The thick line between Sales & Marketing, are they different?
Are you crystal clear about your marketing strategy? Are you trying to draw a clear line between Sales and Marketing and understand the stand-alone value of each function in your business? Let us discuss and evaluate the same in this article. This article will help all the freelancers, entrepreneurs, small businesses, start-ups to understand the inherited power of a well-defined Marketing Strategy and how a good marketing campaign can ensure a smoother sales process. We will discuss clearly the laws and principles that guide the marketing function of the business. The sales function will follow later.
The fundamental laws of Marketing.
“The science and art of exploring, creating, and delivering value to satisfy the needs of a target market at a profit. Marketing identifies unfulfilled needs and desires.” Philip Kotler
If I ask you what comes first to your mind when you think of starting a new business: Product or Marketing Strategy? The answer I get is the product.
Agree that everyone thinks of identifying a product or service which has a future or doing well in the current scenario, research on it, and start a business around it. If we go back and read the definition of Marketing above as given by one of the stalwarts of marketing Mr.Kotler. It is about identifying the unfulfilled needs and desires of the customer. If we are able to identify an important gap in the needs and fulfillment cycle, we can introduce a product or service that will fill the gap and immediately drive attention.
Once the attention for the product is gained in the mind of the customers and as we have discussed the gap already exists in the first place, Sales are bound to happen. The point I want to drive home with this is, a good marketing strategy devised around identifying a potential need of the customer should lead to identifying the product or service, and then we should think about starting the business.
Once it is evident that a need for the product exists now we can build an effective and detailed strategy around it. Starting with clear communication with the consumer. Moving on to building a bond of trust between the brand and the customer. Finally driving sales and revenue for the business.
We have numerous examples of brands that have in recent past arrived in Indian markets fillings gaps and fulfilling customers' needs and desires. The same has worked wonders for them and they are doing exceptionally well. We can take examples of Uber and Ola in the transport industry. Swiggy and Zomato in the food delivery business. Urban Clap in the housekeeping business. All of them identified a potential gap in the market and were first and second movers initiating a new business model leading to an automatic demand and sustainable business model.
In a nutshell, I can say
Right message > Right Person > Right Time > Sales
Modes of Marketing: Digital & Traditional.
I have spent over 15 years with different corporates in handling various roles in Marketing Communications and Trade Marketing. Over the years have come across various marketing communication channels available to make your communication reach your prospective customer. We used traditional marketing sources both in the forms of ATL and BTL activities.
ATL activities are Above the Line activities which included mediums like Television advertising, Print media, Radio ads, OOH via Hoardings or Kiosks, etc. BTL activities are Below The Line activities where we used channels like trade exhibitions, leaflet distribution, society activities, look walkers, product demonstration activities, etc. Both modes had their own significance with various pros and cons. The most important part was to identify which form of activity will suit the product and bring in revenue sources in form of customers.
For products of mass consumption like FMCG products, ATL activities worked well, whereas for a limited edition car to be promoted, BTL activities were the best option to move ahead with.
For the past 5 years, we have come to know a completely new source of marketing called Digital Marketing. Digital Marketing started with Google ads and SEO but now with numerous avenues available on digital platforms and the reach it offers, has made digital marketing an integral part of all marketing campaigns. If you can't ignore it then you have to learn it, and that is how I got introduced to Digital Marketing.
Various mediums available with Digital Marketing are like Google Ads, SEO, Facebook Ads, Blogging, Social Media Influencing, Youtube ads, OTT platforms, and the list goes on. The biggest advantage of Digital Marketing that came across was it provided the flexibility to choose the detailed customer segment and avoid advertising to a mass public like in the case of ATL activities. Secondly, it is also cost-effective as flexible budgets are available and can be modified as per requirements from time to time. This allows small businesses to experiment and reach their customers on a strict budget availability also.
The CATT Marketing Funnel:
When we discuss marketing strategies, devising an effective marketing funnel that creates the value chain of customers for the business, is very important. Traditional marketing worked on a concept that was more of a product-driven concept. It started with displaying the product to the customer. Engaging the customer with certain activities, displaying the features of the product, and converting them into sales.
The Digital Marketing strategy can clearly be understood by the CATT Marketing funnel.
Wealth = n^CATT
N stands for your niche. The business category and the product or service you choose forms your niche. Selecting your niche starts with the first step mentioned in this article with the definition of marketing. Once you identify the gap and select your niche you can set up the funnel as given below:
C for Content: Content forms the core of digital marketing. Creating valuable content is as good as taking your product to customers in the traditional way. The content providing a value proposition to customers will attract them to our website or blog.
