How SBD Creates
a MOTHER of a
Marketing Campaign for You
Mar 24, 2023 | by: Peter Herring
“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.”
― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
In our blog “Secrets of How SBD Works Like a Mother for You Revealed!” we pulled back the curtains and revealed that marketing is neither a miracle nor a mystery. There are basic principles and consistent processes behind those beautiful (or edgy, or whimsical, or...) designs and attention-grabbing headlines that we create for you.
We know that telling you all this runs against the grain, that a lot of marketers like to keep themselves wrapped in mystique, as though they were magicians protecting the tricks of the trade. But we work like a mother for you, and mom doesn’t like secrets! Or posturing. Instead, she likes everyone to be on the same page and know the rules of the game. That way, we and our clients can work together as a coordinated team, achieving great things together. So now we’re going to break down how we create campaigns that achieve the results you want.
For the purposes of this blog let’s assume that we’ve already gone through our discovery process with you. So we know who you and your company are, who your target market is and the needs and wants that drive them. We know your products/services and, more importantly, how you solve your market’s headaches and fulfill their hopes. Now we’re ready to create a promotional campaign for you.
But first, mom puts you to work answering some vital questions.
1. What Do You Want to Achieve?
Since every campaign has an objective this is the important first question. Sure, everyone wants more sales, but it can be a little more complex than that, depending on your position in the market, your sales cycle, things like that. So you might want a direct marketing campaign that creates sales by sending customers to your website, or through your front door. You might want more visibility in the market. Or you might want to create top-of-mind preference for that bright day when a prospect wakes up with a burning need for your product or service. It’s important to know this because it will help inform our message and media choices down the line. So we get it figured out right at the beginning.
Mom’s Maxim #1:
Marketing Is Not (Always) Sales: Sometimes It’s Farming
Direct response marketing is a sales proposition. You get an email, a postcard, or see an ad or social post that provides a direct link to go buy something. But not all sales cycles are that simple, so not all marketing is direct response. To understand this, let’s imagine marketing is a farm, and sales is the harvest. Before that harvest we need to get the ground ready, we need to plant seeds and we need to fertilize and water those plants. Marketing is often doing that for you, nourishing your farm and readying the crop (your prospective customers) for your sales team to harvest.
2. WHAT ARE YOU SELLING?
Again, this seems obvious, but it’s not. For some clients, we may be featuring a single product, or trying to get people in the door (or on your website) where you can then entice them to buy several products. For another client, we may be selling their brand, so that when customers come across their products they’re inclined to trust the company behind them. Or, we may be generating leads. Or creating word-of-mouth. Etcetera. We get clear on this.
Mom’s Maxim #2:
Good Marketing Doesn’t Feature Features
When we talk with our clients they usually tell us all about the features of their products or services. Why their widget is better, faster, more durable, has that spiffy gidget that makes it the best gadget. Why their services are faster, friendlier, etc. Features are important. But we don’t lead with them and here’s why. Features are how stuff does things. But what your prospects want to know is what your stuff will do for them. There’s a difference between what something does and what it will do for me. And that difference is the difference between a feature and a benefit.
3. Whom Are We Talking To and
What Do They Want?
After our discovery process with you, we know the market segment that you appeal to. We know their pain points, their aspirations, and the emotional triggers that motivate them. Now we take your features and match them to your target’s needs. How do they solve their problems, make their day easier, improve their lives, contribute to their joy, make them feel that - at last! - someone understands them, etc. This lets us know which or your features are benefits for your target market.
A benefit is a feature that’s relevant to your market. If a feature does something to improve, fix, ease, or enhance your customer’s life, it magically transforms into a benefit. We lead with benefits, showing and writing about what your product does for your customer. We make an emotional connection between your product’s benefits and your audience’s needs. That’s because emotions motivate. While facts - including features - become backup proof, an essential, secondary part of the customer’s decision making process.
Mom’s Maxim #3:
Marketing is the Business of Buying Brain Real Estate
There is always one predominant benefit in a post or ad, the one that is the most relevant to your target. That benefit is almost always referred to in the headline. There may be a secondary and perhaps a tertiary benefit in the copy. But never more than three. Why? Because too many benefits dilute the message. In today’s marketplace, your prospects are besieged with marketing messages, so one strong primary message has the best chance of cutting through the cacophony and claiming a valuable piece of real estate in their brains.
4. What Do We Want Them to Do?
We’ve all seen ads that are so clever that we can’t really tell what they’re about, and at the end we don’t know what to do. Mom has a word for those ads: “bad”. So mom doesn’t allow them. Every promotion has a Call to Action (CTA). After all, that’s what marketing is. You want people to do something, so you’d better tell them what! Buy something, call you for a consultation, click to your website, come by for your sale, watch a video, etc. The CTA needs to be a clear and simple, one step action. Although sometimes we provide a choice. Contact us today! is a good CTA. But some people don’t like to call. Others don’t like to email. So we’ll offer both. And we’ll throw in Message Us By Courier Pigeon if we’re marketing to the Courier Pigeon Consortium.
5. Where the Heck Are They?
When Are They There?
If we’re marketing to migrating geese and we place ads in the northern tundra during winter when all the geese have flown south to bask in the sun, we’ll probably lay a goose egg. There are best times and places to get messages to your prospective customers. It can be one of many social media platforms; it can be email; it can be offline, such as print ads, brochures or even good old direct mail. Media use differs by various age, educational, and economic demographics as well as other particulars. This is stuff we keep up with because that’s our job. So once we know whom we’re talking to, we know the optimal place and time to reach them.
Mom’s Maxim #4:
Sound Marketing Gets You Found
If the internet was a physical shopping mall, SEO (Search Engine Optimization) would be store signage and mall directories. Imagine you’re walking through a mall desperately searching for ping-pong balls. But Table Tennis Town neglected to get themselves on the mall directory, put up a sign, or window display that clearly shows that they carry paddles, tables, nets, and...ping-pong balls! You wouldn’t find them and if you happened to walk by you wouldn’t know that they had the very thing you wanted. You’re sad. They’re very sad. That’s why every online promotion we do for you checks off all the above boxes and pays attention to SEO at the same time.
Welcome to the SBD Team!
Now that you know the marketing rules, you may want to join our roster of clients and join us for a successful marketing match as part of our team. We love helping you win. All you have to do is follow this simple, one-step Call to Action and...
Call Us Today for a Free Consultation on Your Marketing Needs: 503-334-1815
Or click to our site and let us know what you need: www.snowbdesigns.com
