Autosport International

Really looking forward to visiting Autosport International tomorrow at the NEC. A great networking opportunity for Streets Marketing Agency and my first time in the Live Arena.

“Featuring every level of Motor Racing – from Karting to Formula 1- the show truly brings together the world of motorsport under one roof.

Catering for both professionals and Motorsport fans alike, Autosport International incorporates two Trade-only days (14 & 15 January) followed by two Public days (16 & 17 January) dedicated to Motorsport enthusiasts.

Autosport International takes place alongside the leading UK exhibition dedicated to enthusiasts of sports and performance cars, the Performance Car Show: presented by Landsail Tyres; giving visitors the ideal place to see the very best high-performance machines in their full glory.” Source Autosport International.com

The Marketing Mix

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Marketing is the management process responsible for identifying, anticipating and satisfying customers’ requirements profitably.

Marketing is about getting the right product or service, to the right customers, at the right price, in the right place, at the right time. Using the right Marketing Communication Tools to communicate the value of the product or service to customers for the purpose of selling it. Think what you are offering, and what value it has to your customers.

Good Marketing Will Grow Your Business

In simple terms, businesses sell to customers in markets. By definition a market is any place where buyers and sellers meet to trade products or services; it could be a high street shop, premises, event or website.

Any business in the market is likely to be in competition with other firms offering similar products. Successful products are the ones that meet customers needs better than their competitors’ products.

Markets are dynamic, which means they are always changing. A business must be aware of market trends and evolving customer requirements caused by trends or changes in the economy.

The Marketing Mix is a great tool to analyse any sized business, whether a startup or established.

The Marketing Mix – Marketeers call it ‘The 10 Ps of marketing’:

Let’s start with…

1 PRODUCT – Your Product Strategy

A successful business will find out what customers want or need. Then they develop the right product or service, with the right level of quality to meet those needs now and in the future.

When developing and marketing a product, describe its features and benefits.

Ask yourself the following questions:

  • Will it satisfy my customers’ needs?
  • How will they use the product?
  • Where can they buy the product?
  • How will it differ from competitors and other brands in the market?
  • Will a guarantee be offered?
  • Do I have a system in place to measure and regularly check what they think of the product, service or brand?

2. PRICE – Your Pricing Strategy?

A product is only worth what a customer is prepared to pay for it. The price also needs to be competitive, but this does not necessarily mean the cheapest. The small business may be able to compete with larger rivals by offering excellent customer service for example; adding extra services or details that will offer better value for money.

The pricing must also provide a profit. It’s the only element of the marketing mix that generates revenue – everything else represents a cost. Pricing also positions you in the marketplace.

Ask yourself the following questions:

  • How much does the product cost to produce, distribute and promote?
  • What is the expected demand for my product?
  • Look at the competition, what are they selling, at what price and where?
  • What brand image do you want to promote?

All of these are important factors when setting the price strategy.

3. PROMOTION

Promotion is the way in which a business communicates both itself, its product or service to its customers – the offer. A promotional campaign must gain attention, promote the offer, tell a consistent message and ensure a customer buys your product and not your competitors’. Good promotion is a two-way communication between product and customers; it should communicate the features and benefits that the customer gains from the product.

4. PLACE – Your Distribution Channel Strategy

Channel Management requires you to achieve the most profitable delivery of your product to your customer and market. There are so many opportunities with regard to retail operations, wholesale, mail order, online, internet, direct sales, partnerships, multi-channel, worldwide. Ask yourself:

  • What is the current distribution strategy?
  • Where can people buy the products from?
  • Where do customers expect to find my products?
  • What are the logistics of each channel?

5. PEOPLE – People As Part of the Marketing Mix

People are fundamental to the production and delivery of the service. How they interact with the customers may for example:

  • Determine if the customer buys again.
  • Drive worth-of-mouth marketing.
  • Be a crucial touchpoint in the delivery of the ‘Brand Promise’.

6. PROCESSES

Anyone who comes into contact with your customers will make an impression, and that will have an effect on customer satisfaction. The reputation of your brand is paramount. It is essential to ensure that all employees who have contact with customers are properly trained and the right person for the job. Many customers cannot separate the product or service from the staff member who provides it. This shows the importance of your people.

The level of aftersales support and advice provided by a business is one way of adding value to what you offer, and can give you an edge over competitors.

7. PROMISE

Discuss and review whether or not you’re truly delivering on a unique brand promise; if you don’t have one then get one – this is part of the branding process.

8. POSITIONING

Discuss and review ways in which your customers position you in the market.

9. PACKAGING

An important part of the product decision making process is the design of the packaging of your product. An effective packaging strategy can contribute to the businesses’ competitive advantage. Your ‘packaging strategy’ should exhibit eight functions: unique; functional; easy to remove; promise product features and benefits; informative; follow guidelines and regulations; and reinforce the brand.