A for Attention: Once we are able to drive the customer to our content now we have to gain his attention and get him engaged with our website or blog. We can generate essential traffic to our website which will help us to further target the people visiting our website and build a funnel of prospects. Various sources to drive traffic are available like SEO, Social Media, and Paid advertising on mediums like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc.
T for Trust: Building trust with our consumers will help make a strong base to sell our customers and make them repetitive buyers as well as referrals for our products. Traditionally we display and demonstrate the product to the customer to give a touch and feel the experience. Digitally we can build trust by giving various free experiences through video courses, e-books, keeping customers engaged through marketing automation for tools like emailers and messages. Once the customer keeps on hearing from you it helps in building a strong funnel where people keep moving up the value chain on trust with each every engagement with your brand.
T for Transaction: Finally we reach the end of the funnel with our leads getting converted into confirmed customers with genuine transactions. Sales happen and our prospects in the funnel become our consumers. We can notice that if the customer comes through the journey of the CATT model, the level of product satisfaction will be much higher. As the process involves building trust before the transaction and the customer engages with the brand at every stage of the funnel the acquaintance and comfort level is high. The expectations are well known to the seller and satisfaction is reached by full filling the same.
The CATT model lays a perfect layout for entrepreneurs, freelancers, startups starting with Digital Marketing as a medium to reach their target customers. The funnel nurtures each and every lead on its merit and helps businesses get leads into customers by natural sales methods.
Integrated Digital Marketing.
Diving a bit deeper into the understanding of Digital Marketing will like to share the Integrated digital marketing model as shared by Digital Deepak. We cannot pick an individual digital platform and expect desired results from the same. For example, I cannot just start marketing my course on Facebook through ads and expect customers to click and buy it. Customers will want to check the authenticity of my course. They would like to get a demo before committing to purchase. For all this we require a strong content marketing strategy, when the Facebook ad will direct traffic to my website, the strong content will generate interest and make the customer show interest in my course. If he subscribes to any of my free courses or video channels then he comes into the funnel. Later we can follow up by building further trust by contacting through email marketing. Finally, at the right time, we can convert the lead into a paying sale for our business.
All the digital platforms have to be comprehensively utilized to generate a quality lead and bring it down the funnel to close it as a sale. This forms the basis of Integrated Digital Marketing.
The Power of Personal Branding.
Names like Ratan Tata, Azim Premji, Elon Musk, Steve Jobs come sometime before or maybe almost synonymous with the brands that they have created. Their following on social media platforms is sometimes even greater than the company or brand they have created. This is the power for Personal Branding and it forms a strong influencer in terms of marketing other brands you own under your umbrella.
Here is a blueprint known as Mass Trust Blue Print that gives us an overview of the journey we can take on developing our personal brand. The stages mentioned seem long but are interconnected. As soon as you start the journey the stages start connecting and you can build on it in no time.
Learn: Learning the concepts of a particular niche and gaining a credible skill to practice the concept in practical life forms the base of any new beginning. Be an ardent learner and try to imbibe as much as possible. Be it a skill, concepts, facts, or procedures, learn them, and remember them.
Work: Time to put into practice whatever we have learned in the first stage. When we work on live projects our insights get fresh perspectives and clarity seems to come in on various aspects of the concept.
Blog: Write and share about the new skill or knowledge you have acquired. Communicate with the audience and help them learn the concept better. It will also enhance your capability to analyze and comprehend better on the subject. Blogging always helps in providing visibility and recognition to your personal brand. People start recognizing you and value you as a brand.
Consult: Start consulting services for other brands. When people come to you for your valuable suggestions and implement it in their own scope of work it implies that your in-depth knowledge in your sector is proving to be valuable for others. It adds to the awareness of your personal brand in the market.
Mentor: While consulting goes one on one, mentoring takes the level of interaction to another level. Develop a tribe of people who want to learn from you. Who appreciate your achievements and want to move ahead on the same path as you. It opens doors for communicating and teaching maybe 25 or 50 people together. It grows your brand exponentially.
Start-Up: Finally you can launch products or services business with the understanding that has been developed over time engaging with your tribe as a personal brand. By this time your product and funnel would be ready and will ensure natural sales to happen and will work well as a pull strategy rather than a push strategy.
Using this #masstrustblueprint we can achieve our desired goals in a planned manner and every step we take is followed by a logical analysis with future actions pre-defined and clear in our mind.
To sum up the article I hope by now you must be having a clear understanding as what is the role of marketing as a function in our business. How it affects the overall health of a business and what are the concepts and latest trends in marketing. Next as mentioned initially look forward to my article on Sales as a .function. Detailed analysis of different sales processes and customer life cycles.
Looking forward to your views and suggestion on this article in the comments section. It is always good to discuss and learn from your readers.
Ratnesh Mehn
