Established Company Looking for Marketing Strategies

When times are tough, it's time to prune back marketing activities that bear little fruit.

Optimize those that are bringing in the most profit.

Note I said profit.

Some clients can be low profit, while others are high profit.

So what needs to be done is measure those performance points first
before you take on new initiatives.

Best,
Ewen

I have a series of questions I use when doing a marketing analysis of a business. In every instance I'm able to find hidden marketing assets that are under utilized. You can usually increase your business by 25% in less than 9 months without increasing your marketing budget and often by spending less on advertising.

You need to pin point your target market, find out their pain, what keeps them awake at night, develop a compelling message and deliver it using the right medium.

What is your business strategy? Who are you trying to reach and why? What is their biggest concern?

You could focus on finding other non competitive companies that sell to your target market and do a JV with them.

You could bundle your products and services in a unique way that would boost your per sale profits.

You could focus on giving good, important and powerful information that will benefit your clients and regularly impart that to them via, seminars, teleseminars, reports, etc. This will position you as the trusted advisor and people buy from those they know and trust.

Price is only a factor if it's the only factor.

What makes your company unique? Why should other companies buy from you rather than your competitor?

Send me some of your advertising and I'll give you a quick consult as to how to make it more effective.

Jeff

How about a PPC campaign? Do you guys do much for tracking results of trade shows and other forms of advertising? Do you do email marketing at all?

I'm certain there are things that your company can do to reach more customers. Check out what others in your industry are doing. Then check what others are doing in other industries sort of similar and see if you can make it work for your company.


Sean

You could also try cold calling and lead generation if that would work for you. Just make sure to know your target market first before trying it to avoid complications.

I would suggest Googling:

Richard Johnson Hidden Marketing Assets

Once you get to see an outline of the HMA system, it is an excellent place to begin asking the right questions.

CT

Since the company is large and multinational, why not hire a marketing consultant?

I am available for hire and I have some really good "outside the box ideas" for the company. If interested please feel free to PM me.

You say that most of your sales are done through your sales reps. That's one place to start:

- What are the most successful sales reps doing that makes them successful?
- Teach your lower-performing sales reps those same strategies
- You may have to get rid of the lowest-performing reps. If you can increase the performance of the others, then you won't need to hire more
- Make sure your sales reps have the tools they need to convert customers, whether it's marketing materials, training, prospect information or other. Your top performers can help you identify what you need.

Find out from your existing customers what it is they like most about you. Why did they buy from you? What could you do to improve your product/services?

Is there anything about your product that needs to be improved so that it stands out? Tech is a tough market to keep up in. Make sure you have something that differentiates you, whether it's the product or the service.

Take another look at your marketing materials and compare them to your most successful competitors' ones. What are you lacking? Where can yours be improved?

Your website may or may not be a factor. That depends on where your prospects are searching and buying. If they search online for a supplier, then you definitely need to make a big push to improve and rank your site.

Make this all a multi-prong attack and your sales will improve, but be prepared to make some changes and cut-backs where it makes sense.

I've been through these sorts of situations with companies, mostly on the sales training, management and customer service side. There are plenty of things you can do, so don't get frustrated. Go on the attack.

I’m actually going to second digichik here. Seeing that your company is so large and global it might be in your best interest to hire a marketing consultant.

Use Linkedin create a strategy and deploy it on linkedin , vreate a group or leverage other ppl's groups to get your name and site out there.