10. POSITIONING – Brand Positioning

  • Define your market segment.
  • Do your analysis.
  • Create your brand positioning.
  • Adapt your marketing mix accordingly.
Marketing is the lifeline of any business so it’s important to get the strategies and plans right from the start.
We can help you plan and action powerful Marketing Plans.
Our philosophy is simple: “If you follow our tactics and tips your business will grow”.

CALL 01733 243235 OR EMAIL Maddie@streetsmarketing.co.uk.

VIDEO MARKETING

WHY SHOULD I USE VIDEO MARKETING TO PROMOTE MY BUSINESS?

One area that has experienced recent growth is online video advertising; no surprise as video marketing improves audience engagement:

  • Increases brand awareness.
  • Helps with Search Engine Optimisation (SEO).

On the whole video generates more traffic through rich content, improves shares and conversations, builds links and ensures your brand has a presence on the Video Search Engine.

WHY SHOULD I CONSIDER VIDEO MARKETING FOR MY BRAND?

It will help your brand stand out from the competition. Videos are more eye-catching than text making them a more distinct form of brand promotion.

Create interactivity & user interest: Video advertising will help create higher levels of interactivity and user interest in whatever you are promoting. Well produced videos are both fun and informative to watch; this will encourage your audience to come back for more.

Rank well in Search Engines. Well-made videos rank extraordinarily well in search engines due to descriptive tags you can associate with them and the partnership between video sites and search engines, such as You Tube & Google.

Others will share it. An entertaining, funny or informative video can quickly be spread around the internet. If one person likes the video it may be shared with others. It may even go viral. This increases the reach and scope of your advertising without you having to do any additional work.

If you decide to include video marketing in your marketing communications strategy. 

Streets Marketing Can Help You:

  • Do the research – where and how do you plan to use the video – on your You Tube Channel, website, in newsletters, SM, Blog?
  • Decide on your videos objectives.
  • Define the audience – segment if necessary.
  • Analyse your customers behaviour.
  • Agree on content – what will this audience want?
  • Set KPIs and metrics in place to measure.
  • Assist with keyword research.
  • Agree timings and plan schedule.
  • Agree the distribution strategy:  You Tube (set up account): in-store, exhibition trade fair, online promotional video, video to support a presentation, digital newsletter, 
  • Agree the budget.
  • Plan the video content: video length, the core message, call to action,
  • Scripting (if required) and storyboarding.
  • Decide the tone of voice, is a presenter or narrator needed?
  • Prepare the brief for the Video Production Company, meeting, liaise.
  • Source the video team suitable to shoot (including lighting, filming, editing and music if required) and edit your video.
  • Legal and code of practice checks.
  • Optimise the video so it can be easily found – promote it.
  • Analyse the ROI and feedback.

If you want a video project managing for your Business contact Streets Marketing, call 01733 234235 or email Maddie@streetsmarketing.co.uk, or complete the contact form above and someone will be in touch.

Email Newsletter Marketing

Why should I Communicate with my customers with engaging powerful email newsletters?

Email Marketing Will Grow Your Business.

Many businesses devote a lot of time, budget and resource to lead generation when there’s a far more cost effective and rewarding way to boost sales; keep in regular contact with the customers you already have, even those who have not purchased from you yet, just because they haven’t does not mean they won’t. Not everybody is ready to buy on first contact. Research suggests that only 2% of deals are struck at first contact. The other 98% only happen once a certain level of trust has been established. Contacts that are not turned into sales straight away are often lost but this is an opportunity on potential missed business.

Be patient, if you keep in contact regularly in ways people appreciate and find useful they will reward you with their business.

Benefits of email newsletter marketing:

  • Cost effective.
  • Maintain a relationship with customers.
  • Turn unconverted leads into customers who buy from you.
  • Distribute informative engaging content relative to your market.
  • Go Social – people can share it.
  • Email newsletters compliment your website.
  • Track and measure, giving you ‘insight’ into your customers’ behaviour.

Stand out from the crowd and include valuable content in your email newsletters

Keeping in touch with valuable content means your customers will receive information they value and can learn from. You get an opportunity to build relationships, prove your expertise and stay in contact, so they will remember you when the need arises. The sales side of the information should be 40% of the actual content itself. Include engaging articles, images, videos, surveys, competitions, offers, news, links to blogs, and your website.

Where do I start?

First you need to register to collect personal data.

Why?

The Data Protection Act 1998 requires every organisation processing personal data to register with the ICO, unless they are exempt.  (URL link: www.ico.org.uk/for_organisations/data_protection/registration)

Tips to collect data: Permission based e-mail marketing

Why do I need permission to email market people?

