How to build a winning marketing strategy for your start-up

The right marketing strategy can make or break a new entrepreneurial venture. As a new business, one of your greatest challenges is visibility. You might have a great product or service, a spectacular value proposition, or the perfect disruptive technology that your customers desperately need, but if they don’t know about you and what you can do for them, then you’re dead in the water.

Effective marketing is comprehensive, integrated and strategic. It encompasses everything you do in your business, and is an ongoing effort. Learning the power and practice of great marketing is one of the most valuable things you can do as an aspiring or developing entrepreneur. The London School of Business and Financeoffers relevant courses for a variety of schedules so that you can grow your skills on a part-time or online basis while you build your plan, launch your business, or expand your venture. Here are some of the key steps to building that winning marketing strategy.

Know your customer

Effective marketing is specific. You need to know who your customers are (will be) to build products or services for them and to communicate effectively how your product or service meets their needs.

Find your customer

Once you know your customer (think niche details, not sweeping generalisations), you can target them with your marketing, and this means being where they are. There are a variety of applications for this, including picking the right office or shop location and placing advertisements, but for many businesses these days, online channels are a critical way to connect with customers.

Please your customer

Once you know your customer, you can use your knowledge of what they want, need and are motivated and pleased by to connect with them. Effective marketing speaks to customers. It doesn’t just yell about what a product is or what a service does. Instead, it offers a benefit to the customer. It clearly and enticingly communicates the problem it solves for the customer, the experience it brings, and the reason(s) why it’s worth their time/energy/attention/money.

Integration, consistency and iteration are all important. Your marketing strategy requires an understanding of your customers, which in turn influences your production environment. Building visibility, recognition and trust takes time, so you want to reinforce your identity by using language and visuals that are recognisably related.

While you need to identify and develop your marketing strategy, and keep working at it over time, you also need to assess your results and pivot for greater success. You might find that you need to revisit your understanding of your customers if you find that your product or service doesn’t reach the same people you thought it would reach. You might need to redevelop your product or service to better meet customer needs. You might need to change your channel or marketing language if you’re not connecting with the right customers.

Effective marketing is an ongoing process, but it always comes back to a defined strategy that helps you systematically work through the changes that need to be made to be more effective. While the principles can be simple, the practice is often complex and high value, so investing in the right skill tends to be a meaningful contribution to your entrepreneurial success.