Marketing & Strategy Articles

Companies have various strategies in place to ensure that customers buy their products. There are huge sums of money spent by companies in developing products, acquiring new customers, retaining loyal customers etc. However, no matter how good a product is or how much effort a company puts in, it is very difficult to evaluate a customer’s behavior and intent completely. Thus, companies need to focus on important key metrics or parameters which can help improve business and marketing efficiency.

Marketing has an important role to play in ensuring that the business is driven aggressively yet with the minimum expenditure. It is extremely important that the company identifies the correct set of customers for whom selling the products or services is utmost important. Companies try to identify the most relevant target audience, who will buy the products as they have the maximum need for the same. Though there are several methods of identifying customers, catching & targeting “interested” customers can generate easy revenue for companies. This can be done by evaluating and studying customer funnels.

The Digital Age is a historic period in the 21st century characterized by the rapid shift from traditional industry that the Industrial Revolution brought through industrialization, to an economy based on information technology and finally, to the digitally transformed world that we are in right now. The world is more competitive than ever, there is more scope for R & D, and not to miss out, building something new. Customers remain the focus but a lookout for digitally driven approach would be the new game changer.

Marketing is an ever-evolving field where companies and brands use all possible media channels to reach out to potential customers. Popular advertising media includes having TV campaigns between shows along with prime-time slots. Newspapers & magazines are popular ways to use print media to advertise about one’s products and services. However, all these are advertising channels are not too modern and are pretty old school. With the increasing penetration of smartphones and high-speed data internet, online platforms are popular media tools to advertise. Online advertising can be done on website as banners or on mobile apps. Since a lot of people are engaged with their phones, there is a big opportunity for companies. However, one of the newer ways to engage customers is by live video streaming content.

Base of the economic pyramid provides a great opportunity for any start-up to come up with an innovation as it is easy to find lot of untouched segments in it. A simple solution for a basic problem will make you a hero in this segment. In spite of such huge opportunities why are the big giants not tapping their innovations into this segment is a debating point here. One of the biggest hurdles here is how you make your innovation reach to larger set of customers. In other words, are there enough means to make your innovation visible to people in this segment and attract them to use your services or product? The answer to this question is definitely a starting point for any Start-up to innovate in the base of economic pyramid.

A lot of people feel that if a product is good, it will serve the customers well. A high quality offering which is decently priced is good enough to lure customers. This is the philosophy behind several technology and software startups where they user their creativity and skills to offer a more polished product or service. But in hindsight, it is not the only recipe for success. Thus it is critical for business people to have a thorough understanding about sales and marketing.