, look for things your competitors WON’T. Zig where they are zagging, while they are giving best and fairest awards at the local sports club, you smile after creating an affiliate relationship with all the businesses in the room.
What do you think you can do that they would not? And how can you execute some of the simple ideas with stronger presence and meaning in the market?
3. Act and be accountable– Put your ideas in writing and commit by creating a plan of attack. If you have employees, allocate them a role to play, make yourself accountable by committing to sign off dates. By setting milestones you will actually get things done instead of just talking about them.
4. Evaluate – To get the most out of your investment in the time you put in and the money you are investing, make sure you write down how it went. Not everything we do works the first time, I often joke it’s like having kids, you dont stop if it doesn’t work the first time,and to be honest th work never stops until they leave the nest.
Failure (false starts) are not a bad thing, if we are trying hard it is bound to happen, if you haven’t failed yet you are either lucky or on a collision course and dont know it yet. (sorry to burst your bubble but it is probably the later). when something doesn’t work the way to envisioned it is an opportunity to adjust the strategy and go again.
5. Adjust, and repeat – By taking the time to unemotionally evaluate your efforts, you are in a better position to fix problems and improve ideas to make them even better.
Local Area Marketing is about being creative and coming up with new ideas that will not just reach your end customer but will connect you with your local community so you can establish a Hometown Advantage. With these 5 steps in place you will be able to get serious about your Local Area Marketing efforts.