By having permission from your customers allows you to build a list of potential customers who want to hear from you so your newsletters will not be regarded as SPAM. Customers who opt in want to hear from you and what you have to say.

To get permission you will need a domain page, a capture page and an auto-responder.

The best way to collect data is online through your website. You can do this by having a registration area or a capture page. A capture page is the place on your website where your customers register their data and sign up with you.

Ask website visitors to sign up for:

  • Email newsletters.
  • Knowledge hubs.
  • Online surveys .
  • Competitions.
  • To sell or buy items from your website (e-commerce websites).

What information should I collect online?

  • Name:  so you can personalise your direct mail campaigns (email and postal).
  • Address (including postcode and country):  so you can contact your customers for a postal direct mail campaign.
  • Mobile phone number: for mobile phone marketing campaigns.
  • Email address : for email newsletter marketing campaigns.
  • Gender – female or male and age if possible (in age brackets is more effective).

You may want to collect more information at these collection points, such as occupation, hobbies, but remember the more questions the less likely people are to register due to time.

Be honest and build the trust with data collection

Once people have registered their details ask them to opt in to receive email newsletters – this means they actually have asked to receive communications from you, therefore more likely to open and read. Tell people what they are signing up for, for example you are signing up to receive regular email newsletters.  These will contain free marketing tips, tactics and valuable information to help you grow your business. You can unsubscribe at any point.

Once a person has registered and opted in then it’s a good idea to send an auto responder thanking them and asking them to confirm their email again – two layer policy.

How to motivate more sign-ups?

Ask existing customers to opt-in, makes sense to start with the people you already know.

Make sign-up easy. Joining up your blogs with your website via social media should get a stream of interested people who like what you say. As well as a retweet button to help customers share your valuable content with their followers, include a sign-up to your newsletter. Make it really easy for people to subscribe with a clear and accessible sign-up form.

Use an ethical bribe – You can use your valuable content as a lure for newsletter sign-ups. The promise of a free download written on key subjects will temp some people to want to hear more from you .

Promote your list widely. Whenever you meet people or speak to new contacts, in the real world as well as online. Invite every valuable content contract to opt in with an automated invitation.

Cross-promote. Encourage sign-up from you Facebook account, through Tweets, etc. Engaging headlines that offer little snippets of the stories can temp people to sign up and read more.

Responsive e-newsletters  why optimize your email newsletters for mobile?

If you send email newsletters, it’s likely that a growing percentage of your subscribers are reading messages on an iPhone, Android, tablet or similar.

Research conducted in 2011 found almost 20% of email opens occurred on a mobile device, rising dramatically from a mere 4% of the market in 2009. IOS devices accounted for over 90% of these reported opens.

We design email newsletters to display optimally on mobile devices, this is just as important as ensuring it can be read on long – standing email clients like Outlook and Gmail. In fact, mobile email client usage is soon set to eclipse both that of webmail and desktop clients, meaning that providing a less-than-optimal reading experience on the small screen may not only inconvenience a few recipients but eventually the majority. This could lead to diminished opening rates..

We can help you register, set up, and collect data following UK guidelines and procedure. We can also:

  • Prepare the digital marketing communications plan including goals, budget, brand guidelines, key message and KPIs.
  • Identify market segments using customer insight.
  • Prepare the brief for the campaign.
  • Production:  schedule and prepare produce deadlines; communicate to teams.
  • Plan the best times to contact your database using customer insight.
  • Creative development: source content, write copy, subject line, source images, critique design.
  • Develop and code the HTML newsletter.
  • Update website if necessary.
  • Test.
  • Send the email newsletters to your mailing list.
  • The campaign is measured using key performance indicators/reports: so you can see who opened, when and where, what they clicked through, using Google Analytics you can look at the conversions.
  • Evaluation.

Watch your Business GROW.

What is spam, and how do I make sure I am not sending it?

Spam is unsolicited and unwanted JUNK MAIL. You will never be at risk if you have followed the guidelines:

  • Always ask people’s permission to email them
  • Give the recipient an easy option to unsubscribe
  • Only send information they will find valuable
  • Ensure it is well written.
  • Use a professional or designed/developed template
  • Always send from a professional company not your own email account.

STREETS CAN PROJECT MANAGE YOUR DIGITAL EMAIL NEWSLETTER PROJECTS:

CONTACT STREETS MARKETING AGENCY CALL 0044 (0)1733 243235 OR EMAIL maddie@streetsmarketing.co.uk

OR COMPLETE THE CONTACT FORM AND WE WILL CONTACT YOU.

#StreetsMarketing More Than Just A Marketing Agency - Here To Help You Grow Your Business.

To discuss your projects contact us for a no-obligation quote or request a call back.