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Add in inexpensive digital cameras producinggood high resolution photographs that can becropped and manipulated by the software andit really does become practical for even thesmallest businesses to help produce their ownhigh quality marketing materials.This can further reduce the cost of developingand prototyping your marketing and salescampaigns, which can now be targetedindividually or to very small customer groups.In the past year, breakthroughs in printingtechnology have resulted in significantreduction in the cost of high quality, short runprinting.Very small companies can now presentthemselves to their customers in ways thathave only previously been cost effective for much larger organisations. Any printed material should reinforce theinformation on the website.It is extremely important that a consistentidentity and message is projected in order toget the best return from your marketing spend
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STEP 4. SALES CAMPAIGNS
Does your company make effective presentations to well qualified customer prospects?
For most businesses that provide products or services to other business the actual salesdiscussion is usually conducted in a face-to-face meeting.The website, printed sales material and themarketing programmes must all support thesesales meetings and compliment what iscommunicated verbally.Often the website, a printed leaflet or flyer willbe the first point of contact with your company,so it must do the initial selling and motivate aprospective customer to telephone you.However good a product or service you offer,the decision as to whether it is purchased fromyou or one of your competitors is influenced bythe way your company is perceived throughyour website and the quality and presentationof any printed material you send to them – andby the salesperson communicating with themon your behalf.In many small businesses staff that do notcome from a sales background carry out thistask and they have simply acquired or growninto this additional role.You owe it to your business to ensure your staff who do the selling receive the bestpossible training, help and support becausethey play the pivotal role in convertingenquiries generated into orders for your company.
STEP 2. WEB SITE DESIGN& IT SYSTEMS
Are you using your website to cost effectively test out your marketing communications?
The business plan should give you a clear vision of how to move your business forwardand where you want it to be in 2 and 5 yearstime.Your website should accurately reflect not justwho you are, but who you want to be. In everyinstance where we have completed a businessdevelopment plan for a client, it has resulted insubstantial changes to their website if theyalready had one. A website is the least expensive medium inwhich to develop, change, experiment, monitor and publish. And therefore makes an idealplatform on which to prototype your marketingmessages.Once you are sure it is effective you canconfidently publish in more expensive mediasuch as printed leaflets, brochures andadvertisements.If correctly planned from the outset, this alsoallows maximum reuse of the text and graphicmaterial produced for the website, reducingdevelopment and production costs of your other marketing material as well as creating aconsistent company image.Your website should act as the "master document" for all your marketing messages.The images and text on the website shouldalways be the most up to date reference pointwhenever you are creating any other form of marketing communications.Your website allows you to inexpensivelypublish comprehensive information about your company, it’s products and services. If thewebsite comes up high in the free searchengine listings, it can also attract newcustomers very cheaply. As the Internet has become more and morepopular as an everyday business tool andmore companies are trying to exploit it’spotential, the criteria for getting your particular website high up on search engines havebecome more complex and sophisticated.To achieve high free search engine positions,a website needs to be designed with this inmind from the start. You also need to knowwhich two or three keyword terms are mostlikely to be typed in by a potential customer when searching the Internet for the sort of products or services you provide.With a small marketing budget this isabsolutely vital. It is also extremely importantto make the website easy to navigate bypotential customers. This is most easily doneby having a rollover menu near the top or near the top left hand corner. It is also important todevelop a consistent page identity, so thatvisitors always know when they are on your website and when they leave it.Your web designer therefore needs to be ableto demonstrate the ability and experience toprovide you not only with websites that areeasy to navigate, but are also optimised for thesearch engines.In addition to the actual design of your websiteother aspects need careful consideration.These include: domain name selection, webhosting; email set-up; website maintenance;and up-date planning to ensure costs are keptas low as possible and the best value for money is achieved.Quite often businesses operate in more thanone market or market sector and in suchsituations more than one website and domainname may be required to achieve the bestresults.
STEP 3. MARKETINGCOMMUNICATIONS
If the very essence of marketing is clear persuasive communications, how effectiveare your marketing materials?
Your marketing communications shouldanswer your potential customer’s keyquestions:
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Who are you?
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What do you do?
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What’s in it for me?
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What makes you better than others?Having completed steps one and two, your website will already clearly and persuasivelyhave answers to these questions.The business development plan will also haveindicated what mixture of sales and marketingactivities to pursue and included priorities andcost estimates.Therefore as soon as the first release of your new or redesigned website is completed, youwill be well prepared to begin developingspecific marketing programmes, reusing theproven text and graphics from your website.Before Windows XP, it was not practical for small businesses to bring Desk Top Publishing(DTP) in house, as previous PC systems werenot capable of handling photographic filesproperly.Now Windows XP, combined with low costpowerful computers and software, allow theproduction facility for quality marketing tools tobe brought in-house cost effectively.
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