The art of building a strategy
Estimated Read Time: 3 Minutes
Welcome to The Steel Road, where we will always give you interesting and insightful takes on how you can start or grow your own non-tech business.
If you are a fairly new subscriber or you just need a few reminders, here are some good places to start:
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Every business idea we’ve ever discussed
These two links should be able to get you moving in the right direction.
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Alright, back to the good stuff.
Let’s talk advertising. We’ve gone over the marketing funnel before in a previous post. But let’s widen that conversation a little.
Often businesses will neglect the marketing funnel, but that’s a wider sign of a lack of overall marketing strategy. Within marketing there are infinite options and niches for different tactics. Don’t believe us? Here, we’ll show you.
Facebook ads
Google Ads
YouTube
Newsletter
Local Radio
Local TV
Door Hangers
Billboards
Podcast ads
LinkedIn ads
Organic social media
Display ads
Referrals
SEO
Influencer
OTT/CTV
Texting
And this is just barely scratching the surface. The possibilities are endless and are only limited by your creativity. In fact, the more creative you are the better marketer you’ll be.
This is why we cringe so much when we see businesses throwing everything at one tactic without any further thought to the rest of the funnel.
So how do you create a marketing strategy?
It all starts with 2 questions.
Who is my target customer?
Where do they spend their time?
Here’s an example:
The Steel Road had less than 100 subscribers. So they sat down and and answered the 2 questions.
Who is my writing for?
Entrepreneurs that are looking for simple, back to the basics business talk
Where do they spend their time?
Reddit and Twitter
So what did we do? We spent a lot of time on organic posting in Twitter and Reddit.
This is a really simple example, so let’s look at another more complicated situation:
Suddz is a concierge mobile detailing business that washes and details cars without having to go to the car wash(shoutout to Will).
Who is the target customer?
Someone who owns a car and values convenience and efficiency over just going with the cheapest option. Generally a higher income.
Where do they spend their time?
At home, at work, on various social media platforms.
Because there is some ambiguity it becomes a little trickier, but there are some really solid options.
Door hangers to reach people at home
Social media videos showing before and after results(organic or paid)
Referral programs
Local radio advertising to reach people who are already in their cars
Tl;dr Putting together a marketing strategy just comes down to thinking like your target customer and meeting them wherever you are. Don’t confuse using one marketing tactic for a whole strategy.
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